Saturday, August 11, 2018

Hate Is Not Anger


Tomorrow some racists will have a rally near the White House. It's a year since their greatest moment in Charlottesville and they want to make a statement. DC only expects a few hundred of them but they are taking extraordinary precautions to protect them, shutting down traffic, flooding the area with police -- in a face-off last week in Portland between nazis and anti-fascists, the police attacked the anti-fascists, so this could go any way. WMATA was going to give the white supremacists their own private Metro cars to get to and from the demonstration, but the Metro employees' union pretty much made that a non-starter. It would have been hilarious though to see them get stuck in a sweltering tunnel somewhere. Schedule adjustment, moving momentarily, suckers.

I think we have difficulty with the word, and the concept, of hate. To a kid, hate is related to anger; you are so angry at someone that you can't stand them, don't want to be around them, you think they are a bad person because they did something that made you so mad. But as adults the concept becomes more in-the-head, the temperature comes down a bit. Grown-up hate is not necessarily personal, it is more likely applied to groups of people, especially people you don't know. I do not think kids have this in their lives; they hate when they're angry and then get over it. Adults rationalize their hate. They treat their judgments as facts.

We reveal it by attribution, by assigning qualities to a group. You may say that a certain kind of people are evil, or stupid, or lazy. Greedy, whatever, often the attributed qualities are related to a group stereotype that is spread by innuendo and even direct instruction at times -- friends pick it up from friends, parents teach it to children. Anger is not a visible component of this grown-up hate, it is conceived and presented as thought only, as if these beliefs were conclusions inferred from some knowledge about a group. And so you often see dangerous bigots responding in surprise when the word "hate" is used, like, me? I don't hate anybody -- my beliefs are just common sense.

Perfect example: on Fox News this week Laura Ingraham seemed to think she was stating facts as she talked about how "Massive demographic changes have been foisted on the American people, and they are changes that none of us ever voted for, and most of us don't like." First, her use of the pronoun "us" suggests that there is some group who feels this way, collectively. Clearly, "us" refers to white people, the kind who watch Fox, because this doesn't make sense to anyone else. It would have ruined her message to define the term, if instead of "none of us ever voted for," she had said, "no white people who watch Fox ever voted for" these demographic changes. It would wreck it. The vague first-person plural pronoun lets Fox viewers imagine that they are in with the in crowd, that "people like us" are reasonable and never voted for these changes, and don't like them.

And as for the demographic changes that have been "foisted on the American people?" See, there are "the American people" and then there are those "demographic changes," which are not real American people. Okay, sure, well white people are losing their majority status in this country, and that is about all you have to know to understand the whole Trump, alt-right, authoritarian phenomenon that has poisoned these historical times. Some people feel it is important for someone of their own racial type to have the privilege of making all the important decisions. All you need to know, right there.

And why in the world would there ever be a vote on demographic changes? (If there is going to be one you'd better hurry up, or somebody else will win it!) And what is it that we "don't like" about it? It would never occur to most of us -- and here I mean "us" patriotically, I mean the totality of people living in this country -- to dislike the diversity of America. Only certain people are predisposed to seeing it that way, and that predisposition is what we call hate. If you support democracy then you believe that all the people should be invited to participate in it, not just the pale ones -- if only a selected subset gets a vote then it is not democracy, it is something else. And if you do not support democracy, I would recommend picking a nice country on some other continent and moving to it, something with a strong dictator and the military enforcing his will. There are lots of those. America is not one of them, we are a democracy.

It feels odd to have to make a statement explaining why I oppose racism. If you think of human beings as some kind of apes living in groups and warring with rival groups, then yeah that is just the way it is. Once the species has developed language and the ability to agree about the reality of the objective environment, once we are able to distinguish truth and falsehood and are able to use scientific techniques to know truths with high certainty, once we are able to empathize and to articulate feelings of empathy -- once we figured out the profound practicality of the Golden Rule -- it seems to me the rival-ape-group perspective becomes background noise: now we can be civilized. We can have things like respect, fairness, kindness. The human species has much more interesting things to do than fight about whose ancestors came from the best continent. But there are those among us who believe that the ape-groups are the most important thing. They are now running our country, and tomorrow they will wave their flags and chant their slogans in the heart of the nation's capital.

328 Comments:

Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Its incredibly galling and arrogant that people like Ingraham automatically assume that the only people that matter, the only people who should have a say in how things are run are white people who watch Fox "News".

Then, like Trump, she tried to gaslight everyone and later falsely claim her comment wasn't racist, that it wasn't about desiring white supremacy and a whites only country

When she talked about those "demographic changes" that "we" never voted for and don't like it never occurred to her that anyone would see something wrong with her commentary or take exception to it. Her and her "people" are blind to concern for and empathy with anyone other than white Fox "News" viewers.

August 12, 2018 1:15 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

The Fox "News" audience is almost 100% white".

No wonder Laura Ingraham is so popular with Fox viewers when she said "The America we know and love doesn't exist anymore," Ingraham said Wednesday night. "Massive demographic changes have been foisted on the American people, and they are changes that none of us ever voted for, and most of us [white people] don't like. This is related to both illegal and legal immigration."

Fox - For racists by racists.
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And Wyatt/Regina/bad anonymous claims Republicans aren't racist and the justice system doesn't treat black people unfairly
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Court Rebukes EPA, Orders Ban on Pesticide That Harms Kids’ Brains

In a scathing opinion, today a federal court ordered the Environmental Protection Agency to ban chlorpyrifos, a toxic pesticide linked to brain damage in children.

Think about it: The Trump administration wanted to allow indiscriminate use of this toxin despite knowing about the serious harm it would cause to children. They are so desirous of attacking the environment that sustains us all, the damage to children simply was of no concern to them - they ARE that evil!
-----------------------------

@thehill "JUST IN: Trump official calls endangered species protections an "unnecessary regulatory burden"!

August 12, 2018 3:06 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Trump thinks NFL players should be punished for kneeling during the anthem. Decent Americans think Trump should be punished for kneeling before Putin.

"A reminder: We didn't have neo-nazi rallies until Trump took office - let alone in the light of day in our nations capital! Their hate used to be unacceptable and hidden until Trump came along and legitimized them."

Have you noticed? The racists, religious extremists, bigot and white supremacists all align themselves with the Republican party?

August 12, 2018 3:07 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Former Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe: Racists No Longer Feel The Need To Wear Hoods Because Trump [VIDEO]

August 12, 2018 Extremists, Nazis

“To see these neo-Nazis and white supremacists, about a thousand walking down the streets screaming most vile things about members of the African American community about members of the Jewish faith – I’ve never seen anything like it. People used to wear hoods in this country because they this country because they wanted to disguise themselves. They don’t feel the need to do that anymore.

“I talked to the President that afternoon, explained him the situation, what had been going on, what these people were doing in the city of Charlottesville. When he came out and gave his statement that it was both sides’ fault, I’ve got to tell you, it was shocking to me. It wasn’t both sides. You had one side of neo-Nazis wearing Adolph Hitler T-shirts, the white supremacists screaming obscenities at the African American community walking down the streets. They came armed.

“There’s a time in your presidency when you need to show moral leadership and you need to stand and send a message to the world. He failed that day.” – Former Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe, speaking this morning on CNN.

August 12, 2018 3:09 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

A lot of people pointing out that there weren't many racists marching today but you have to keep in mind most of them are pretty busy right now running their campaigns as Republican candidates.

August 12, 2018 11:57 PM  
Anonymous What a dud said...

NYT - Outnumbered, White Nationalists Exit Early

Los Angeles Times - White supremacists are outnumbered by counter-protesters at dueling rallies outside the White House

US Today - White Nationalists Outnumbered at DC Protest

CNN - White nationalists are outnumbered at their own rally

FOX News (way down low on front page) Antifa demonstrators confront police as storms end ‘Unite the Right” rally early

WaPo - Rally of white supremacists near White House dwarfed by thousands of anti-hate protesters

HuffPo - A Couple Dozen Neo-Nazis Got The Red Carpet Treatment from DC Law Enforcement

The Hill - Massive counter-protests dwarf white nationalist rally in DC

August 13, 2018 7:18 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

“In Ferguson, black protesters had police snipers trained on them. In DC, the Nazis get a police escort.”

August 13, 2018 7:37 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

99% of Elana Kagan's White House records were made public before her nomination hearing.

.08% of Brett Kavanaugh's records are public now.

Its unprecedented to go to these lenghts to hide a Supreme Court nominee's records from the American people.

Everything about Kavanaugh's nomination stinks to high heaven.
--------------------------------------

This week Trump said tariffs will eliminate the $21 trillion national debt.
Trump's tariffs will generate only about $40 billion this fiscal year.
That is one-fifth of one percent
Also Trump thinks foreign companies pay those tariffs.
They don't. Americans do.
------------------------------


An 11-year old boy on Friday was able to
hack into a replica of the Florida state election web site
and change voting results found there in under 10 minutes during the world's largest yearly hacking convention.

So now you know why Republicans don't want to punish the Russians or discourage their cyber attacks on the mid-term elections.

August 13, 2018 2:05 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

So Iran just fired a missle for the first time in over a year. Wasn't that brilliant of Trump to violate the Iran nuclear deal full of all manner of detailed intrusive investingations and verification in exchange for no oversight at all?

Its strange that people aren't focusing on Omarosa's claim that Trump has declined mentally, can't process complex information, and is not part of some of the most important policy decisions. Seems like a big deal.

August 13, 2018 2:07 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Why They Have to Treat Trump Like a Child

Okay, so the obvious answer to why his own advisers have to treat Donald Trump as a child is because he so often thinks and acts like one, and a temperamental and impossible to please one at that. But here’s a good example of it. Before the NATO summit recently, his advisers were pushing to get the final communique done before the meeting started so he would be less likely to get upset about ongoing negotiations and blow the whole thing up, like he had just done with the G-7 summit communique.

Senior American national security officials, seeking to prevent President Trump from upending a formal policy agreement at last month’s NATO meeting, pushed the military alliance’s ambassadors to complete it before the forum even began…

The rushed machinations to get the policy done, as demanded by John R. Bolton, the national security adviser, have not been previously reported. Described by European diplomats and American officials, the efforts are a sign of the lengths to which the president’s top advisers will go to protect a key and longstanding international alliance from Mr. Trump’s unpredictable antipathy.

Allied ambassadors said the American officials’ plan worked — to a degree.

Mr. Trump did almost blow up the two-day meeting in Brussels that began on July 11. He issued a vague threat that the United States could go its own way if allies resisted his demands for additional military spending. After the gathering, he also questioned a pillar of the alliance: that an attack on one NATO country is an attack on all.

But the approval of the communiqué — renamed for the meeting as a declaration — was critical for the alliance. It ensured that, despite Mr. Trump’s rhetorical fireworks, NATO diplomats could push through initiatives, including critical Pentagon priorities to improve allied defenses against Russia.

That communique included agreements on some matters that were very important in countering the current threat from Russia to the alliance. It approved of officially welcoming Macedonia into NATO. It created a new Atlantic Command post dedicated to coordinating a rapid response to any potential Russian aggression against NATO members. And it created what they’re calling the Four 30s — 30 mechanized battalions, 30 air squadrons and 30 combat vessels, ready to be deployed in 30 days in case of a war.

Time and time again we get these reports about his advisers having to coddle and cajole and treat Trump with kid gloves to keep him from either ignoring everything out of boredom or blowing up and throwing a tantrum. They have to cut his daily intelligence briefings down to just a couple pages, with no real data, just soundbytes. It’s practically a coloring book now, made necessary by the fact that he simply can’t, or won’t, pay attention any longer than that. They actually go on Fox News to try to influence him in one direction or another, knowing he’ll be watching. They present him with a limited number of options because he’s likely to choose the wrong one.

That’s how bad this has gotten. We have a president who has to be handled like a spoiled child because that is exactly what he is.

August 13, 2018 3:19 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

In a series of Facebook messages gone viral, a parent group is threatening to cause bodily harm to a 12-year-old transgender girl near Achille, Oklahoma.

An emergency protective order has been filed in order to safeguard the child. At this time, her name has not been released publicly.

A series of screenshots captured by concerned citizens shows the conspiracy attempt being plotted to alienate, harass and discriminate against the girl and anyone else like her. They even show calls of action asking for other students to join in and assault the trans girl until she decides she’s too scared to return to school altogether.

Burney Crenshaw appears to be the ringleader in this anti-trans attack. The bullied student’s mother filed the restraining order on Friday, August 10. Crenshaw was formerly convicted of domestic abuse after pleading no contest in 2006. The charge was later dismissed following a deferred sentence.

Crenshaw’s wife, Jamie Ann Standifer Crenshaw, posted on the Achille ISD Parent Group Facebook page: “Heads up parents of 5th thru 7th grade girls. The transgender is already using the girls bathroom. We have been told how the school has gone above and beyond to make sure he has his own restroom yet he is still using the girls. REALLY….looks like it’s gonna be a long year. We have made school board meetings over this situation last year but nothing seems to be changing. This is the same kid that got an trouble as soon as he transferred two years ago for looking over the stalls in the girls bathroom. Enough is enough. – with Burney Crenshaw.”

The Facebook responses were in line with the original intent to harm the child. Below are a few as previously published on Hate Trackers.

Eddie Belcher, age 79 of Broken Arrow, said, “If he wants to be a female make him a female. A good sharp knife will do the job really quick.”

Edward W. Belcher is a white supremacist supporter of the Confederacy.

Kevin Lee Bickerstaff, age 58 of Ada, suggested, “Just tell the kids to kick ass in the bathroom and it won’t want to come back!”

Bickerstaff is a bus driver for Frontier Airlines. He is married to Lajuan “Lou” Gayle Koehn Pachner Bickerstaff, age 46. Both Bickerstaffs have been sued in civil court for non-payment of debts and are involved in the Mid-South Youth Rodeo Cowboys Association of Oklahoma.

Seth Cooper said, “Let Parker [son of Burney and Jaime Crenshaw] whip his ass until he quits coming to school.”

Waylon Lott responded, “I let the queer teacher get me worked up! This is even worse! Lol”

Cooper then replied, “Lmao, both cases are BS, neither one of them should be allowed near th[sic] school.”

According to the 2010 census, the town of Achille has a population of only 492.

This is the kind of thing Wyatt/Regina/bad anonymous have been supporting and encouraging. If you want to take some action there's more info at the link - Priya

August 13, 2018 3:20 PM  
Anonymous Well said said...

Stephen Miller Is an Immigration Hypocrite. I Know Because I’m His Uncle.

If my nephew’s ideas on immigration had been in force a century ago, our family would have been wiped out.

August 13, 2018 5:24 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

So Much for that Increase in Wages from the Tax Cuts

Trump’s economic cluelessness is again on stark display. To justify those huge tax cuts, he claimed that it would lead to a $4000 average increase in earnings for American workers, something no economist took the least bit seriously. But the reality is that inflation-adjusted earnings have actually gone down since the tax cut was passed.

Rising prices have erased U.S. workers’ meager wage gains, the latest sign strong economic growth has not translated into greater prosperity for the middle and working classes.

Cost of living was up 2.9 percent from July 2017 to July 2018, the Labor Department reported Friday, an inflation rate that outstripped a 2.7 percent increase in wages over the same period. The average U.S. “real wage,” a federal measure of pay that takes inflation into account, fell to $10.76 an hour last month, 2 cents down from where it was a year ago.

But Kevin Hassett, head of Trump’s Council of Economic Advisers, promised that the tax cuts would lead to “an immediate jump in wage growth” of “4,000 to $9,000 a year from reducing business tax rates alone.” That claim was laughable at the time and it’s now been proven conclusively wrong. That won’t stop Trump from lying about it and claiming that wages have increased. Hell, he’ll probably claim they’ve increased more than at any time in history, the greatest wage increase ever. And they’ll do it by pointing to specific anecdotes. They’ll note that Company X handed out a $2000 bonus to all its workers and say, “See! I told you it worked!” Anecdotes are more powerful than data to the uneducated and the credulous.

August 13, 2018 6:39 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Trump Launches “Presidential Petition” To End Chain Migration Days After Melania’s Parents Become Citizens

From the Trump Make America Great Again Committee:

Friends, Our immigration system is in a state of COMPLETE CHAOS. Under current U.S. law, individuals can sponsor unlimited numbers of foreign immediate relatives for residency in the United States. THIS MUST END! Many of these chain migrants are not thoroughly vetted. This policy is a shameless Washington BETRAYAL of regular Americans whose safety is put at risk. I need every American on board to help end the despicable policy of chain migration. Friend, add your name to my OFFICIAL Presidential Petition to TERMINATE Chain Migration.

All those boldings, italics, and random capitalizations are theirs. Melania’s parents became US citizens on Thursday.

@ananavarro "For some God-forsaken reason, I am on a Trump-Pence email list. These disgusting, two-faced hypocrites are blasting out an email railing against "chain migration". Yes. The very same vehicle Melania's parents used this week to become U.S. citizens. They have no damn shame."

August 14, 2018 12:24 AM  
Anonymous Trump-appointed judge upholds Mueller's legitimacy said...

A federal judge appointed by President Donald Trump ruled Monday that special counsel Robert Mueller's probe is constitutional and legitimate, rejecting an effort by a Russian company -- accused of financing a massive political influence operation in the United States -- to stamp out the ongoing investigation.

Judge Dabney Friedrich, who Trump appointed to the U.S. District Court of Washington D.C. last year, is the fourth judge to quash efforts to upend Mueller's legitimacy and cancel his investigation. Judges overseeing the two trials of former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort -- D.C. judge Amy Berman Jackson and Eastern District of Virginia Judge T.S. Ellis -- rejected Manafort's bid to invalidate Mueller.

Earlier this month, the D.C. circuit's Chief Judge Beryl Howell issued a lengthy ruling rejecting similar legal arguments offered by Andrew Miller, a longtime associate of Trump confidant Roger Stone, who was attempting to beat back a subpoena to testify before Mueller's grand jury. Miller's lawyer, Paul Kamenar, told POLITICO on Monday morning that Miller still intends to appeal the decision. Last week, Miller was held in contempt of court for again ignoring the grand jury subpoena, a move Kamenar said was necessary in order to pursue his appeal.

Mueller indicted the Russian company, Concord Management, in February along with 13 individual Russians — including Yevgeny Prigozhin, a close associate of Russian President Vladimir Putin. The indictment alleges that Concord, Prigozhin's firm, funded and organized an army of internet trolls, the purchase of social media ads and even directed operatives to travel to the United States to set up political rallies. Their goal, Mueller alleged, was to sow discord in the 2016 U.S. election and ultimately assist Donald Trump's candidacy.

Concord pleaded not guilty to the charges and though the indicted Russians aren't expected to participate in the proceedings, the firm tapped American attorneys to represent it in court, a move seen as an attempt to gain insight into the evidence Mueller has gathered.

Though Friedrich upheld Mueller's probe, she did offer a significant nod to his critics: that no laws "explicitly authorize" Mueller's appointment. Rather, she concluded that Watergate-era Supreme Court precedent -- as well as Howell's recent ruling -- found that the Justice Department had the authority. They concluded this "without analyzing specifically how any individual provision combination of provisions accomplished this," Friedrich wrote.

Concord's lawyers had argued that Mueller's appointment was flawed at multiple levels -- and at its core was unconstitutional. Mueller was appointed last year by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein. But Mueller's power is so vast, Concord contended, that he should have been subject to presidential nomination and Senate confirmation, rather than treated as an "inferior" officer who may be appointed and supervised by the attorney general. Though Mueller, in theory, reports to Rosenstein, Concord contended that Justice Department regulations prevent Rosenstein from overturning many of Mueller's decisions, giving him an authority that should only be permitted for individuals appointed by the president.

Friedrich agreed that the regulations governing Mueller's probe are ambiguous enough to grant him some sweeping authority, but she found one fatal flaw in the argument: Justice Department leaders may rescind the special counsel regulations at any time. If Attorney General Jeff Sessions or Rosenstein decide to exert more control over Mueller, they can simply rewrite the rules, she noted...

August 14, 2018 8:27 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Republicans (Moral Conservatives) More Likely to Cheat on Spouses than Democrats

Republicans have traditionally been more inclined to espouse tight moral conservatism, especially within the sexual domain. Of course, with three-time married pussy-grabber and alleged marital rapist Trump as their idolised number one, anything goes. Because they can’t be seen to criticise Trump, they find it hard to deal with his own sexual misdemeanours.

For many of us, this latest news is hardly surprising. If you keep your sexualised behaviour secretive because you outwardly profess very puritanical ideals, then the closet becomes where most things happen. Everything becomes just a little more illicit.

The study does not shed light on why Republicans might be more likely to have affairs than Democrats, but Arfer has a couple of theories. The first is that, thanks to more restricted sex education and discussion, right-leaning people may be less well-informed about sex and sexuality, and so have poorer sexual self-control. The second is that people who are more interested in taboo activities declare themselves Republicans, and profess to have stricter attitudes, to deflect suspicion. [Sounds like Wyatt/Regina - a marriage of convenience and espousing hatred of gays and lesbians to deflect suspicion]

August 14, 2018 1:25 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

School Cancels Classes After Parents Threaten Violence Against Trans Student: “A Sharp Knife Will Do The Trick”


Oklahoma City’s Fox affiliate reports:

Several law enforcement agencies have stepped in after parents made threats to harm a 12-year-old Achille Public Schools student on social media last week. 12-year-old Achille Schools transgender student Maddie’s mother Brandy Rose says her family moved to Achille from Sherman when Maddie was in 5th grade.

“She’s been living as female for years– she started at Achille as Maddie,” Rose said. “We had no problems when we first started.” Trouble started when Maddie was accused by another student peeping under a bathroom stall.

One parent found out, and took to a private Achille Facebook group to complain. That’s where the threats started. Adults called Maddie by “it” and “thing.” Some said she should be stabbed or beat up. One even suggested it was open hunting season for transgender people. “That’s a threat against her life–that’s scary,” Rose said. “These are adults making threats– I don’t understand it.”

The Washington Post reports:

“Why are parents letting their kids be transgender?” said one post. “Parents and Churches need to shut this down, the Bible says God created man, and woman . . . not any transgender bs,” said another. “Hell with new laws and new rules, this is what our future is if WE don’t stop it.”

Others made disturbing threats of violence: “If he wants to be a female make him a female. A good sharp knife will do the job really quick.” “Just tell the kids to kick a– in the bathroom and it won’t want to come back!!”

Images of the posts circulated widely on Facebook, drawing outrage from transgender advocates. After activists began writing to the superintendent and organizing a protest at the school, the district announced it would be cancelling all classes on Monday and Tuesday of this week.

August 14, 2018 2:51 PM  
Anonymous It's a woman's prerogative to change her mind.... said...

Republican candidate for U.S. Senate Marsha bLackburn felt the sting of a massive county Democratic sweep in Tennessee, as well as watching the landslide loss of tRump-supporting Diane bLack who was running for Tennessee governor. Learning from her peer’s mistakes, bLackburn put out a new ad very unlike her previous. She mentions nothing about her her love for guns, tRump, the Wall, immigrant ban, war against Planned Parenthood, war against equal pay for women...nothing at all about those issues. Instead, her new ad depicts a safe, saccharin sweet clip of a nothing burger.

August 14, 2018 3:57 PM  
Anonymous Nice try, Gov. Too little, too late said...

After $700M in water district cuts, Florida governor wants $2.4M more

Red-tide algae’s deadly trail of marine animals has triggered a state of emergency in Florida

Samples: The greenwashing of Gov. Rick Scott

August 14, 2018 4:18 PM  
Anonymous Another GOP liar said...


The Virginia Democratic Party on Monday sued the state Board of Elections to force an independent candidate off the ballot in the 2nd Congressional District, where aides to the incumbent, Rep. Scott W. Taylor (R), have been accused of collecting fraudulent signatures for the independent in order to split the vote among Taylor’s challengers.

A special prosecutor is investigating claims that Taylor’s aides forged signatures on petitions for independent candidate Shaun Brown to help her get on the Nov. 6 ballot.

Analysts say voters disinclined to vote for Taylor would split between Brown and Democratic challenger Elaine Luria, possibly delivering Taylor enough voters to win a third term.

But the move backfired after nearly three dozen voters came forward and said they never signed the petitions on which their names appeared.

The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit in Richmond against Elections Commissioner Christopher E. Piper and the three-member Board of Elections, says Brown’s petitions were “positively riddled with fraud” and should disqualify her from the ballot.

Thirty-five people signed affidavits saying their signatures or those of their deceased relatives were forged, according to the lawsuit.

They include Elizabeth “Bet” Cake, the widow of R. Stuart Cake, a longtime civil servant for the Navy, who died in April, before the date on which he is supposed to have signed the petition. Del. Glenn Davis (R-Virginia Beach) said signatures for he and his wife, were forged as well...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/virginia-politics/virginia-democrats-sue-to-knock-independent-off-ballot-in-rep-taylor-race/2018/08/14/429604b6-9ca9-11e8-8d5e-c6c594024954_story.html

August 14, 2018 5:00 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Dumbed-Down Security Briefings Still Too Difficult for Trump to Read

Donald Trump won’t read his briefing and you can’t make him.

When Donald Trump was elected president, it quickly became obvious that the traditional national-security briefing a person in his position receives daily would be well beyond his zone of proximal development. The briefings were slimmed down in length, chopped up into easy-to-digest bullet points, and decorated with lots of graphs and pictures. Alas, the Washington Post reports, even the kiddie version of the presidential brief has proven too challenging. Now, Trump gets his briefing verbally.

Trump, the Post reports, “has opted to rely on an oral briefing of select intelligence issues” because reading the brief — which every president has been able to do since its existence began — “is not Trump’s preferred ‘style of learning,’ according to a person with knowledge of the situation.”

Also, Trump does not receive his verbal briefing daily, but instead “about every two to three days on average in recent months, typically around 11 a.m.” That’s when “executive time” ends and Trump has to turn off Fox News to listen to officials for a while, before he gets more screen time later in the day.

Perhaps not surprisingly, while the verbal method comports with Trump’s preferred learning style, he does not show very strong listening skills:

Trump would discuss the news of the day or a tweet he sent about North Korea or the border wall — or anything else on his mind, two people familiar with the briefings said.


On such days, there would only be a few minutes left — and the briefers would have barely broached the topics they came to discuss, one senior U.S. official said.


“He often goes off on tangents during the briefing and you’d have to rein him back in,” one official said.

So even the verbal briefings devolve into rambling stories by the person who is supposed to be receiving the briefing.

The story does conclude on the optimistic note that Chief of Staff John Kelly has made “an effort to exert more discipline” over the process, though it does not contain any conclusions about his level of success.

August 15, 2018 12:30 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

A white supremacist, a sex offender, and a traitor walk into a bar. The bartender says "What'll it be, President Trump?"

August 15, 2018 1:34 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Hello, I'm Ronald Reagan, A Republican Tea Party legend. I was caught supplying weapons to murderous regimes - twice. I caved in to the demands of terrorists - twice. I provided the funding to create the terrorist organization that would later become known as Al Qaeda. I supported the racist apartheid in South Africa. 138 members of my administration were investigated, indicted, or convicted of crimes. I tripled the national debt in only 87 years. I robbed the Social Security trust fund to pay for budget shorfalls.

Thank you for voting Republican.

August 15, 2018 1:37 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Trump's Saturday Night Massacre is already well under way!

Back in early 2017 when Trump asked Comey to let the investigation into Flynn go Comey knew this was very unusual and very inappropriate so immediately upon leaving the meeting with Trump he did what he had been trained to do, he wrote a detailed memo recording the conversation. He then sent the memo to six different high level people in the Justice Department and the FBI (see link above) to demonstrate what he had been told at that date. These people are all potential witnesses in the obstruction of justice case against Trump.

So, what has Trump been doing? He has one by one attacked each of these witnesses and forced them out of their jobs. He's eliminating the witnesses against him and sending a vicious message to the rest of the FBI - "If you don't defend me I'll destroy your career."

Other than Rachel Maddow, the media has failed to report this corruption by Trump.

August 15, 2018 1:37 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Katrina Pierson Caught Lying About Trump ‘N-word’ tape

Omarosa said in a recent interview while she was working at the white house she had a converstation with Trump spokesperson Katrina Pierson about Trump using the "N"-word. Pierson got on national TV and claimed Omarosa lied that "no such conversation every took place.

Omarosa has zero credibility, to say the least, but that doesn’t mean she doesn’t tell the truth when telling the truth serves her interests (she’ll also happily lie when it suits her interests). And in this case, she did keep the receipts, in the form of a recording of Trump campaign spokesperson Katrina Pierson admitting that Trump uses the N-word about black people.

In a tape released by Omarosa Manigault-Newman on Tuesday, Pierson can be heard discussing whether Trump used the racial epithet during tapings of The Apprentice:

“I am trying to find at least what context it was used in to help us maybe try to figure out a way to spin it,” Pierson says on the tape. “He said it. No, he said it. He is embarrassed by it.”

The only part of that statement that isn’t the least bit believable is the claim that Trump is embarrassed by it. To be embarrassed, you have to be capable of shame and Trump simply isn’t. Pierson is just like every other Trump spokesperson - willing to lie prolifically about anything to help Trump.

Trump’s response is no more credible:

"@MarkBurnettTV called to say that there are NO TAPES of the Apprentice where I used such a terrible and disgusting word as attributed by Wacky and Deranged Omarosa. I don’t have that word in my vocabulary, and never have. She made it up. Look at her MANY recent quotes saying…."

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 14, 2018

But Trump previously said that that word just isn’t in his vocabulary. So why would Burnett have to call him to tell him there’s no tape of him saying it? If he hadn’t said it, he would not need it confirmed that there isn’t a tape of it because there couldn’t possibly be a tape of it. The only way this makes any sense is if he did say it. And if Trump ever considered the logical meaning of anything he says, he would know that. But he doesn’t. He says anything he feels like he needs to say at each and every moment to get out of whatever trouble he finds himself in, with no strategic thought at all. It’s why he’s so easily and so frequently caught lying.

August 15, 2018 6:07 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

David Frum:

"If conservatives become convinced that they cannot win democratically, they will not abandon conservatism. They will reject democracy."

August 15, 2018 7:38 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

With American's attention focused on Trump's horrific treatment of immigrant children, House Republicans on Tuesday quietly unveiled their 2019 budget proposal that calls for $537 billion in cuts to Medicare, $1.5 trillion in cuts to Medicaid, and $4 billion in cuts to Social Security over the next decade - so all of you "ordinary people" can pay for their tax cuts for the Super Wealthy.

August 15, 2018 7:46 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Ethics Waivers Put Us One Step Closer to State-Owned Media

Trump’s new Deputy Chief of Staff, Bill Shine, is the former president of Fox News. And as they did with Steve Bannon, Trump is waiving ethics rules to allow him to communicate directly with his friends at the network, but the wording of the letter that officially waives those rules reveals a great deal.

It is “in the public interest” for the White House’s top communicator to be excused from federal ethics laws so he can meet with Fox News, according to President Donald Trump’s top lawyer.

Bill Shine, Trump’s newly minted communications director, and Larry Kudlow, the White House’s top economist, who worked at CNBC before his White House post, have both been excused from provisions of the law, which seeks to prevent administration officials from advancing the financial interests of relatives or former employers.

“The Administration has an interest in you interacting with Covered Organizations such as Fox News,” wrote White House counsel Don McGahn in a July 13 memo granting an ethics waivers to Shine, a former Fox executive. “[T]he need for your services outweighs the concern that a reasonable person may question the integrity of the White House Office’s programs and operations.”

Note the change in wording. The law requires that waivers be justified because they’re “in the public interest,” bu McGahn’s letter says says that the “administration” has an interest in waiving those rules. Just as Trump substitutes himself personally for the country — what’s good for him is obviously good for America, amirite? — McGahn substitutes the interests of the administration for the interests of the public. But not only are these not the same thing, they are almost certainly to be diametric opposites because Trump has done everything he can to undermine our ethics laws and regulations, from refusing to put his finances into a blind trust to refusing to release his taxes to selling policy to the highest bidding corporations.

August 16, 2018 12:58 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

2017 was the worst year for job creation in 6 years.

Under Obama

2012: 2.19 million jobs created
2013: 2.33 million jobs created
2014: 3.11 million jobs created
2015: 2.74 million jobs created
2016: 2.24 million jobs created.

Under Trump

2017: 2.05 million jobs created

August 16, 2018 1:31 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

A question to Trump supporters:

If Omarosa is lying, why is the Trump administration trying to shut her up using a non-disclosure agreement? Why aren't they attacking her for libel and slander?

One difference between Nixon and Trump: When the Republicans nominated Nixon, they didn't know he was a crook.

Report: Out of 282 traffic arrests and bookings in Polk County Iowa, 282 were black and 0 were white

Polk County Iowa is 4.8% black and 88% white. This is what institutionalized white supremacy looks like in the criminal justice system.

And Wyatt/Regina/bad anonymous constantly denies there's any racism amongst police forces - just like racists would do.

Trump in WSJ interview drew a direct link between the Russia investigation and his decision to revoke Brennan's security clearance

“I call it the rigged witch hunt, [it] is a sham. And these people led it!” Trump told the newspaper hours after it was announced Brennan’s clearance was being revoked. “So I think it’s something that had to be done,” he added.

He keeps admitting to obstructing justice - clearly by the spirit and letter of the law he must be impeached and convicted.

August 16, 2018 2:25 PM  
Anonymous Revoke my security clearance, too, Mr. President said...

Dear Mr. President:

Former CIA director John Brennan, whose security clearance you revoked on Wednesday, is one of the finest public servants I have ever known. Few Americans have done more to protect this country than John. He is a man of unparalleled integrity, whose honesty and character have never been in question, except by those who don’t know him.

Therefore, I would consider it an honor if you would revoke my security clearance as well, so I can add my name to the list of men and women who have spoken up against your presidency.

Like most Americans, I had hoped that when you became president, you would rise to the occasion and become the leader this great nation needs.

A good leader tries to embody the best qualities of his or her organization. A good leader sets the example for others to follow. A good leader always puts the welfare of others before himself or herself.

Your leadership, however, has shown little of these qualities. Through your actions, you have embarrassed us in the eyes of our children, humiliated us on the world stage and, worst of all, divided us as a nation.

If you think for a moment that your McCarthy-era tactics will suppress the voices of criticism, you are sadly mistaken. The criticism will continue until you become the leader we prayed you would be.

William H. McRaven, a retired Navy admiral, was commander of the U.S. Joint Special Operations Command from 2011 to 2014. He oversaw the 2011 Navy SEAL raid in Pakistan that killed al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.

August 16, 2018 3:45 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

John Brennan: Trump’s Collusion Denials Are “Hogwash”

From his op-ed just published by the New York Times:

Mr. Trump’s claims of no collusion are, in a word, hogwash. The only questions that remain are whether the collusion that took place constituted criminally liable conspiracy, whether obstruction of justice occurred to cover up any collusion or conspiracy, and how many members of “Trump Incorporated” attempted to defraud the government by laundering and concealing the movement of money into their pockets.

Mr. Trump clearly has become more desperate to protect himself and those close to him, which is why he made the politically motivated decision to revoke my security clearance in an attempt to scare into silence others who might dare to challenge him. Now more than ever, it is critically important that the special counsel, Robert Mueller, and his team of investigators be allowed to complete their work without interference — from Mr. Trump or anyone else — so that all Americans can get the answers they so rightly deserve.

August 16, 2018 6:20 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Rachel Maddow "Significant development - 3 Senate Dems say they have new evidence Supreme Court nominee was not truthful under oath in 2006 confirmation. This is the kind of thing that would be the end of the road in the Senate for many nominees to even minor jobs. But for the Supreme Court?"

No wonder Republicans have been hiding all the records of his time at the White House!

Republicans want to put an unqualified, lying, religious extremist on the Supreme Court who will move the U.S. to christian Sharia law.

August 16, 2018 6:40 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Hee Hee Hee!

Omarosa’s Publisher Fires Back At Trump’s Legal Threat: If You Sue Us, You’ll Be Ever So Sorry During Discovery

August 16, 2018 Idiocracy, Infighting Is Funny

“While your letter generally claims that excerpts from the book contain ‘disparaging statements,’ it is quite telling that at no point do you claim that any specific statement in the book is false. Your client does not have a viable legal claim merely because unspecified truthful statements in the Book may embarrass the president or his associates. At base, your letter is nothing more than an obvious attempt to silence legitimate criticism of the president.

“My clients will not be intimidated by hollow legal threats and have proceeded with publication of the Book as scheduled. Should you pursue litigation against S&S, we are confident that documents related to the contents of the Book in the possession of President Trump, his family members, his businesses, the Trump Campaign, and his administration will prove particularly relevant to our defense.” – Simon & Schuster counsel Elizabeth McNamara.

BOOM.

August 17, 2018 12:45 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Rick Scott Was Against High-Speed Rail, Killed 2011 Obama Plan, And You Know Where This $tory Is Going

The Miami Herald reports:

As one of his first acts in office in 2011, Gov. Rick Scott canceled a $2.4 billion federally funded and shovel-ready bullet train from Orlando to Tampa because it carried “an extremely high risk of overspending taxpayer dollars with no guarantee of economic growth.’’

It was a political slap to then-President Barack Obama, who considered the high-speed rail project central to his infrastructure reinvestment initiative. Now, the idea has returned — revived by All Aboard Florida, a Coral Gables-based company that has heavily supported Scott — and the governor has reversed course.

Scott said in June he believes a high-speed rail line from Orlando to Tampa is a good idea and he and his wife last year invested at least $3 million in a credit fund for All Aboard Florida’s parent company, Fortress Investment Group, according to recently disclosed financial documents.

Republicans are a never ending fountain of hypocrisy - how do voters keep getting fooled?

August 17, 2018 12:46 AM  
Anonymous The Senate unanimously passed a resolution rebuking Trump's statement that the news media is 'the enemy of the people' said...

WASHINGTON — The Republican-led Senate passed a resolution affirming its commitment to protecting freedom of speech and condemned recent attacks on journalists and members of the media.

In a resolution brought forth by Hawaii Sen. Brian Schatz, a Democrat, and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, lawmakers affirmed "that the press is not the enemy of the people," which passed by unanimous consent.

The resolution also reaffirmed "the vital and indispensable role the free press serves to inform the electorate, uncover the truth, act as a check on the inherent power of the government, further national discourse and debate, and otherwise advance our most basic and cherished democratic norms and freedoms."

It condemned "attacks on the institution of the free press" and said the Senate "views efforts to systematically undermine the credibility of the press as a whole as an attack on our democratic institutions."

The resolution also mentioned quotes from previous US presidents, including the Founding Fathers, who revered a free and independent press.

"Throughout history, the free press has always kept our government in check when it has gone astray, perhaps more than anywhere else around the world, and the Congress has a duty protect the press's First Amendment right," Schumer said in a statement.

"We rely on reporters and newscasters to keep our leaders honest, accountable, and always working in the best interest of the American people. I truly believe that America always solves its problems and combating dangerous and irresponsible attacks on journalism is no exception."

Schatz told Business Insider that he was "a little less surprised" it passed, noting the Senate's adoption of a resolution last month to reject the floated proposal to let the Russian government interrogate Americans, including former US Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul.

"So I think the mouse is trying to roar wherever it can.Wherever they make the judgment that maybe the president isn't watching every twist and turn of this," Schatz said, implying that Republicans often fear rebuking Trump in public. "But it's important for all of us who swore an oath to defend the Constitution that we actually do something."

The resolution comes in the wake of polling showing that a majority of Republicans view the news media as the "enemy of the people," which Trump himself often brands journalists and news outlets when he is upset by certain coverage.

August 17, 2018 7:18 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

August 16, 2018

STATEMENT FROM FORMER SENIOR INTELLIGENCE OFFICIALS

As former senior intelligence officials, we feel compelled to respond in the wake of the ill-considered and unprecedented remarks and actions by the White House regarding the removal of John Brennan’s security clearances. We know John to be an enormously talented, capable, and patriotic individual who devoted his adult life to the service of this nation. Insinuations and allegations of wrongdoing on the part of Brennan while in office are baseless. Since leaving government service John has chosen to speak out sharply regarding what he sees as threats to our national security. Some of the undersigned have done so as well. Others among us have elected to take a different course and be more circumspect in our public pronouncements. Regardless, we all agree that the president’s action regarding John Brennan and the threats of similar action against other former officials has nothing to do with who should and should not hold security clearances – and everything to do with an attempt to stifle free speech. You don’t have to agree with what John Brennan says (and, again, not all of us do) to agree with his right to say it, subject to his obligation to protect classified information. We have never before seen the approval or removal of security clearances used as a political tool, as was done in this case. Beyond that, this action is quite clearly a signal to other former and current officials. As individuals who have cherished and helped preserve the right of Americans to free speech – even when that right has been used to criticize us – that signal is inappropriate and deeply regrettable. Decisions on security clearances should be based on national security concerns and not political views.

William H. Webster, former Director of Central Intelligence (1987-1991)

George J. Tenet, former Director of Central Intelligence (1997-2004)

Porter J. Goss, former Director of Central Intelligence, (2005-2006)

General Michael V. Hayden, USAF, Ret., former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (2006-2009)

Leon E. Panetta, former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (2009-2011)

General David H. Petraeus, USA, Ret., former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (2011-2012)

James R. Clapper, former Director of National Intelligence (2010-2017)

John E. McLaughlin, former Deputy Director of Central Intelligence (2000-2004)

Stephen R. Kappes, former Deputy Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (2006-2010)

Michael J. Morell, former Deputy Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (2010-2013)

Avril Haines, former Deputy Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (2013-2015)

David S. Cohen, former Deputy Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (2015-2017)

August 17, 2018 10:19 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

"The Senate unanimously passed a resolution rebuking Trump's statement that the news media is 'the enemy of the people'".

I'm pretty surprised to see all of the Republican Senators vote for this. It seems like an encouraging sign but with Republicans one doesn't want to get their hopes up too much.

August 17, 2018 12:06 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Sure, there may be just as much chance of a school teacher sexually abusing children as there is a chance a priest would. Sure, there may be just as many pedophiles outside the church as there inside the church. What makes the Catholic church different is the systematic cover-ups; the harbouring of known offenders; the placement of known offenders in front of new groups of children to avoid prosecution. What makes it different is that every branch of this institution is involved in the organized enabling of child rape for hundreds and hundreds of years. It starts in local dioceses and goes all the way up to your beloved, perceived progressive Pope.

For almost a dozen years, there was a man who, using scripture from the Old Testament, convinced underage boys that they would go to hell if they didn’t perform continued and repeated sexual acts with him. His favourite place to manhandle their prepubescent bodies was in confessional. Fr. Mauro Inzoli, who loved to own and drive fast, expensive cars so much, they nicknamed him ‘Don Mercedes’, raped, repeatedly, boys as young as ten by threatening them with eternal torture. Using the fear of their own beloved god, he tormented them, exposing them to things no child should ever be exposed to.

I have no doubt this priest entered the priesthood with the belief that the rule of celibacy would save him from his evil desires. Instead the church gave him the psychological tools and the secrecy to sexually attack children and leave them with severe psychological torment that will never go away.

The Catholic church's requirement of celibacy for priests attracts and protects men with sexual paraphilias who might otherwise get counselling for their problems that could prevent offences such as these.

August 17, 2018 1:43 PM  
Anonymous Red hot planet: This summer’s punishing and historic heat in 7 maps and charts said...

The headlines of record-crushing heat in the Northern Hemisphere began in June and haven’t stopped midway through August. Scores of locations on every continent north of the equator have witnessed their hottest weather in recorded history.

The sweltering temperatures have intensified raging wildfires in western North America, Scandinavia and Siberia, while leading to scores of heat-related deaths in Japan and eastern Canada.

Even with peak of summer having passed, several locations in western North America notched their highest temperatures on record last week. They included Calgary in western Canada, and Glacier National Park in Montana, where the temperature touched the century mark for the first time in 70 years of records.

A weather station in Idaho soared to a torrid 119 degrees (48.3 Celsius) last week. While it requires verification, it would mark the state’s highest temperature ever measured.

Maps and charts really help tell the story of the incredible heat this summer and place it in historical perspective. Here are 7 of the most compelling:

1. Record heat, day by day, May through July

...Few areas were left untouched by the heat which spread around the planet. Some areas, like the western United States, Japan and Scandinavia, were hit repeatedly.

2. The hottest May through July on record in the U.S. Lower 48 states

The contiguous United States witnessed its hottest May on record, passing the previous mark set during the Dust Bowl. But it was July, which ranked 10th hottest, which delivered some of the most remarkable heat extremes...

3. The hottest May through July on record in Europe

A number of major cities in Europe have witnessed all-time high temperature records since July, including Lisbon, Shannon, Glasgow, Copenhagen, and Berlin.

The heat has intensified rare instances of drought in parts of the United Kingdom, which experienced its driest first half of the summer on record...

4. Scandinavia torched

The hottest weather ever recorded spread over large parts of Scandinavia. The heat was remarkable for its coverage, intensity and duration. Many areas saw temperatures climb over 90 degrees (32.2 degrees) compared to normal levels in the 70s, even locations more than 300 miles north of the Arctic Circle....

5. The planet’s third hottest July on record

It was the third warmest July on record for the planet, according to NASA, following 2016 and 2017, the two warmest....national heat records fell in Japan, South Korea, Algeria and Taiwan.

6. Heat records vastly outnumbered cold records

...daily record highs outnumbered record lows by a factor of more than three.

7. 2018 versus 1976

June 1976: the UK was one of the warmest places relative to normal across the globe, with most areas cooler than average.

June 2018: the UK was just another warm blob in a mostly warmer than normal world.#GlobalHeatwave.

August 17, 2018 2:41 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Hee Hee Hee!

REPORT: Omarosa May Have 200 More Tapes


The New York Times reports:

The tapes of Ms. Manigault Newman’s private conversations with Mr. Trump and other officials connected to him have rattled the White House in a way that few things other than the special counsel investigation into possible campaign collusion with Russia have.

Mr. Trump’s aides have been concerned that they will make appearances on other tapes, of which Ms. Manigault Newman is believed to have as many as 200.

Her willingness to slowly deploy the tapes for maximum effect is straight from Mr. Trump’s playbook, which includes boasts of relying on “truthful hyperbole” to engage people, of threatening to expose people with recordings and of claiming to have scurrilous information about people that he might reveal at any moment.

August 17, 2018 3:02 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

"Red hot planet: This summer’s punishing and historic heat in 7 maps and charts"

Global warming is speeding up. Some climate research says things will warm up twice as fast as previously predicted. This is looking very bad...

August 17, 2018 3:06 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Global warming may be twice what climate models predict

Future global warming may eventually be twice as warm as projected by climate models and sea levels may rise six metres or more even if the world meets the 2°C target, according to an international team of researchers from 17 countries.

The findings published last week in Nature Geoscience are based on observational evidence from three warm periods over the past 3.5 million years when the world was 0.5°C-2°C warmer than the pre-industrial temperatures of the 19th Century.

The research also revealed how large areas of the polar ice caps could collapse and significant changes to ecosystems could see the Sahara Desert become green and the edges of tropical forests turn into fire dominated savanna.

“Observations of past warming periods suggest that a number of amplifying mechanisms, which are poorly represented in climate models, increase long-term warming beyond climate model projections,”[Hmmm...just what I've been saying for some time now - Priya] said lead author, Prof Hubertus Fischer of the University of Bern.

“This suggests the carbon budget to avoid 2°C of global warming may be far smaller than estimated, leaving very little margin for error to meet the Paris targets.”

Combining a wide range of measurements from ice cores, sediment layers, fossil records, dating using atomic isotopes and a host of other established paleoclimate methods, the researchers pieced together the impact of these climatic changes.

In combination, these periods give strong evidence of how a warmer Earth would appear once the climate had stabilized. By contrast, today our planet is warming much faster than any of these periods as human caused carbon dioxide emissions continue to grow. Even if our emissions stopped today, it would take centuries to millennia to reach equilibrium.

August 17, 2018 3:11 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

“Even with just 2°C of warming – and potentially just 1.5°C – significant impacts on the Earth system are profound,” said co-author Prof Alan Mix of Oregon State University.

“We can expect that sea-level rise could become unstoppable for millennia, impacting much of the world’s population, infrastructure and economic activity.”

Yet these significant observed changes are generally underestimated in climate model projections that focus on the near term. Compared to these past observations, climate models appear to underestimate long term warming and the amplification of warmth in Polar Regions.

“Climate models appear to be trustworthy for small changes, such as for low emission scenarios over short periods, say over the next few decades out to 2100. But as the change gets larger or more persistent, either because of higher emissions, for example a business-as-usual-scenario, or because we are interested in the long term response of a low emission scenario, it appears they underestimate climate change,” said co-author Prof Katrin Meissner, Director of the University of New South Wales Climate Change Research Centre.

“This research is a powerful call to act. It tells us that if today’s leaders don’t urgently address our emissions, global warming will bring profound changes to our planet and way of life – not just for this century but well beyond.”

August 17, 2018 3:11 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

CALIFORNIA: State Senate Approves Bill Defining Conversion Therapy As Fraud, Allows Victims To Sue


Courthouse News reports:

California is on the verge of shunning treatments that promise to “cure” patients of gayness through hypnosis, counselling and even electric shock sessions.

The state Senate on Thursday cleared a proposal to list so-called conversion therapy as a fraudulent business practice, bringing it under the umbrella of state consumer-protection laws and opening the door for victims to sue practitioners.

California outlawed "conversion" or "reparative" "therapy" for minors in 2012 but there is still a fringe market for adults. The current measure, Assembly Bill 2943 by Assemblyman Evan Low, makes it illegal to advertise practices claiming to “change an individual’s sexual orientation.”

Via press release from Assemblyman Low:

“We as legislators have a responsibility to protect Californians from harmful and deceptive practices. All Californians should be celebrated, cherished, and loved for who they are. I am grateful to my colleagues in the Senate for affirming their support for those in the LGBT community who need it most by voting for this bill.”

The moral arc of the universe is long, but it bends towards justice.

August 17, 2018 6:17 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Trump Is Giving Federal Contractors A “Religious Exemption” For Discrimination

The Department of Labor’s directive applies to millions of people who work for companies that do business with the federal government.

President Donald Trump offered skeptical LGBT Americans an olive branch when he took office in January 2017. The White House promised to safeguard a 2014 executive order that protects workers, announcing former President Obama’s ban on anti-LGBT discrimination by federal contractors "will remain intact."

But on Aug. 10 of this year, the Department of Labor’s Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) quietly issued Directive 2018-03, which broadly expanded the rights of businesses with federal contracts to raise a "religious exemption" if they’re accused of discrimination.

Sharon McGowan, a former lawyer in the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, and now the legal director of the LGBT group Lambda Legal, said the new directive attempts to “immunize” federal contractors who discriminate.

“This Administration apparently recognizes — correctly, in our view — that rescinding [Obama’s 2014] executive order outright would cause a huge public outcry,” she told BuzzFeed News. “So instead, this Administration is trying to accomplish the same end through different means.”

“The damage that could be done here cannot be overstated,” added McGowan, who said one-fifth of the federal workforce is employed through contractors.

The new directive cites three Supreme Court cases and two Trump policies in instructing federal investigators to give contractors a pass if they claim a religious justification in certain cases — which, critics say, betrays Trump’s promise last year.

“The new directive tells federal contractors they are free, in the Trump administration’s view, to use taxpayer dollars to discriminate,” Ria Tabacco Mar, a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union, told BuzzFeed News.

For example, she said, “a federal contractor could point to this directive to justify firing someone because they are gay or transgender — while continuing to accept federal funds. That’s a big deal because federal contractors employ millions of people.”

August 17, 2018 11:49 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Department of Labor and White House officials stressed that the text of Obama’s anti-LGBT discrimination order remains intact. However, they refused to answer numerous questions from BuzzFeed News about the sort of situations where this “religious exemption” directive could get federal contractors off the hook.

The official noted that an underlying executive order — originally enacted in 1965 by former president Lyndon B. Johnson — contains an exemption clause that “permits religious organizations to make employment decisions on the basis of religion.” However, that exemption is narrow. It applies to religious corporations, allowing, for instance, a Catholic organization with a federal contract to hire only fellow Catholics.

But the latest memo is broader and more ambiguous — and it targets LGBT protections directly.

The Aug. 10 directive specifically says it “supersedes” the Department of Labor’s “Frequently Asked Questions” memo that explains that anti-LGBT discrimination by contractors is illegal.

“The previous FAQ did not reflect recent Supreme Court decisions regarding religious freedoms,” the Department of Labor official said in response to a BuzzFeed News question about why the LGBT memo was the only policy explicitly overridden by the new directive.

The official did not answer follow-up questions about how Supreme Court rulings negated the LGBT policy or what sort of “religious exemption” will be permissible under the directive going forward.

More than anything, she said, the Labor Department is signaling it will tolerate anti-LGBT discrimination in some cases. That reflects the Trump administration’s position that workers can be fired simply for their sexual orientation or gender identity, and that religious exemptions allow businesses to turn away gay couples.

“This administration is clearly signaling it thinks LGBTQ people don’t get the same protections as everyone else,” she said.

August 17, 2018 11:50 PM  
Anonymous Trump's Enemies List said...

JOHN BRENNAN
JAMES CLAPPER
JAMES COMEY
MICHAEL HAYDEN
SALLY YATES
SUSAN RICE
ANDREW McCABE
PETER STRZOK
LISA PAGE
BRUCE OHR

August 18, 2018 8:59 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

The army just admitted that Trump's military parade to himself will cost $92 million - $80 million more than initial estimates.

But tell me again how the government cant' afford the $55 million we need to fix Flint's water...

August 18, 2018 12:48 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

‘There is a tipping point’: UN warns climate change goals laid out in Paris accord are almost out of reach

Rising seas threaten the existence of small island states and could displace tens of millions in Bangladesh, Vietnam and other countries with densely populated river deltas

The Paris Agreement goal of capping global warming at 1.5 degrees Celsius will slip beyond reach unless nations act now to slash carbon pollution, curb energy demand, and suck CO2 from the air, according to a draft UN report.

Without such efforts, “holding warming to 1.5C (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) by the end of the 21st Century [is] extremely unlikely,” said the 1,000-page report, prepared by hundreds of scientists.

“There is a very high risk that under current emissions trajectories, and current national pledges, global warming will exceed 1.5C above pre-industrial levels.”

On current trends, Earth’s thermometer will cross that threshold in the 2040s, said the report.

The greenhouse gas emissions guaranteeing that outcome will have been released within 10 to 15 years.

Under any scenario, there is no model that projects a 66-per cent-or-better chance of holding global warming below 1.5C, the synthesis of recent scientific studies concluded. With 2C, according to our models, sea level will just keep on rising

With only a single degree Celsius of warming so far, our planet is already coping with a crescendo of climate impacts including deadly droughts, erratic rainfall, and storm surges engorged by rising seas.

The landmark, 197-nation climate treaty, signed in 2015,calls for limiting global warming to “well under” 2C, and “pursuing efforts” for the 1.5C cap. All countries made voluntary carbon-cutting pledges, running out to 2030.

At the same time, the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change (IPCC) was mandated to prepare a special 1.5C report covering impacts and feasibility. The final version, vetted by governments, will be unveiled in October.

Pressure for the lower temperature target and the report came from nations whose fate could turn on the half-degree difference between a 1.5C and 2C world.

Rising seas, for example, threaten the existence of small island states and could displace tens of millions in Bangladesh, Vietnam and other countries with densely populated river deltas.

August 18, 2018 12:48 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

“There is a tipping point on sea level rise” – driven mainly by melting icesheets on Greenland and Antarctica – “somewhere between 1.5C and 2C,” said Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research.

“With 2C, according to our models, sea level will just keep on rising,” he said.

The pathways that do exist for stabilising at 1.5C would require breaching that threshold and then dialling down Earth’s surface temperature by drawing CO2 out of the atmosphere and then using if for fuel or storing it underground.

None of technologies that do this exist today on an industrial scale, and some experts fear the long-shot 1.5C target could pose problems of its own.

“Any scenario for 1.5C stabilisation likely requires a dubious dependence on ‘negative emissions’ technologies, whereas 2C stabilisation is still possible without that,” said Michael Mann, director of the Earth System Science Centre at Pennsylvania State University.

The lure of silver-bullet fixes, he and others point out, could weaken resolve to reduce greenhouse emissions at their source – an unintended side-effect known as “moral hazard”. Ensuring even a 50/50 chance of a 1.5C world would require the equivalent of a climate change Marshall Plan, the study concluded.

By 2050, carbon dioxide emissions would need to fall to “net” zero, meaning that any CO2 released into the air would have to be offset. Renewable energy sources – mainly solar and wind – would by then be the dominant energy source, and burning coal a distant memory.

Other planet-warming gases such as methane and HFCs would also have to be drastically reduced. “Rapid and large-scale behaviour and lifestyle changes,” such as a shift away from eating meat, will also be essential, the report said.

“We don’t have any margin for less than total commitment,” said Chris Field, Director of the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment in California and a former co-chair of the IPCC’s Working Group II. “Tackling climate is making serious investments more than making exactly the right mix of investments.”

August 18, 2018 12:49 PM  
Anonymous Christian Love on Full Display said...

And Christians still wonder why people don't like them... This guy claims to be a missionary!

Take this display of Jesus' love, for example:

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/white-man-assaulted-ugandan-receptionist-hotel_us_5b7378aee4b02b415d73773f

No wonder so many people want to blow us up.

Frankly I can't blame them. Until Christians learn to behave like reasonable people, their antics are only going to invite a harsher response.

August 18, 2018 2:17 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/white-man-assaulted-ugandan-receptionist-hotel_us_5b7378aee4b02b415d73773f

Oh dear.

August 18, 2018 3:01 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Republicans overflow with corruption - they can't win an honest election where everyone eligible is allowed to vote:

Officials defend plan to close almost all polling places in majority black Georgia county.

Local officals say they need to close seven polling places because they aren't accessible to peole with disabilties. The ACLU says that doesn't make sense.

Georgia was one of nine states that had to seek approval from the federal government before making changes to its election practices under the 1965 Voting Rights Act. In 2013, the U.S. Supreme Court nullified that requirement, ruling the formula used to determine which states had to get approval was unconstitutional. Chief Justice John Roberts, who authored the majority opinion, pointed to progress in getting rid of racial discrimination to justify why the formula should be struck down. In a dissent, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg famously wrote that Roberts’ reasoning was akin to “throwing away your umbrella in a rainstorm because you are not getting wet.”

Rick Hasen, a law professor at the University of California, Irvine, said the proposed changes in Randolph County showed the significance of the Supreme Court’s decision to get rid of the preclearance formula.

“Had the Supreme Court not killed the Voting Rights Act, then the county would not have been able to make these changes without demonstrating to the Justice Department or a three-judge court that the changes would not make minority voters worse off,” he wrote in an email. “The Chief Justice assured us that things have changed in the South, but apparently they haven’t changed enough.”

August 19, 2018 12:50 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Watergate's John Dean Says McGahn Was Smart To Cooperate With Mueller

Nixon administration attorney John Dean told Slate on Saturday that White House counsel Don McGahn did the “right thing” cooperating “extensively” with the ongoing Russia investigation by special counsel Robert Mueller, as reported by The New York Times.

McGahn is “doing exactly the right thing, not merely to protect himself, but to protect his client. And his client is not [President] Donald Trump; his client is the office of the president,” said Dean, who was White House counsel under Richard Nixon.

He also said McGahn was smart to make an early move and avoid the risk of being blamed for any potential illegalities.

“I think there is good reason for McGahn to believe that Trump would throw him under the bus, since Trump throws almost everyone under the bus,” Dean said. “Self-preservation is a real motive.”

Dean was in a similar situation during the Watergate scandal of the early 1970s. He ended up pleading guilty to conspiracy to obstruct justice, but also ultimately cooperated with prosecutors.

McGahn told people that he wanted to avoid Dean’s fate, according to the Times.

Dean said that Nixon, just as Trump reportedly does, treated the White House counsel as his own personal attorney.

The difference between the presidents, Dean tweeted Saturday, is that Nixon was “generally very competent,” even though he “bungled and botched” his handling of Watergate. Trump, on the other hand, is a “total incompetent” who is also “bungling and botching his handling of Russiagate,” he tweeted.

Dean also speculated that unlike Nixon “Trump won’t leave willingly or graciously.”

Dean had one more piece of advice, via a tweet, for Trump’s staff: Get out while you still can:

"Memo to Trump's White House Staff: FYI. Very few people who worked at Nixon's White House later included that fact on their resumes. It doesn't do much for a career to be on the wrong side of history, nor to have worked for the worst president in American history."

August 19, 2018 12:39 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Since 1965

Democrats (25 years in power):
3 indictments
1 conviction
1 prison sentence.

Republicans (28 years in power):
120 indictments
89 convictions
34 prison sentences.

Remind me again how both parties are basically the same?
------------------------------


The bomb that killed 40 children on a bus in Yemen was supplied to the Saudis by the U.S. according to CNN. Obama banned the sale of these bombs to the Saudies but Trump lifted that ban as part of his attempt to undo everything Obama did. Trump's ego aided this attack.

August 19, 2018 12:39 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Trump: "The Russia investigation is a witch hunt - I have nothing to hide!"

Then why are you refusing to be interviewed by Bob Mueller????

August 19, 2018 2:30 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

"Mueller and his gang of angry Dems..."

Trump claimed again today that the FBI investigation against him is run by Democrats but...

Mueller is a Republican
Sessions is a Republican
Comey is a Republican
Rosenstein is a Republican
McCabe isa Republican
The 4 FISA judges are Republicans

There are no Democrats.

August 19, 2018 2:33 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Decades from now, when people look back upon the Trump presidency as they now look back upon the Nixon presidency, Rudy Giuliani will not be remembered as "America's mayor", he'll be remembered as the Trump crony who said "Truth isn't truth." which epitomized the sum total of the defence of Trump at the time.

August 19, 2018 4:07 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Trump keeps claiming "I'm innocent, I've done nothing wrong, I've got nothing to hide, no collusion!" And then he says he isn't worried because the White House Lawyer Don Mcghan isn't a "John Dean type of rat" - that Don McGhan isn't going to reveal anything to Mueller's Russia investigation that's going to hurt Trump. If Trump is innocent and has nothing to hide then why is he happy that Don McGhan isn't "a rat" (won't spill the beans)?

If he's innocent and has nothing to hide it wouldn't matter at all if Mcghan was "a rat" and told everything he knows. It only matters if McGhan is "a rat" if Trump has illegal things to hide and this shows he believes he does.

August 19, 2018 7:17 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Ex-prosecutor: Giuliani is in ‘very dark place’ after shocking ‘truth isn’t truth’ meltdown over Mueller investigation

During an MSNBC panel discussion on Rudy Giulini’s disastrous interview on NBC Sunday morning, an ex-federal prosecutor said his flailing performance indicated that he knows he is losing the legal battle with special counsel Robert Mueller.

Speaking with NBC host Chuck Todd, the personal attorney for President Donald Trump argued about the nature of “truth,” finally blurting “truth isn’t truth” to the incredulous host.

Asked by AM Joy fill-in host Rev. Al Sharpton “What just happened here?” ex-prosecutor Joyce Vance said the former New York City mayor is “in a very dark place.”

“If you have to resort to ‘truth isn’t truth,’ particularly as a lawyer, you’re in a dark place,” she explained. “You’re in a place where you know your client is in a lot of trouble because we know there is a truth and when two witnesses tell different stories in an investigation, the job is to look at evidence that corroborates one version or the other.”

“But Trump tried to maintain that the truth is what he says the truth is ” Vance continued, “and a couple weeks ago he said you can’t believe what you see, you can’t believe what you hear and at bottom it’s this effort by his administration to convince the American people that there is no truth.”

“That is the most disheartening part of this endeavor because there is truth, it’s what prosecutors like folks in my former job do every day in court — help juries make determinations about what is the truth,” she lectured. “There is a truth about this presidency and it’s time for the American people to learn what it is.”

August 19, 2018 7:31 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Reasonable Doubt Finale: Why You Ought To Care

It’s a fact that most people don’t give prison a second thought. Many, like I did, just assume, somewhere in the deep recesses of their mind, that only bad people go to prison. They imagine prison as a terrifying place, full of monsters and they’re glad the doors are locked.

It isn’t until someone you love and care about gets locked up, that the hidden world of incarceration becomes all you can see. You watch, as your friend or family member goes through the system and you cannot help but wonder, and sometimes be overcome with burning curiosity… well, if he can get locked up, there must be other good people inside, as well.

If there is anything I could relay to the world after writing and talking to my friend in prison for near a decade, it’s that you absolutely need to care, before this happens to someone you love.

Why should you care? The reasons why make up part 8 and the final instalment of a series called Reasonable Doubt. Here are the previous parts:

Part 1: How Skepticism Could Improve The Criminal Justice System
Part 2: Why You Should Always Be Skeptical Of Eyewitness Testimony
Part 3: Here’s Why You Are Capable Of Confessing To A Crime You Didn’t Commit
Part 4: You May Be Surprised Just How Much Woo And Quackery Is Used In Your Criminal Justice System
Part 5: Lawyers Who Sleep And Get Drunk During Trials Are Defending Capital Cases
Part 6: Why Do We Place So Much Stock In Jailhouse Snitches?
Part 7: The Executed Innocent

August 20, 2018 1:31 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Here are several reasons why you ought to care about wrongful convictions:

1. You are more likely to go to prison than become a victim of crime. If you are an American, prison is not just a bigger threat for you, it’s a far, far bigger threat for you than ever being raped, mugged, robbed, murdered, or assaulted. In fact, 9% of all males in the USA go to prison. If you’re Hispanic that increases to 16%. God forbid (no holy) you’re black because a whopping 25% of you go to prison in your lifetime, making the systematic racism in the US absolutely undeniable. 1 in every 20 people, men and women, will do time in the United States of America. Whereas, your chances of being the victim of crime, are 1 in 250.

Ask yourself: Is this reasonable? These statistics make clear that more people are doing time for victimless crimes than they are for crimes in which someone has experienced harm or terror. Is this reasonable?

2. It costs your State and your Country an absolutely horrendous amount of money. If you’ve ever found yourself complaining about the lack of funding for education or healthcare, senior care or mental health, drug rehabilitation, roads, environmental protection, etc, etc, and you want to know where your money is going? Prison. It’s going to prison.

A recent report on state spending by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities showed an unsettling trend. State spending on corrections has grown twice as fast as spending on K-12 education, at the same time, spending on the prison system has grown 28 times more than spending on higher education.

It costs approximately $22,000 per year for a minimum security inmate, $26,000 for low security, $27,000 for medium security, and $34,000 for max security.

It can and often does cost upward of $25 million per death row inmate from the beginning of his trial until his last breath.

Just imagine what that could do for education in the United States of America.

August 20, 2018 1:32 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

3. Prison is not just for poor minorities. While being poor or a minority or both puts you at greater risk of going to prison, it’s doesn’t mean white, middle class and rich folk are exempt.

I am a white, middle class, educated Canadian woman. I had about as much reason as anyone to think the American justice system would never, ever find it’s way into my life…. and yet it did. My friend? The one who was actually in prison? White, brilliant, and came from a wealthy family. The ex-con I reached out to when I needed to learn more? White, Jewish, wealthy, worked with the creator of the Dilbert cartoon and was an executive at a major telecom company. Remember Michael Peterson? Convicted of murdering his wife on little more than a hunch? Famous author, white, wealthy.

No one is safe, no one lacks the need to be very concerned about how the American justice system works. Not non-Americans, not white people, not wealthy people, not educated people. Everyone is at risk when the most influential country in the world is incarcerating people for sport.

4. Wrongful convictions lead to more victims of violent crime. As I’ve said many times over in this series, when the wrong man is put away for a crime, it leaves the real perpetrator out there, able to harm more people. Further, by the time it is discovered that the incarcerated individual is innocent, all trails to the real offender may have run cold. It also victimizes the innocent inmate’s family and loved ones, and the families of the victims of the real perpetrator.

5. Prison leads to prison leads to prison. Many studies, including the one I am referencing from The Sentencing Project, indicate that children who grow up with an incarcerated parent are much more likely to end up incarcerated themselves. So, what does that mean for you? It means more crime. The more parents who are locked up for things they did not do, or for non-violent, victimless crimes, the more crime is committed in the long run.

6. The cost of calls. Calls from prison are expensive. If the person you know who is incarcerated happens to be someone you love and adore and want to talk to a lot, you’re going to go broke. A 15 minute call from my friend was never any less than $20 a pop and 15 minutes is nothing. It goes by in a flash. You can’t help but say yes when they ask if you mind them calling back, because you miss them so desperately and you know this is the best part of their day. I had bills upwards of $800 per month. When you do the math, that’s a little more than a 15 minute call a day. Think of the person you most love in this world, and then imagine only being able to speak to them for 15 minutes a day. My friend was a friend, but imagine if it had been my husband? Is 15 minutes a day enough to sustain a marriage? Most people can’t even afford a call a week, let alone one per day. Being as incarceration affects the poor more often, the average person with a loved one inside can’t even afford to accept one collect call from prison. This is nothing short of victimization of the inmate’s families

August 20, 2018 1:32 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

7. Prison is big business. With states finding that they are spending more and more on prison, they’ve turned to privatization. Private prisons are for-profit endeavours. To raise profits they have often lowered food rations, signed agreements with states to fill to a certain percentage (between 90-100%) ultimately giving the state a conviction quota, and had deals with immigration so that they house more than 50% of all detained immigrants.

According to Truthout,

The biggest private prison owner in America, The Corrections Corporation of America, has seen its profits increase by more than 500% in the past 20 years.

and

100% of all military helmets, ID tags, bullet-proof vests and canteens are created in federal prison systems through prison labor. Though prisoners are “generously” compensated cents per hour, it’s clear having this inexpensive, exploited labor force is critical to the military industrial complex.

The bigger private prisons get, the more incarceration there will be. This, despite the fact that since 1993, violent crime has dropped by a mind-blowing 43%.

It’s one thing to read stats and arguments for why you should care, but incarceration is so deeply personal and can’t be whittled down to stats and facts. It’s hard to care about someone inside. I imagine it’s even harder to be in there.

On one particular call from my friend, the normal recording played,

“This is a call from an inmate at an Ohio correctional institution.”

Then I would hear him say his name, and the recording would continue,

“has placed a collect call from BlahBlah Correctional Institution.”

August 20, 2018 1:33 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

I would then be prompted to accept the call by pressing 1. I’d finally hear his half-hearted, “Hey. Sup?” and we got to chatting. It was either something about working out or how he made his ramen that day, as per usual. About 12 minutes in, I hear shouting in the background. This is a maximum security prison that, at the time, housed Ohio’s death row.

“What was that?” I asked, worried. He didn’t answer and instead began shouting back. It sounded heated. There were deep, booming voices of hardened men. I heard a crash and asked frantically, “Are you okay? M? Hello? Are you alright?”

“You have one minute left.” The recording came on reminding me I only had a minute left on the call.

“M! Are you okay? One minute left!” I demanded a few times, while still listening to shouting and banging. The call disconnected. I was beside myself with worry. Then the phone rang again, again the recording, again I accepted the call, and again I hear, “Hey.” Then he says he’s sorry he let the call disconnect without saying bye. I asked him if he was okay. He said, and I quote,

“Yeah. Dude just wanted to borrow my mayonnaise.”

After giving him sufficient crap for scaring me half to death, we finished our call. I had near forgotten where he was, and things like that would happen frequently to remind me. You go to bed scared, you wake up scared, and sometimes you go stretches of time without hearing from them at all.

My friend went to the hole after a fight in the yard. He was there for 3 months. The prison doesn’t tell anyone where he is. We’re not kept up to date on how he’s doing. My only way of kind of knowing whether he was alive or not was to check his offender page on the corrections database web site which was rarely updated. He just simply went silent. No calls. No letters. No nothing. I cannot express in words how utterly terrifying that is.

August 20, 2018 1:33 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

I want to reiterate, this was my friend. He meant a lot to me, but I wasn’t married to him or related to him. I’d never lived with him; I didn’t grow up with him. He was a friend who definitely mattered to me, deeply, but just a friend nonetheless. What I experienced was child’s play compared to what wives of inmates experience. Mothers of inmates, brothers of inmates, fathers, girlfriends, sons, daughters. They experience what I can only guess is a living hell. To know that some studies estimate that nearly 10,000 innocent men and women are incarcerated every single year, is to know that you are willingly, and knowingly victimizing hundreds of thousands of innocent people every year, and paying for it with your safety, with your tax dollars and with your own ability to identify as an innocent.

If 20 Americans read this post, odds predict one of you is going to prison. Which one will it be? Will you be guilty of the crime you are convicted of? Will you deserve to go? How will it affect your family?

As atheists who proclaim to be rational thinkers, we voice outrage with ease when a terror attack occurs but the odds of being in an attack are 1 in 3.5 million. The odds of prison are one in 20 and yet we are relatively silent on the topic.

I’d like to change that. I’d love to see some fellow atheists with blogs voice their opinion on this. I’d love to read your take, your experiences and your ideas. Be sure to send me the link to anything you post via email here: mommy@godlessmom.com.

August 20, 2018 1:34 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Russia, if you're listening, I hope you're able to find Trump Supreme Court pick Brett Kavanaugh's 1,000,000 records that are hidden.

August 20, 2018 2:06 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Brett Kavanaugh’s fellow alumni at Yale Law School call him ‘morally bankrupt’ in scathing open letter

The letter already has almost 1000 signatures.

Just a few months ago, Judge Kavanaugh ruled to deny a detained immigrant minor her constitutional right to abortion. Decades-old Supreme Court precedent makes clear that the government may not place an undue burden on a pregnant person’s access to abortion. But Judge Kavanaugh clearly did not feel constrained by precedent: what could be a greater obstacle than a cage? The minor had never wavered in her decision to seek an abortion and had received a judicial bypass from a state judge who found that she was competent to make the decision. Yet Kavanaugh condescendingly and disingenuously held that she must wait weeks until she was in a “better place” to make a choice about her own bodily autonomy — at which point she might not be able to have a legal abortion. Further, Kavanaugh argued that to require immigration authorities to stop blocking her from accessing this right would force the government into complicity.

The judge employed similar spurious reasoning in a 2015 dissent arguing that the ACA’s contraceptive mandate violated the rights of religious organizations, even though those organizations were granted an accommodation that allowed them to opt out of providing contraceptive coverage. Kavanaugh’s opinions give us grave concern that he will consistently prioritize the beliefs of third-parties over the rights of the oppressed — not only when it comes to abortion and contraception, but also regarding other forms of medical care (including care for transgender patients), family privacy, and sexual liberty. Litigants harness this same logic when arguing that institutions have a religious right to discriminate against LGBT people — an issue the Court is certain to take up in the years to come.

Judge Kavanaugh would also act as a rubber stamp for President Trump’s fraud and abuse. Despite working with independent counsel Ken Starr to prosecute Bill Clinton, Judge Kavanaugh has since called upon Congress to exempt sitting presidents from civil suits, criminal investigations, and criminal prosecutions. He has also noted that “a serious constitutional question exists regarding whether a president can be criminally indicted and tried while in office.” This reversal does not reflect high-minded consideration but rather naked partisanship. At a time when the President and his associates are under investigation for various serious crimes, including colluding with the Russian government and obstructing justice, Judge Kavanaugh’s extreme deference to the Executive poses a direct threat to our democracy.

As part of his assault on the administrative state — based not in law, as he claims, but on policy preference — Judge Kavanaugh has undermined attempts to protect the environment and regulate predatory lenders and for-profit colleges. If elevated, the judge would pose an existential threat to the government’s ability to regulate for the common good and further twist the First Amendment beyond recognition, using it as a sword to advance his personal political preferences.

August 20, 2018 3:12 PM  
Anonymous What Rudy meant.... said...

tRump Truth Isn't Truth

August 20, 2018 4:05 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"I think we have difficulty with the word, and the concept, of hate. To a kid, hate is related to anger; you are so angry at someone that you can't stand them, don't want to be around them, you think they are a bad person because they did something that made you so mad. But as adults the concept becomes more in-the-head, the temperature comes down a bit. Grown-up hate is not necessarily personal, it is more likely applied to groups of people, especially people you don't know. I do not think kids have this in their lives; they hate when they're angry and then get over it. Adults rationalize their hate. They treat their judgments as facts."

Jim,

I think you're off-base here. You're political worldview appears to be warping your perception of reality. What you're missing is that hate is extreme or intense. This intensity is, indeed, often caused by anger but it can also be caused by fear or insecurity. So, just as there is a difference between "like" and "love", there is a difference between "dislike" and "hate."

This blurring of definition is typical of what has caused our country to become so polarized. How easy it is to demonize others if they are filled with "hatred" rather than filled with "dislike." How easy it is to justify any level of incivility.

But what society are you contributing to? At what point does the political global temperature rise become irreversible?

August 20, 2018 9:41 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

This comment has been removed by the author.

August 21, 2018 1:11 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

"How easy it is to justify any level of incivility."

Its conservatives like you that attacked liberals for asking for consideration and respect (Calling transpeople by their chosen pronouns,etc.). You were furious at such "political correctness" and said how you hated it and wouldn't put up with it.

Now when liberals call you out for your bad behavior you wail about "incivility".

You want to be able to attack and offend liberals and be very uncivil to them but you expect to be treated with civility - you can't have it both ways.

You conservatives first broke the social contract by attacking liberals who weren't hurting anyone, we liberals were forced to respond in kind by your actions. If you want civility the obligation is upon you to first return to the social contract you broke and then we will return to the civility we had previously given you.

August 21, 2018 1:23 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

"Elizabeth Warren Is Trying to Save Capitalism from Itself..

Free market advocates like to describe the government as a parasite on the market, but the reverse is true. In healthy democracies, governments are merely the representatives of the people’s will, designed to protect the sweak from the powerful and purchase or create crucial goods and services that the market left to its own devices will not. Furthermore, markets exist not in automatic theoretical state but through rules implemented by society. We decide, for instance, that ponzi schemes are not allowed to operate, that people cannot be exploited to sell their organs, that addictive hard drugs must be banned or regulated, and so on.

The corporation itself, long considered an inviolable natural entity by conservatives, is itself an artificial legal entity sanctioned by society and its representatives. Nothing in nature demands that the owners of corporations be legally shielded from the consequences of their actions, or that the full costs of their operation should be externalized onto taxpayers, or that they should pay lower tax rates than real people. Nothing in nature demands that corporations be operated purely on behalf of their shareholders rather than on behalf of their workers and the public trust. These are all things that modern industrialized society decided in a more or less corrupted fashion, artificial rules that are kept in place by the rich and powerful as if they were acts of God and laws of nature. They are neither.

Senator Elizabeth Warren has taken some bold steps to try to fix some of these broken rules and save capitalism from itself in the United States. Nor are her proposals exactly even radical: many of her proposals are already in place in other developed capitalist countries such as Germany. Some of the worst trends in capitalism, such as shareholder value theory, are actually fairly new but considered as gospel by business tycoons and Chicago-school economists. They are not impossible to reverse, and they are badly needed. All that is missing is political will.

August 21, 2018 1:23 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Rising arctic temperatures mean we face a future of ‘extreme extremes’ where sunny days become heatwaves and rain becomes floods, study says

Rising arctic temperatures have slowed the circulation of the jet stream and other giant planetary winds, which means pressure fronts are getting stuck and the weather is less able to moderate itself, say researchers.
Rising arctic temperatures have slowed the circulation of the jet stream and other giant planetary winds, which means pressure fronts are getting stuck and the weather is less able to moderate itself, say researchers. Photograph: Henry Nicholls/Reuters

Summer weather patterns are increasingly likely to stall in Europe, North America and parts of Asia, according to a new climate study that explains why Arctic warming is making heatwaves elsewhere more persistent and dangerous.

Rising temperatures in the Arctic have slowed the circulation of the jet stream and other giant planetary winds, says the paper, which means high and low pressure fronts are getting stuck and weather is less able to moderate itself.

The authors of the research, published in Nature Communications on Monday, warn this could lead to “very extreme extremes”, which occur when abnormally high temperatures linger for an unusually prolonged period, turning sunny days into heat waves, tinder-dry conditions into wildfires, and rains into floods.

“This summer was where we saw a very strong intensity of heatwaves. It’ll continue and that’s very worrying, especially in the mid-latitudes: the EU, US, Russia and China,” said one of the coauthors, Dim Coumou from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research. “Short-term heatwaves are quite pleasant, but longer term they will have an impact on society. It’ll have an affect on agricultural production. Harvests are already down this year for many products. Heatwaves can also have a devastating impact on human health.”

Circulation stalling has long been a concern of climate scientists, though most previous studies have looked at winter patterns. The new paper reviews research on summer trends, where it says there is mounting evidence of planetary wind systems – both low-level storm tracks and higher waves in the troposphere – losing their ability to shift the weather.

One cause is a weakening of the temperature gradient between the Arctic and Equator as a result of man-made greenhouse gas emissions. The far north of the Earth is warming two to four times faster than the global average, says the paper, which means there is a declining temperature gap with the central belt of the planet. As this ramp flattens, winds struggle to build up sufficient energy and speed to push around pressure systems in the area between them.

August 21, 2018 1:24 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

As a result, there is less relief in the form of mild and wet air from the sea when temperatures accumulate on land, and less relief from the land when storms build up in the ocean. Last year, Hurricane Harvey had a devastating impact on Texas because it was parked an unusually long time on the coast, where it kept drawing up moisture from the sea and dumping it in the form of the greatest deluge ever recorded in the US. Scientists had previously noted that hurricanes are slowing and bringing more rain.

A separate new paper in Scientific Reports indicated that the trapping of planetary airstreams – a phenomenon known as amplified quasi-stationary waves – also contributed to the 2016 wildfires in Alberta, which took two months to extinguish and ended as the costliest disaster in Canadian history with total damages reaching 4.7bn Canadian dollars.

“Clearly, the planetary wave pattern wasn’t the only cause for the fire – yet it was an additional important factor triggering a deplorable disaster,” says lead author Vladimir Petoukhov from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research. “In fact, our analysis reveals that beyond that single event, actually from the 1980s on, planetary waves were a significant factor for wildfire risks in the region.”

He said wave pattern studies will help forest managers and fire forecasters because changes can be detected ahead of their impacts.

However, scientists are also concerned that slowing circulation could produce “surprises”, by amplifying other climate changes.

“Simple warming is well understood in climate models, but scientists are trying to understand non-linearities, how climate change effects interact with one another and how feedback processes are involved,” said Coumou. “Non-linearities can rapidly change weather conditions in a given region so you get more abrupt changes.”

Scientists unconnected with the paper said it highlighted the risks of disturbing natural weather patterns.

“What happens in the Arctic doesn’t stay in the Arctic. By upsetting the energy balance of the planet we are changing the temperature gradient between the equator and the pole. This in turn sets in motion major reorganisations of the flow patterns of the atmosphere and ocean,” said Chris Rapley, professor of climate science at University College London. “The consequences are emerging and they are disruptive, and likely to become even more profoundly so. We are on a journey and the destination doesn’t look good.”

August 21, 2018 1:24 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Lunatic fringe gay activists are again attacking the small baker in Colorado who refused to bake cakes for gay weddings and beat them at the Supreme Court. Now, they are seeking to violate his religious rights by compelling him to make cakes celebrating transgender "coming out" parties. The lunacy must end.:

"Vox may still be keeping up its risible just-the-facts posturing, but it is tendentious to the point of dishonesty: “Colorado baker who refused to serve gay couple now wants to refuse to serve transgender person,” it says.

That is not true, of course.

(But everybody knows that.)

Phillips serves customers of all sorts, including homosexual customers. What he declines to do is to make cakes for certain events, participation in which, even as a vendor, would violate his conscience. As he put it: “I serve everybody. It’s just that I don’t create cakes for every occasion.”

Phillips has been prosecuted under a civil-rights law, but this is not really a case about civil rights: It is a case about compulsion.

After winning his case at the Supreme Court, Phillips was again targeted by Colorado activists, one of whom asked him to make a cake to celebrate coming out as transgender. Phillips declined, and was ordered to the state to compulsory mediation. He is countersuing."

August 21, 2018 7:18 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"This all began with the best of intentions.

The situation of African Americans in the 1960s was both unjust and untenable. On the one hand, civil-rights activists argued that the project of more closely integrating African Americans into the nation’s social, economic, and political life could not be left up to the states (the Democratic political machines controlling the South were built on segregation) and further that it should not be left up to the states, being a problem that was genuinely national in character. Critics of the 1964 legislation, including Republicans such as Senator Barry Goldwater who had supported earlier civil-rights reforms, argued that the proposed legislation went too far, that the expansive “public accommodations” doctrine would insert politics into what had been private life, politicizing the conduct of business and inviting the federal snout into places where it did not belong. The tragedy was, and is, that both sides were right.

But it would be foolish to analogize the situation of gay or transgender Americans in Colorado in 2018 to the situation of black Americans in Mississippi in 1930 or Arkansas in 1964. There is widespread tolerance and accommodation, and America’s sexual minorities have social, economic, and political power far beyond what African Americans had in the 1960s. (It is arguably the case that, in spite of their smaller numbers, gay Americans have more social, economic, and political power than black Americans have today, too.) In 1964, the case for intervening in the business of any particular motel operator or restaurateur was identical to the case for intervening in all of them: The problem was systemic, and effectively universal.

The same cannot be said of Jack Phillips and his little bakery. No gay couple seeking a wedding cake is going to have to travel three states away to find one if Phillips declines their custom. No transgender person celebrating a coming out is going to want for baked goods if Phillips refuses service.

Everybody knows this. The activists targeting Phillips do not care. The point is not to see to it that gay and transgender people can live their lives as they wish to — the point is to coerce Jack Phillips into conformity."

August 21, 2018 7:19 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"This is a matter of religious bigotry: Jack Phillips is a Christian, prone to citing the Bible as the basis for his business decisions, and gay activists wish to see such people publicly humiliated. They wish to seem them forced by the machinery of the state to submit and to violate their own beliefs. There isn’t any other juice in going after a previously obscure baker in this way.

Liberalism has always struggled to balance the protection of minority rights against majoritarian institutions and — less often appreciated — the protection of individual rights. The American Left has liberated itself from such considerations by abandoning liberalism for identity politics and a might-makes-right ethic. Why compel Jack Phillips to knuckle under? Because you can, and because you hate him. Hate is an inescapable part of tribalism, and hate is now the single most important organizing principle of the American Left.

T. H. White understood this ethic, which he described as the constitution of an ant colony: “Everything which is not forbidden is compulsory.” To the cranky dissidents such as Jack Phillips, and to the likewise unassimilated nonconformists of our time, we owe a debt of gratitude. If the human ethic survives the ant ethic, it will be in no small part because of them."

August 21, 2018 7:21 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Ryan Knight

The TRUTH is Trump's campaign had 75 contacts withy Russia while Russia was attacking the election.

The TRUTH is 5 Trump campaign advisors and 26 Russians have been charged.

The TRUTH is Russia is attacking out elections and Trump is attacking the investigation into Russia's attack.
--------------------------

When someone sees a slippery slope between same sex marriage and beastiality or pedophila that's a pretty good indication that they view marriage as a pairing between a man and his sex-object, not a loving bond between two consenting adults of sound mind.

August 21, 2018 1:18 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

A Retirement Community Turned Away These Married Women

They took a tour of Friendship Village Sunset Hills and were impressed by its pool and fitness center, a calendar crammed with activities, the newly built apartments for independent living. They had meals with a friend and with a former co-worker, and their spouses, all of them enthusiastic residents.

“We’d met other people from the community, and they were very friendly,” said Ms. Walsh, 72, a retired manager for AT&T. “I was feeling good about it.”

Like most C.C.R.C.s, Friendship Village — a “faith-based” but nondenominational nonprofit — includes assisted living and a nursing home on its 52-acre campus, an important consideration. If one woman someday needed more care than the other, “we’d still be able to have dinner together,” Ms. Walsh said. “We wanted to be together, no matter what happened.”

The community seemed eager to recruit them, too, offering a lower entrance fee if they signed an agreement promptly. So they paid a $2,000 deposit on a two-bedroom unit costing $235,000. They notified their homeowners association that they’d be putting their house in Shrewsbury, Mo., on the market and canceled a vacation because they’d be moving in 90 days. Ms. Walsh contacted a realtor and began packing.

Then came a call from the residence director, asking Ms. Walsh the nature of her relationship with Ms. Nance, 68, a retired professor. “I said, ‘We’ve been married since 2009,’” Ms. Walsh replied. “She said, ‘I’m going to need to call you back.’”

Last month, the women brought suit in federal court, alleging sex discrimination in violation of the federal Fair Housing Act and the Missouri Human Rights Act.

In turning down their application, Friendship Village had mailed a copy of its cohabitation policy, which limits shared units to siblings, parents and children, or spouses. “The term ‘marriage’ as used in this policy means the union of one man and one woman, as marriage is understood in the Bible,” the policy noted.

“It’s hard to think of a more clear-cut case of discrimination because of sex,” said Julie Wilensky, senior staff attorney at the National Center for Lesbian Rights. The center represents the couple, along with private attorneys and the ACLU of Missouri, in what’s believed to be the first federal suit by a same-sex couple turned away from a retirement community.

August 21, 2018 1:28 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

“One thing so troubling about this case, and this time, is the argument that religious beliefs can justify discrimination,” said Michael Adams, chief executive of Sage, an advocacy group for L.G.B.T. seniors.

Faith organizations operate many retirement facilities. If a baker can refuse to make a wedding cake for a gay couple (and have the Supreme Court agree, albeit on narrow grounds), can a C.C.R.C. refuse admission to Mary Walsh and Beverly Nance?

With Attorney General Jeff Sessions announcing the creation of a “religious liberty task force,” some facilities might try.

Neither the federal nor the Missouri law explicitly covers sexual orientation, but both outlaw sex discrimination. “If either Mary or Beverly were a man, the couple wouldn’t have been denied housing,” Ms. Wilensky said.

It’s an approach that’s been used in other legal actions over discrimination, including employment and education cases. Advocates for L.G.B.T. seniors have argued for years that long-term care facilities fail to protect them against discrimination and harassment, leaving them particularly vulnerable.

Compared to older adults who are heterosexual, “they’re much less likely to be parents and twice as likely to be single and live alone,” said Mr. Adams of Sage. “We often hear about people deciding to go back in the closet because they’re afraid,” Mr. Adams said.

In an extreme case, Marsha Wetzel, 70, sued the Glen St. Andrew Living Community in Niles, Ill., alleging that as a lesbian she suffered threats, slurs and taunts — and three physical assaults — while administrators did nothing to protect her.

The facility’s lawyers argued that Ms. Wetzel had failed to show “discriminatory intent.” A federal court agreed and dismissed her suit. She has appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, with a ruling expected shortly.

Often, though, discrimination takes subtler forms. In 2013, for example, the Equal Rights Center conducted 200 matched-pair tests in 10 states (including Missouri) to ascertain whether senior housing facilities were more apt to discriminate against same-sex than opposite-sex married couples.

August 21, 2018 1:29 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

In about half the tests, the facilities were more likely to discriminate. The testers posing as same-sex spouses were offered fewer rental units, faced higher prices or more burdensome application requirements, or were less likely to hear about financial incentives. With its written policy, Friendship Village operated more blatantly.

A Harris Poll conducted for Glaad, the media advocacy group, found more Americans each year saying they felt comfortable with and supportive of L.G.B.T. people from 2014 to 2017. But in its most recent survey, more respondents said they felt uncomfortable in certain scenarios (a child having a gay teacher, for example), while L.G.B.T. people reported increasing discrimination [Once again the Trump administration is creating greater hatred of minorities].

Ms. Walsh and Ms. Nance thought they’d gotten past this sort of response. Earlier, visiting a Lutheran retirement community, Ms. Walsh had asked an administrator if he foresaw a problem admitting two married women.

“He said no and looked at me like, why would you ask me such a silly question?” So when Friendship Village suddenly refused them, “I was blindsided,” she said. “I felt like they had kicked me in the stomach.”

Initially stunned, the women grew angry, contacted the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development, then decided to turn to the courts. “This is not right. They shouldn’t be able to do this,” Ms. Walsh said of Friendship Village. “We met all the qualifications, other than one of us wasn’t a man.”

Their lawsuit asks the court to order the facility to develop policies and procedures to prevent discrimination. And the women seek a permanent injunction to keep the community from denying them admission. After all this, they still want to move into Friendship Village.

August 21, 2018 1:29 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Anti-gay christians put up a facade about their discrimination being motivated by their religion but the truth is that's just an excuse to try to cover their naked desire to spit on LGBT people and show them they consider them inferior.

August 21, 2018 1:31 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

So, after exclaiming "I may never be back!" evil Wyatt/Regina/bad anonymous of course is back at TTF.

They've said on three previous occaisions they weren't going to comment anymore but once again they're full of sh*t.

August 21, 2018 1:33 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

The American Taliban:

"Oh Lord help us to prevent gay people from marrying, deny heterosexuals birth control and disallow young people honest sex education. Let us control what all Americans can do, say or think. Amen."


The Trump administration is halfway to implementing christian Sharia law in the States.

August 21, 2018 2:03 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

All those in favour of renaming bigotry, prejudice, hate, and discrimination "Religious Freedom" Raise your hands

August 21, 2018 2:09 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

So in court today Michael Cohen pleaded guilty to eight counts of criminal wrondoing including two counts of illegal campaign contributions which he says Trump directed him to commit these crimes. So Trump is now an unindicted co-conspirator. Republicans like Wyatt/Regina/bad anonymous will be quick to claim that its a "he said, he said" situation where its Cohen's word against Trump and Cohen is a liar. Well, no one lies more than Trump and it is not just Cohen's word against Trump. There are emails, text messages, bank statements, and recordings all corroborating what Cohen has said - it is beyond doubt that Trump directed Cohen to committ campaign finance violations in an admitted effort to influence the outcome of the 2016 election. And Trump lied about these illegal campaign contributions both before and after the election as president which is also a crime.

Trump boasted throughout his campaign that he knew the best people and would hire them. Instead five of the people key to his campaign and presidency have been convicted of crimes. Far from hiring the best people Trump has surrounded himself with criminals

But for these crimes by Trump and Cohen to influence the outcome of the election Trump would almost certainly not be president. Coming on the heels of the Access Hollywood tape where Trump admitted to being a sexual predator, it coming out weeks before the election that he had affairs with a porn star and a playboy playmate while he was married to Melania would have almost certainly prevented him from being elected.

Republicans played a cynical game when Obama, a scandal free, crime free president had an opening on the Supreme Court and nominated Merrick Garland. Republicans proclaimed that Obama couldn't exercise his right to appoint a justice because there would be an election in over a year. Well, if it was improper for Obama to put his choice on the Supreme court it is far, far more untenable for Trump to get his choice of Brett Kavanaugh on the Supreme Court.

Trump committed a crime to become president. Clearly him being an illegitimate president, far, far more than Obama should be inelligable to choose a supreme Court justice. There are matters likely to come before the supreme court such as whether Trump has to obey a subpoena to testify before the Russia investigation and whether or not a sitting president can be indicted for a crime. The founding fathers certainly never would have wanted a president to choose the judges who would decide a case involving that president and neither would any person with the slightest concern for the rule of law.

August 22, 2018 12:12 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"So in court today Michael Cohen pleaded guilty to eight counts of criminal wrondoing including two counts of illegal campaign contributions"

Cohen paid some women for the rights to their story and was reimbursed by Trump. Lawyers pay expenses for clients and get reimbursed every day of the week. It could only be a campaign contribution if Cohen wasn't to be reimbursed AND if you assume that the only reason Trump wanted to keep the stories secret is to win the election. He probably would have sought to keep the stories secret to protect his marriage anyway.

Cohen pleaded guilty to these campaign violations not because he agreed with them but under pressure from Mueller, who is looking for any way to frame Trump for something because he has completely failed to substantiate the Russian hoax. No jury would have convicted Cohen of these campaign finance charges, just like a jury failed to convict Manfort on 10 of Mueller's 18 charges.

"Trump boasted throughout his campaign that he knew the best people and would hire them. Instead five of the people key to his campaign and presidency have been convicted of crimes. Far from hiring the best people Trump has surrounded himself with criminals"

Every conviction so far is either one that is rarely prosecuted or a crime that wouldn't have existed except for the special prosecutor's creation of the crime. No one has been found to have colluded with Russia to commit any crime, which is what Mueller was charged with finding out.

"But for these crimes by Trump and Cohen"

no crime was committed

"to influence the outcome of the election Trump would almost certainly not be president. Coming on the heels of the Access Hollywood tape where Trump admitted to being a sexual predator, it coming out weeks before the election that he had affairs with a porn star and a playboy playmate while he was married to Melania would have almost certainly prevented him from being elected."

it was widely known that he had extramarital affairs, that's how his previous marriages ended

these stories would likely have had no impact on the election

Trump had personal reasons for not wanting them to become public information

"Republicans played a cynical game when Obama, a scandal free, crime free president had an opening on the Supreme Court and nominated Merrick Garland."

they exercised the political power the American people gave them to protect the Constitution

btw, other than the scandal where Obama used the IRS to destroy the Tea Party movement and win the 2012 election, it also appears Obama weaponized the intelligence agencies in the 2016

he may eventually be prosecuted

"if it was improper for Obama to put his choice on the Supreme court it is far, far more untenable for Trump to get his choice of Brett Kavanaugh on the Supreme Court."

Americans gave the Dems no power to stop Trump

we're a democracy and the victors, at every level, have been the Republicans

if the Dems persist in their move to socialism, they may never win again

Brett Kavanaugh's confirmation is a foregone conclusion, you might want to get used to it

I have news for everybody:

when Roe is overturned, the legality of abortion will be decided by each state

however, when the new SCOTUS rules that unborn children deserve equal protection under the law, which will happen in some other case, that will make abortion illegal everywhere

and all because Dems nominated a crooked and incompetent Hillary

August 22, 2018 5:27 AM  
Anonymous That's a big witch said...

Cohen entered a plea deal in federal court to a total of eight counts, five for tax evasion, one for a false statement to a bank and two related to campaign-finance charges. Most important, the plea states that Cohen, in committing the campaign-finance violations, acted at the behest of the “candidate.” There is only one candidate. The president of the United States has now been implicated in commission of federal crime(s) by his longtime lawyer...

Cohen was involved in the payment of hush money to silence multiple women with whom Trump allegedly had extra-marital affairs. The political fallout will depend on how many women and the circumstances of those payments. The criminal liability here concerns violation of campaign-finance rules as part of a deliberate attempt to conceal large amounts of money from voters. Blaming Cohen exclusively will be hard for Trump to pull off, given the tape we already have heard.

August 22, 2018 7:13 AM  
Anonymous TTF's Troll is just another deplorable liar said...

Anon's bullshit claim = "no crime was committed"

What a liar you and your party of deplorables are.

FACT:

"President Trump’s former longtime attorney and his onetime campaign chairman were separately declared guilty Tuesday of eight crimes each, a dramatic collision of two investigations that intensified the legal and political pressure on the embattled president."

August 22, 2018 7:21 AM  
Anonymous Thick as thuggish thieves said...

Rep. Duncan Hunter, wife charged with spending campaign money on personal expenses

Indicted Congressman Chris Collins Ends Reelection Campaign

The First 2 Congressmen To Endorse Trump Have Been Indicted:
Reps. Chris Collins (R-N.Y.) and Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) are now in hot water over allegations of insider trading and campaign finance violations.

August 22, 2018 7:31 AM  
Anonymous Racist, thuggish tRump and team said...

Trump and security team must face claims of assault on Mexican protesters, judge says

August 22, 2018 7:40 AM  
Anonymous tRump loses another swamp ceature said...


Billionaire Foster Friess defeated in Wyoming gubernatorial race despite last-minute Trump endorsement

August 22, 2018 7:49 AM  
Anonymous tRump is our latest "unindicted co-conspirator" said...

Watergate Prosecutor Hits Trump: ‘The President Is An Unindicted Co-Conspirator’

A former Watergate prosecutor said that Tuesday’s plea deal by Michael Cohen means President Donald Trump now has something in common with President Richard Nixon.

“There’s no question about it,” Nick Akerman said on MSNBC. “This makes the president of the United States an unindicted co-conspirator.”

Cohen, Trump’s former personal attorney, admitted in his plea deal that he illegally interfered in the 2016 presidential election “at the direction of a candidate for federal office,” presumably Trump.

That, Akerman said, makes Trump an “unindicted co-conspirator,” a term used by the Watergate grand jury to describe Nixon’s role in the scandal, which ultimately led to his resignation.

“This is the first time this has happened since Richard Nixon was named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the Watergate trial,” Akerman said. “This is a big deal.”

Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani said the deal means “there is no allegation of any wrongdoing against the president.”

Akerman dismissed that as “nonsense.”

“The fact of the matter is, if you read this indictment, he’s doing it at the direction of Donald Trump,” he said. “And if he’s doing it at the direction of Donald Trump, there’s a conspiracy. It’s an agreement, an agreement to commit campaign financing crimes. It’s a five-year felony. This is a serious matter.”

Akerman wasn’t the only one to use the ominous Watergate-era phrase on Trump.

Jonathan Turley, a law professor at George Washington University, made a similar comment on Fox News.

“If the prosecutors accept what is in this indictment, then the president just became an unindicted co-conspirator,” he said. “If they believe that what’s in this indictment was true, and that he was directed to make this payment ... then the president just became an unindicted co-conspirator, and he could become an indicted co-conspirator depending on the timing and circumstances.”

August 22, 2018 7:56 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Cohen entered a plea deal in federal court to a total of eight counts, five for tax evasion, one for a false statement to a bank and two related to campaign-finance charges. Most important, the plea states that Cohen, in committing the campaign-finance violations, acted at the behest of the “candidate.” There is only one candidate. The president of the United States has now been implicated in commission of federal crime(s) by his longtime lawyer..."

judges can reject guilty pleas

that's what should happen for the campaign "violations" here

this is a highly adventurous interpretation of the law

you won't find another case where it has been interpreted this way

Cohen has little to lose by pleading guilty to it

he did so to get a deal, which Mueller gave him as a clever way to make Trump look guilty of something

under these circumstances, this highly adventurous interpretation of the law should be tested in court

that's in the public interest

"The criminal liability here concerns violation of campaign-finance rules"

could you be specific? what rule is broken?

"Anonymous TTF's Troll is just another deplorable liar said...
Anon's bullshit claim = "no crime was committed"

What a liar you and your party of deplorables are.

FACT:

"President Trump’s former longtime attorney and his onetime campaign chairman were separately declared guilty Tuesday of eight crimes each, a dramatic collision of two investigations that intensified the legal and political pressure on the embattled president.""

when I said "no crime was committed", I was referring to a crime committed by Trump AND Cohen

that's obvious from the context

the fraud charges may be valid, although they are of a type that is not usually prosecuted

banks usually don't press charges if loans are paid even if fraud was committed obtaining them

August 22, 2018 7:59 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"A former Watergate prosecutor said that Tuesday’s plea deal by Michael Cohen means President Donald Trump now has something in common with President Richard Nixon.

“There’s no question about it,” Nick Akerman said on MSNBC. “This makes the president of the United States an unindicted co-conspirator.”"

a grand jury named Nixon an "unindicted co-conspirator"

in Trump's case, Cohen, a defendant, alleged that Trump was involved

completely different situation

"Cohen, Trump’s former personal attorney, admitted in his plea deal that he illegally interfered in the 2016 presidential election “at the direction of a candidate for federal office,” presumably Trump."

it's not illegal for campaigns to interfere in elections

indeed, it's their mission

how is managing public information illegal? Hillary certainly concealed many things

as a matter of fact, Russia is thought to have "interfered" in the election by revealing some things Hillary tried to conceal

“It’s an agreement, an agreement to commit campaign financing crimes. It’s a five-year felony. This is a serious matter.”

Trump can spend unlimited amounts of his own money for campaign activities

it's not illegal

August 22, 2018 9:04 AM  
Anonymous FEC said...

"Trump can spend unlimited amounts of his own money for campaign activities"

"Using the personal funds of the candidate
When candidates use their personal funds for campaign purposes, they are making contributions to their campaigns. Unlike other contributions, these candidate contributions are not subject to any limits. They must, however, be reported."

https://www.fec.gov/help-candidates-and-committees/candidate-taking-receipts/using-personal-funds-candidate/

August 22, 2018 9:27 AM  
Anonymous Blue wave building blocks said...

For a president who had promised to hire only the best, the twin results represented a stunning rebuke. Throughout these prosecutions, Mr. Trump vacillated between distancing himself from Mr. Manafort (he worked for the president for only “a very short period of time”) and embracing him (he is “a very good person”). Similarly, Mr. Trump flipped from fury that Mr. Cohen’s offices were raided to claiming that he and Mr. Cohen were never all that close. This contradictory excuse-making should not distract from the fact that the president has staffed his campaign and administration with shady characters, fringe ideologues and other opportunistic hangers-on who would never have approached their high positions but for Mr. Trump’s lack of judgment.

In Mr. Manafort, he hired a campaign chairman who made millions working for people interested in undermining democracy in the former Soviet Union, then used exotic methods to bring the money to the United States. As his scheme was unraveling, he was counting delegates for Mr. Trump’s Republican National Convention balloting.

Mr. Cohen spent years in the Trump Organization apparently putting out fires Mr. Trump started. This practice resulted in an illegal 2016 campaign contribution consisting of a $130,000 payoff to Stormy Daniels, an adult-film star alleging an affair with Mr. Trump. Trump lawyer Rudolph W. Giuliani said in May this was part of “a long-standing agreement that Michael Cohen takes care of situations like this, then gets paid for them sometimes.” In fact, Mr. Cohen said in court Tuesday that he paid hush money to Ms. Daniels “at the direction of” Mr. Trump. Campaign finance experts say Mr. Trump may now be considered a co-conspirator in Mr. Cohen’s crime. Meantime, Mr. Cohen also committed bank and tax fraud relating to his New York taxi and other businesses.

These revelations of guilt come on top of those of others who spent time in Mr. Trump’s orbit, including former national security adviser Michael Flynn, who admitted in a December plea deal that he lied to the FBI about his contact with Russian officials.

Mr. Cohen and Mr. Manafort are heading to prison. Mr. Flynn has yet to be sentenced. But it is unclear whether the man they worked for, the president, will face any formal scrutiny or consequences. The Constitution largely assigns that job to Congress, and powerful Republican lawmakers have seemed more interested in covering for Mr. Trump than investigating him.

Tuesday’s events must bring that partisan abdication of public duty to an end. Congress must open investigations into Mr. Trump’s role in the crime Mr. Cohen has admitted to. It is far too soon to say where such inquiries would lead. But legislators cannot in good conscience ignore an alleged co-conspirator in the White House.

August 22, 2018 9:37 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Using the personal funds of the candidate
When candidates use their personal funds for campaign purposes, they are making contributions to their campaigns. Unlike other contributions, these candidate contributions are not subject to any limits. They must, however, be reported."

thanks, but Cohen wasn't charged with failure to report to the FEC donations Trump made to himself

it wasn't Cohen's responsibility

"For a president who had promised to hire only the best, the twin results represented a stunning rebuke."

quite simply, a load of media rhetorical crap

other than the purchase of the women's stories, nothing was related to Trump

"These revelations of guilt come on top of those of others who spent time in Mr. Trump’s orbit, including former national security adviser Michael Flynn, who admitted in a December plea deal that he lied to the FBI about his contact with Russian officials."

the charge was bogus

even the FBI officials who interviewed Flynn thought the misstatement was inadvertent

"Mr. Cohen and Mr. Manafort are heading to prison. Mr. Flynn has yet to be sentenced. But it is unclear whether the man they worked for, the president, will face any formal scrutiny or consequences. The Constitution largely assigns that job to Congress, and powerful Republican lawmakers have seemed more interested in covering for Mr. Trump than investigating him.

Tuesday’s events must bring that partisan abdication of public duty to an end. Congress must open investigations into Mr. Trump’s role in the crime Mr. Cohen has admitted to. It is far too soon to say where such inquiries would lead. But legislators cannot in good conscience ignore an alleged co-conspirator in the White House."

thanks for copying the Post editorial page but we all read it already this morning

paying for the stories of the women was not a crime

August 22, 2018 9:54 AM  
Anonymous Trumplandia stinks said...

"other than the purchase of the women's stories, nothing was related to Trump"

So tRump's personal attorney and campaign manager were not related to tRump in your view?

Must be all that sand you planted your ass on interfering with your view.

""These revelations of guilt come on top of those of others who spent time in Mr. Trump’s orbit, including former national security adviser Michael Flynn, who admitted in a December plea deal that he lied to the FBI about his contact with Russian officials."

the charge was bogus"

Michael Flynn's plea was guilty. Flynn admitted "he lied to the FBI about his contact with Russian officials."

"paying for the stories of the women was not a crime"

Not reporting these campaign cover-up expenses was a crime.


August 22, 2018 10:48 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"So tRump's personal attorney and campaign manager were not related to tRump in your view?"

their personal lives and other clients and past history are not related to Trump, no

"Must be all that sand you planted your ass on interfering with your view."

lovely metaphor but my view is quite unimpeded

""the charge was bogus"

Michael Flynn's plea was guilty. Flynn admitted "he lied to the FBI about his contact with Russian officials.""

he was bullied and blackmailed

the FBI agent who interviewed him when he supposedly "lied" said he thought the error was inadvertent

Flynn would never have been found guilty

he got bad legal advice

"Not reporting these campaign cover-up expenses was a crime. "

perhaps, but Mueller must not have thought it was a significant crime because he didn't charge Cohen with it

and Mueller is generally very aggressive if he thinks can make any case at all

August 22, 2018 11:01 AM  
Anonymous Ex-congressional IT staffer sentenced to time served in loan case after prosecutors debunk [tRump touted] conspiracy theories said...

A former congressional technology staffer who became the target of a litany of political conspiracy theories was sentenced to time served Tuesday for lying on a loan application as a federal judge in Washington condemned his ongoing harassment by the “highest” levels of government over unfounded conspiracies.

In releasing Imran Awan, 38, U.S. District Judge Tanya S. Chutkan read aloud passages of court filings in which federal prosecutors debunked allegations promulgated on right-leaning news sites and fanned by President Trump on Twitter that suggested Awan was a Pakistani operative who secretly compromised computer files with cover from House Democrats. Chutkan also noted that the Virginia man’s July 3 guilty plea to a felony over a home-equity loan was unrelated to his work on Capitol Hill.

Prosecutors sought no jail time for Awan, who fully repaid the $165,000 loan within 30 days in 2017 before he knew he was under investigation for falsely claiming that a rental home was his wife’s main residence.

Chutkan noted “an unbelievable onslaught of scurrilous media attacks to which he and his family have been subjected,” as well as harassment and threats that “will probably continue some time” over the Internet and social media.

Without naming the president, Chutkan said, “There have been numerous allegations . . . accusations lobbed at him from the highest branches of the government, all of which have been proved to be without foundation by the FBI and the Department of Justice.”

In sentencing Awan to time served — which was one day in detention and 11 months of GPS monitoring — plus three months’ supervision, Chutkan concluded: “The court finds Mr. Awan and his family have suffered sufficiently.”

Awan and four of his associates, including family members, worked as IT specialists for dozens of Democratic lawmakers on the Hill until they were banned from the computer network in February 2017, having been accused of violating House security rules.

Trump — who has tweeted repeatedly about Awan, calling him the “Pakistani mystery man” — has continued to link him to the hacking of the Democratic National Committee server during the 2016 campaign, a breach intelligence agencies have concluded was directed by Russia.

Trump implicated Awan, and suggested that he worked for the DNC, as recently as July 16, after his summit in Helsinki with Russian President Vladi­mir Putin...

August 22, 2018 11:07 AM  
Anonymous tRump thugs will either fall on their swords for tRump or sing said...

""So tRump's personal attorney and campaign manager were not related to tRump in your view?"

their personal lives and other clients and past history are not related to Trump, no"

Do you think Cohen and Manafort are talking about their personal lives or other clients?

Come on Sandy!

Trump's personal attorney, Michael "Cohen has accused Trump of directing him to commit crimes with the intention of improperly influencing the 2016 election."

And while already facing years in jail for 8 crimes he was convicted of yesterday, Trump's former campaign manager, Paul Manafort will face second trial next month and prosecutors have double the evidence for a trial centered on allegations of lying to the FBI, money laundering and foreign lobbying.

"...Federal prosecutors said in the indictment filed in Washington against Manafort that he secretly enlisted a group of “former European politicians,” including a former European chancellor to advocate on behalf of the pro-Russian faction Manafort represented in Ukraine.

Prosecutors have asserted that Manafort wired the unnamed officials more than 2 million euros from his offshore accounts and tried to cover up their work even while holding a senior role in Trump's campaign..."

August 22, 2018 1:23 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

The Mirror Images of Donald Trump and Steven Seagal

Matthew Rozsa has a look at the many similarities between Donald Trump and Steven Seagal, now Putin’s “cultural ambassador” to the United States (he holds dual citizenship). He points out the incongruity of Seagal making so many movies pretending to be an environmental crusader, then backing Trump, who has been busy dismantling the EPA piece by piece. But there’s more.

Like the president he serves — the American one, not the Russian — Seagal embodies the ugliest sides of American political and cultural life. Just as Trump is plagued by accusations of sexual misconduct, and yet is put in positions of power despite those claims, so too is Seagal able to keep rising through the ranks regardless of alleged misconduct and abuse. Both men are also completely unqualified for the positions of power that they’ve obtained: They were washed-up entertainers, not statesmen, with Trump being little more than a male Paris Hilton before being elected president and Seagal having lost the nimble athleticism of his “Under Siege” days. Yet in a culture that can’t grasp the fact that fame alone does not endow any wisdom or worthiness, Seagal and Trump have used their bloated masculine images — one as an erstwhile action star, the other as a supposed giant of business — to gain offices they don’t deserve.

Finally, and most obnoxiously: Both Seagal and Trump fight for causes that enrich themselves and harm innocent people, even as they hypocritically put on populist airs.

Trump is famous for being a businessman but has filed for multiple business bankruptcies, and while he claims to fight for the working class, his trade policies are hitting target farmers and blue collar workers the hardest. Seagal, meanwhile, presents himself as a deeply spiritual, moral and nature-friendly action star in his movies, yet in real life sells out the environment if doing so will please other frail masculine egos, and exploits the vulnerable instead of protecting them.

It is perhaps fitting that Putin, the master manipulator from the KGB, can see right through these phony exteriors to the potential assets just waiting to be cultivated.

Both are thin-skinned sexual predators and pseudo-macho posers, exactly the kind of people with enormous appeal to a certain segment of the population — insecure white men prone to bigotry and xenophobia. That is both Trump’s base and Seagal’s target audience.

August 22, 2018 1:30 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Zinke caught red-handed trying to sell off public lands

His plan included selling part of Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument.

Environmental groups caught the Department of the Interior trying to sell off part of the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in Utah, despite a pledge by Secretary Ryan Zinke never to put public lands up for sale.

After massive backlash from environmental groups and the public, the Interior Department’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM) late Friday canceled all plans to sell off the land. The 1,610 acres of public lands that the BLM proposed selling to private interests had been part of the Grand Staircase national monument until President Donald Trump — in an extremely controversial move — radically shrunk the size of the monument last December.

“We believe the Department only walked it back because those who are closely reading the management plans brought this to light,” Nicole Croft, executive director of the Grand Staircase-Escalante Partners, said in a statement in response to the Interior Department changing its mind. Grand Staircase-Escalante Partners is a nonprofit group that works to protect the landscape and wildlife habitats the of the national monument

The environmental groups’ work “shows that diligence pays off and is likely an omen for what we’re going to uncover as we dive deeper into Secretary Zinke’s plans for leasing and decimating this national treasure,” Croft said.

New plans for Utah national monuments reveal resource extraction was goal of Trump’s attack

The Interior secretary has pledged on several occasions that he opposes the sale or transfer of public lands to private entities. At his confirmation hearing in January 2017, Zinke said: “I am absolutely against transfer or sale of public land.”

In a March 3, 2017 speech, only days after getting sworn in as secretary, Zinke promised Interior staffers: “You can hear it from my lips. We will not sell or transfer public land.”

Just last December, Zinke reiterated this pledge. “There’s not one square inch, not one square inch, of land that is removed from federal protection,” Zinke told Fox Business.

August 22, 2018 1:31 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

But then last Wednesday, the Trump administration released its management plans for the much smaller Grand Staircase and Bears Ears national monuments — prepared by the BLM and the U.S. Forest Service — that placed a priority on energy development and included the plan to sell off the 1,610 acres of public lands.

The plans cover the 880,000 acres carved out by Trump from Grand Staircase and the 200,000 acres remaining in Bears Ears from its original 1.35 million acres.

Either Zinke had a change of heart about selling off public lands or does not have a clear understanding of what his agency is doing.

In December, Trump announced the largest-ever reduction of a national monument in the nation’s history, shrinking Bears Ears by some 1.1 million acres, or nearly 85 percent. Trump also announced that he would be reducing Grand Staircase to nearly half its original size.

Environmental groups were not convinced that the planned sale of public lands in Utah was a mistake.

“The attempt was more than just Zinke’s dirty scheme to illegally sell off public lands, as some of the land slated for sale is adjacent to land owned by an avid Trump supporter and a current Republican lawmaker in Utah,” the Sierra Club said Friday in a statement.

One parcel of the public land that the BLM proposed selling was a 120-acre property that sits adjacent to 40 acres owned by Utah state Rep. Mike Noel (R) and which were removed from the monument.

Noel applauded Trump’s decision to shrink the size of the Grand Escalante monument. He unsuccessfully attempted to rename a Utah highway after Trump to thank the president for the executive order, HuffPost reported last week.

August 22, 2018 1:32 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

The Trump effect: World Tourism up, USA tourism down

People are afraid to visit the U.S. now that Trump is president.

The mango Mussolini views John Dean as a "Rat"? The guy who helped expose a criminal conspiracy in the White House? Unintentionally revealing, isn't it.
------------------------------------

Poll: Majority Say Trump Doesn’t Hire The Best People

President Donald Trump repeatedly said during the 2016 election that he would “hire the best people” for his administration, but a new poll Monday shows that most Americans don’t think he delivered on that promise.

The new Monmouth University Poll found that only 30 percent of respondents believe that Trump has hired the “best people,” with 58 percent saying he has not. Twelve percent of those polled responded either that the president’s hiring record was mixed or that they didn’t know about his hiring record.

Respondents held a dim view of how the Trump White House operates in general — just 19 percent said that they were “very confident” in the way that the president’s advisers and staff are handling their jobs, with 23 percent saying they were “somewhat confident” in White House personnel. More than half said they were “not too confident” or “not at all confident.

August 22, 2018 1:33 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Do you think Cohen and Manafort are talking about their personal lives or other clients?

Come on Sandy!"

I wonder if this jackass thinks he's impressing anyone

"Trump's personal attorney, Michael "Cohen has accused Trump of directing him to commit crimes with the intention of improperly influencing the 2016 election."

yes, we've discussed that

what Cohen pleaded to in connection with campaign violations wasn't a crime

and as Cohen has implicated someone else, under encouragement from a special prosecutor of dubious integrity, the plea should be rejected and a trial should be held

"The Trump effect: World Tourism up, USA tourism down

People are afraid to visit the U.S. now that Trump is president."

it's a scary place

tell all your foreign friends to visit Moscow instead

we could do with a few less tourists from overseas

August 22, 2018 1:47 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Wyatt/Regina/bad anonymous said ""the charge was bogus...even the FBI officials who interviewed Flynn thought the misstatement was inadvertent"

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!

He lied about it repeatedly, it was obviously NOT inadvertent.

August 22, 2018 1:49 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Good anonymous said "Not reporting these campaign cover-up expenses was a crime. "

Wyatt/Regina/bad anonymous said "perhaps, but Mueller must not have thought it was a significant crime because he didn't charge Cohen with it"

Fatuous nonsense.

Up until a few days ago all the millions of pieces of evidence seized from Cohen were still being reviewed to see which had attorney client privilege - the prosecution never had access to all this evidence until then so obviously they were in no position to charge Cohen with it until a few days ago. They then informed Cohen of the charges they were going to bring (including this charge) and Cohen under tremendous pressure and threat of jail time decided to plea guilty

So, the claim that they "didn't think it was a significant enough crime to charge Cohen with" is a lie(typical of Wyatt/Regina/bad anonymous).

August 22, 2018 1:55 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

as usual, Priya is lying

Cohen was charged with making the payments, not covering them up

what he did was not a crime

August 22, 2018 1:59 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Wyatt/Regina/bad anonymous said "Trump can spend unlimited amounts of his own money for campaign activities".

Irrelevant to the charges against Cohen and Trump's status as an unindicted co-conspirator.

The illegal campaign contributions were paid for by Cohen and the owner of the National Enquirer and that's what made them illegal.

The payments were made with the cooperation of and at the direction of Trump in order to influence the election. That made Trump a co-conspirator in an illegal act.

That Trump later repaid them is irrelevant, it doesn't make the original crime go away.

Further, Trump didn't declare these campaign contributions from outside donors to his campaign which is also a crime.


Trump committed crimes to get elected. If Republicans thought Obama, a duly elected president, shouldn't be able to appoint a supreme court justice as was his right then clearly Trump, an illegitimate president, cannot be allowed to appoint a supreme court justice who would be judging matters related to Trump's involvement in Russiagate.

No morally correct person with even a passing concern for the rule of law would support Trump being allowed to nominate the religious extremist Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court.

August 22, 2018 2:05 PM  
Anonymous Shut up, Sandy said...

Trump campaign chairman: Guilty
Trump personal attorney: Guilty
Trump deputy campaign chairman: Guilty
Trump National Security Advisor: Guilty
Trump foreign policy advisor: Guilty

August 22, 2018 2:06 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Wyatt/Regina/bad anonymous said " Priya is lying Cohen was charged with making the payments, not covering them up"

I was refering to the crime of Cohen making the illegal campaign contributions that you referred to, not to Trump's coverup of the payments so, once again, it is you being dishonest in falsely claiming that I lied.

Wyatt/Regina/bad anonymous said "what he did was not a crime".

Cohen, and the owner of the National Enquirer vastly exceeded the personal campaign contribution limits which IS a crime.

And Trump cooperated with and directed them to make those illegal campaign contributions which IS a crime.

And Trump did not report those campaign contributions which IS a crime.

Trump committed crimes without which he almost certainly would not have eked out the narrow electoral college victory he needed to become president.

Trump is an unindicted co-conspirator, a criminal, and NOT a legitimate president.

August 22, 2018 2:13 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Good anonymous said

"Trump campaign chairman: Guilty
Trump personal attorney: Guilty
Trump deputy campaign chairman: Guilty
Trump National Security Advisor: Guilty
Trump foreign policy advisor: Guilty"

And let's not forget:

Trump: Guilty

August 22, 2018 2:14 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"I was refering to the crime of Cohen making the illegal campaign contributions that you referred to, not to Trump's coverup of the payments so,"

no you weren't

you jumped into a conversation you weren't part of, but we were discussing the cover-up and you knew that

"Cohen, and the owner of the National Enquirer vastly exceeded the personal campaign contribution limits which IS a crime."

Cohen acted as an agent of Trump

very common lawyer-client relationship

that doesn't mean a contribution he makes on behalf of Trump is his own

that's ludicrous and any judge will agree, as they are all lawyers themselves

"And Trump cooperated with and directed them to make those illegal campaign contributions which IS a crime."

"directing" actually solidifies the agency relationship

he "directed" Cohen because Cohen was doing it on behalf of Trump

it wasn't Cohen's donation

it was Trump's

and Trump can make unlimited donations

"And Trump did not report those campaign contributions which IS a crime."

well, perhaps

but Mueller didn't charge anyone with failure to report donations

I can tell you that reports to the FEC often have errors

if every campaign was prosecuted for it, we could have no elections

"Trump committed crimes without which he almost certainly would not have eked out the narrow electoral college victory he needed to become president."

that's false

the electorate clearly isn't concerned with candidates' affairs

"Trump is an unindicted co-conspirator,"

no prosecutor or grand jury has designated him as such

this is just media rhetoric

"a criminal,"

no convictions

"and NOT a legitimate president."

he's legit per the Constitution

that's the law down here

August 22, 2018 2:46 PM  
Anonymous WHAT IN THE ACTUAL FUCK IS THIS WHAT IS HAPPENING RIGHT NOW said...


tRump speaks: "Sir, can you get this deal done immediately? I said it doesn't work that way, I don't want to go too fast. The deal's not going to be any good if we do that. We gotta take time, it's gotta gestate, right? The word gestate. It's like when you are cooking a chicken...time...time. Turkey for Thanksgiving. My mother would say "Oh, 8 hours." And I said "Eight hours!?" She made the greatest turkey I've ever had."

August 22, 2018 3:16 PM  
Anonymous Are these the good white supremacists? said...

A Maryland Ku Klux Klan leader who fired a gun at a black counterprotester during last year’s deadly white supremacy rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, has been ordered to spend the next four years behind bars.

Richard W. Preston, 53, was sentenced Tuesday after pleading guilty in May to a charge of firing a weapon within 1,000 feet of a school property. During the Aug. 12, 2017, “Unite the Right” rally, hundreds of white supremacists took to the streets with chants of “Jews will not replace us” and “blood and soil.”

The event turned violent as anti-racism protesters met racists in the streets. Heather Heyer, 32, was killed when she was struck by a car driven by a white supremacist. That same day, Preston was captured on video firing at the feet of black counterprotester Corey Long. Long was wielding an aerosol can that he sprayed onto a lighter. Preston’s attorney, Elmer Woodward, tried to argue that his client was protecting himself.

“Somebody had to put a stop to that flamethrower,” Woodard said. “The rules go out the window when flamethrowers are involved.”

Long is facing his own charges of misdemeanor assault and disorderly conduct.

Many of the racists identified at the rallies have lost their jobs, while other bigots were given prison time. Earlier this year, 23-year-old Jacob Scott Goodwin was found guilty in the beating of a black man at the same rally. Video captured Goodwin and others beating 20-year-old DeAndre Harris in a parking garage. A jury recommended that Goodwin be sentenced to 10 years in prison.

Meanwhile, white nationalist leader Richard Spencer is facing a federal lawsuit over his role in the rally and has been having trouble finding a lawyer to represent him.

More recently, neo-Nazi Jason Kessler ― who helped organize the rally ― was seen on video getting yelled at by his dad, with whom he was living as of June 28.

Congratulation to Preston and the “master race.” You’ve lost again.

August 22, 2018 3:29 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

The proof that Trump directed his lawyer Cohen to commit criminal acts to influence the election means that Trump's presidency is not only illegitimate but criminal. It means a presidential election was compromised by the most insidious criminal conspiracy in American history. It means that Trump is a traitor and that Putin determined the outcome. The impeachment bar has been reached.

August 22, 2018 4:25 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

The Guardian:

"The news over the past 24 hours is a sobering reminder of how closely the president of the United States resembles a crime boss struggling to keep his head above water as his henchmen are picked off by law enforcement one by one."

August 22, 2018 4:49 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

With a corruption indictment of Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif) capping Republicans's hell day, GOP guru Mike Allen told Axios "The Republican party looks like a criminal enterprise"

Hunter was the second member of Congress to endorse Trump. The first was Rep Chris Collins (R-N.Y.), charged two weeks ago with insider trading.

Mike, the Republican party looks like a criminal enterprise because it IS a criminal enterprise.

August 22, 2018 5:01 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Crazy Wyatt/Regina/bad anonymous absurdly claim being gay is immoral but look at them here lying left and right to defend an admitted sexual predator who defrauded the American public by keeping critical information about him from them in an illegal act that allowed him to eke out the narrowest of possible electoral college wins to become president.

They're just as corrupt as Trump!

August 22, 2018 5:13 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"The proof that Trump directed his lawyer Cohen to commit criminal acts to influence the election"

what the evidence shows is that Trump directed his lawyer to make a payment on his behalf, which would be reimbursed

that's completely legal

the fact that he didn't want his adulterous affairs to be public knowledge is irrelevant to its legality

"means that Trump's presidency is not only illegitimate but criminal. It means a presidential election was compromised by the most insidious criminal conspiracy in American history. It means that Trump is a traitor and that Putin determined the outcome. The impeachment bar has been reached."

clearly, Priya believes hyperbole makes scurrilous accusations credible

I think Adolf Hitler expressed a similar view in his demented writings

August 22, 2018 5:54 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

to see how ludicrous the campaign violation charges against Cohen are, consider this:

they rest on the assumption that paying for the stories of the two women was a campaign expenditure because it would protect Trump's reputation

what if the payments for the stories had been made out of campaign funds that had been lawfully donated?

right now, the Dems and media (I apologize for the redundancy), would be claiming Trump paid for personal expenses out of campaign funds

this is one more case of Mueller twisting the law

one more reason for him to be dismissed

August 23, 2018 6:55 AM  
Anonymous "The evidence was overwhelming" said...

A juror who participated in the trial of President Donald Trump's former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, said just one holdout prevented the jury from convicting Manafort on all of the 18 federal charges he faced.

In a Fox News interview on Wednesday, Paula Duncan, a self-described Trump supporter, said the unidentified juror was not convinced that Manafort was guilty of all 18 criminal charges he faced.

"We all tried to convince her to look at the paper trail, we laid it out in front of her again and again," Duncan said during an interview with Fox News host Shannon Bream.

Manafort was ultimately convicted on eight counts on five counts of tax fraud, two counts of bank fraud, and one count of failure to report a foreign bank account. The judge declared a mistrial on the remaining 10 counts.

Duncan claimed that the holdout juror is the one who prompted them to send a note to Judge T.S. Ellis asking for an explanation of the term, "reasonable doubt."

"Most of us did not want that question out there ... we felt a little foolish," Duncan said.

The interview Wednesday night marked the first time a juror has publicly identified themselves after the trial. Judge Ellis cautioned against publicizing the juror's identities, citing the high-profile nature of the case. Ellis previously said he had personally received "criticism and threats" while presiding over the trial.

"I don't feel a threat," Duncan said. "I'm an American, I'm a citizen, I feel I did my civic duty. I don't think I need to hide behind anything. I'm not afraid at all."

Duncan said she wanted to come forward because "the public, America, needed to know how close this was."

"The evidence was overwhelming," Duncan said. "I did not want Paul Manafort to be guilty, but he was, and no one is above the law. So it was our obligation to look through all of the evidence."

August 23, 2018 8:10 AM  
Anonymous The moral rot is spreading said...

What President Trump and his cadre have done is very bad.

What Republican leaders are doing is unforgivable.

Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) stood on the Senate floor Wednesday morning for his first public remarks since the seismic events of the day before: The president’s former personal lawyer pleaded guilty to fraud and breaking campaign finance laws, implicating the president in a crime; the president’s former campaign chairman was convicted on eight counts of financial crimes, making him one of five members of Trump’s team who have been convicted or have admitted guilt; and a Republican congressman was indicted, the second of Trump’s earliest congressional supporters to be charged this month.

It was time for leadership. McConnell ducked.

Instead, he hailed Trump’s campaign rally in West Virginia the night before. He disparaged President Barack Obama’s record. He spoke about low unemployment “under this united Republican government.” He went on about coal, taxes, apprenticeship programs, health research, prisoner rehabilitation and more — and not a peep about the corruption swirling around the president. When reporters pressed McConnell in the hallway for comment, he brushed them off.

McConnell’s counterpart in the House, Speaker Paul D. Ryan (Wis.), was equally cowardly. “We are aware of Mr. [Michael] Cohen’s guilty plea to these serious charges” was his office’s official statement. “We will need more information than is currently available at this point.”

What more do you need, Mr. Speaker? What more will it take, Republicans? It seems nothing can bring them to state what is manifestly true: The president is unfit to serve, surrounded by hooligans and doing incalculable harm...

...there doesn’t have to be collusion, or even speculation, to recognize that something is terribly wrong. There is no good answer to the question Cohen lawyer Lanny Davis posed after his client said under oath that Trump directed him to pay off two women to influence the election: “If those payments were a crime for Michael Cohen, then why wouldn’t they be a crime for Donald Trump?”

A few Republican senators (Jeff Flake, Bob Corker, Ben Sasse, Susan Collins, Richard Burr) have rhetorically distanced themselves from Trump. But their modest efforts don’t sufficiently protect the party, or the country, from Trump’s sleaze and self-dealing.

The moral rot is spreading. Two weeks ago, Rep. Chris Collins (R-N.Y.) was arrested on charges related to insider trading — from the White House lawn. On Tuesday, Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) and his wife were charged with using campaign funds for travel, golf, skiing, tuition, tickets, clothing, makeup, dental work and more, often while claiming the funds were being used on charities.

His office’s Trumpian response: “This action is purely politically motivated.”

If Republicans don’t put some moral distance between themselves and Trump, there will soon be nothing left to salvage.

August 23, 2018 9:54 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"The president is unfit to serve, surrounded by hooligans and doing incalculable harm..."

Manafort's crimes didn't do any incalculable harm

tax fraud?

stupid and wrong but generally not prosecuted because it's hard to prove intent and the IRS usually will settle for getting their money plus penalties

please let us know the "incalculable harm"

bank fraud?

no one has ever been convicted or charged with this when the bank has gotten repaid

no harm at all, much less "incalculable harm"

failure to report dealing with a foreign entity?

LOL

happens all the time

indeed, the brother of Hillary's campaign manager has done this and has yet to be indicted

please let us know the "incalculable harm"

"...there doesn’t have to be collusion, or even speculation, to recognize that something is terribly wrong."

we have elections for people to express that view

it's not a matter for Congressional action

"There is no good answer to the question Cohen lawyer Lanny Davis posed after his client said under oath that Trump directed him to pay off two women to influence the election: “If those payments were a crime for Michael Cohen, then why wouldn’t they be a crime for Donald Trump?”"

actually, there's an excellent answer to that question

Cohen didn't commit a crime

he was bullied into pleading to these bogus campaign finance violations by a prosecutor threatening to arrest his wife

when this is all over, a Congressional committee needs to investigate Mueller's entire career and reform the prosecutor function to protect the civil rights of Americans

"A few Republican senators (Jeff Flake, Bob Corker, Ben Sasse, Susan Collins, Richard Burr) have rhetorically distanced themselves from Trump. But their modest efforts don’t sufficiently protect the party, or the country, from Trump’s sleaze and self-dealing."

all Republican Senators have admirably resisted media pressure and continue to pursue policies in the best interests of all Americans

Trump, while no poster boy for civility and dignity, has nonetheless done a good job and kept his campaign promises

"The moral rot is spreading. Two weeks ago, Rep. Chris Collins (R-N.Y.) was arrested on charges related to insider trading — from the White House lawn. On Tuesday, Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) and his wife were charged with using campaign funds for travel, golf, skiing, tuition, tickets, clothing, makeup, dental work and more, often while claiming the funds were being used on charities.

His office’s Trumpian response: “This action is purely politically motivated.”

If Republicans don’t put some moral distance between themselves and Trump, there will soon be nothing left to salvage."

Collins and Hunter don't work in the White House

btw, Lanny Davis, Cohen's lawyer, and former Clinton lawyer, yesterday confirmed that the Steele dossier's accounts of Cohen in Prague are false

August 23, 2018 10:54 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Ever since the news broke that Michael Cohen pleaded guilty to finance laws and swore that candidate Donald Trump directed him to do so, I have been reviewing the morass of rules and laws that govern campaign finance. I have been teaching and practicing criminal law for more than a half century, and yet, I have to acknowledge that I am having difficulty understanding the laws as they relate to the allegations made by Cohen against President Trump.

A few things are clear. A candidate is free to contribute to his or her own campaign. It also is not criminal for a candidate to pay hush money to women whose disclosures might endanger his campaign. So if candidate Trump paid hush money to his two accusers, there would be no violation of any campaign or other laws. To be sure, if he did so for the purpose of helping his campaign — as distinguished from helping his marriage — his campaign would have to disclose any such contribution, and failure to do so might be a violation of a campaign law, but the payments themselves would be entirely lawful.

If, on the other hand, Michael Cohen made the payments by himself, without direction from the president, that would constitute an impermissible campaign contribution from a third party. But if Cohen was merely acting as Trump’s lawyer and advancing Trump’s payments, with an expectation of repayment, then it would be hard to find a campaign finance crime other than failure to report by the campaign.

Failure to report all campaign contributions is fairly common in political campaigns. Moreover, the offense is committed not by the candidate but, rather, by the campaign and is generally subject to a fine. Though it is wrong, it certainly is not the kind of high crime and misdemeanor that could serve as the basis for a constitutionally authorized impeachment and removal of a duly elected president.

Moreover, prosecutors should be reluctant to rely on the uncorroborated word of a guilty defendant who pleaded guilty to lying and defrauding. Thomas Jefferson once observed that a criminal statute, to be fairly enforceable, must be so clear that it can be understood by the average person who reads it “while running.” Jefferson did not mean while running for office; he meant that a criminal statute should not be subject to varying reasonable interpretations.

Anyone reading the collection of statutes, regulations and rules that govern elections would immediately conclude — even while sitting — that they do not satisfy this Jeffersonian criteria. Reasonable people can disagree about whether these open-ended laws apply to any of the acts and omissions alleged against Trump by Cohen.

An overzealous prosecutor could, of course, stretch the words of the accordion-like statute to target a political enemy, or read it more narrowly to favor a political friend. If the same morass of laws were being applied to a President Hillary Clinton, civil libertarians would be up in arms about their ambiguity and lack of clarity.

You wouldn’t know all this if you just watched those cable-television stations that are determined to find crimes and impeachable offenses against President Trump without regard to the law, the facts or consideration of civil liberties. If one applies a single standard without regard to politics, what I call “the shoe on the other foot test,” there are still large gaps between Michael Cohen’s plea of guilty, on the one hand, and crimes or impeachable offenses against Donald Trump on the other. Until and unless those gaps are filled with credible evidence of criminal behavior by the president, his enemies should be cautious about tolling the death knell for this presidency.

August 23, 2018 11:46 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Wyatt/Regina/bad anonymous said "Moreover, prosecutors should be reluctant to rely on the uncorroborated word of a guilty defendant who pleaded guilty to lying and defrauding."

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!

Wow! Talk about having your head in the sand! There is all kinds of corroborating evidence to show Trump coordinated with and directed Cohen to make the illegal campaign contributions.

We've all heard the tape of Trump setting up the criminal payment with Cohen. In addition the prosecutor has other recordings, bank and phone records, emails and text messages corroborating Cohen's statement that he made the payments to Trump's mistresses to influence the election at the direction of Trump.

No honest informed person can deny Trump committed a crime and a massive fraud on the American public to be elected president.

August 23, 2018 12:39 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Trump Paid $420,000 to Keep Women Quiet During Campaign, Covered It Up

Turns out the $130,000 payment to Stormy Daniels was only the tip of the iceberg when it came to Trump paying off mistresses to keep them quiet during the 2016 presidential campaign. He reimbursed Michael Cohen $420,000 in hush money payments and they used fake invoices from a shell company to cover up the purpose of those payments.

President Trump’s real estate company authorized paying $420,000 to lawyer Michael Cohen in his effort to silence women during the presidential campaign and then relied on “sham” invoices from Cohen that concealed the nature of the payments, according to legal filings released Tuesday.

The payments began flowing in February 2017, soon after Trump took office, when Cohen approached Trump Organization executives seeking to be reimbursed for “election-related” expenses, prosecutors said.

That included a $130,000 payment Cohen had made to adult-film star Stormy Daniels so she would remain silent about an alleged affair with Trump, according to the court documents.

Trump executives decided Cohen should be paid more than he sought — an additional $360,000 for expenses and other fees and taxes, plus a $60,000 bonus, prosecutors said.

Can’t wait to hear from all those people who wanted Bill Clinton impeached for lying about his affair with Monica Lewinsky. If lying about a single affair is an impeachable offense, how about lying about multiple affairs — and could anyone doubt that there are many more out there than just Daniels and Karen McDougal? — then paying them to keep quiet, covering up the payments with fake companies and fake invoices? Indeed, for Trump this seems to have been just business as usual. It’s one of the big reasons he kept Cohen around, to pay off all the women he had affairs with and cover up those payments.

And I’d still love to know how many abortions Trump paid for. I bet it’s a pretty high number.

August 23, 2018 12:39 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

To be clear, Trump's position is now that Michael Cohen randomly wandered into a courtroom, pleaded guilty to things that weren't even crimes, and the judge just went along with it.

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!

August 23, 2018 1:22 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Wow! Talk about having your head in the sand! There is all kinds of corroborating evidence to show Trump coordinated with and directed Cohen to make the illegal campaign contributions."

here Priya lies

if you don't believe me, read the Washington Post editorial page this morning

they say it's not clear if this is true

I guess they don't have the same resources as a foreign troll

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!

Wow!

"We've all heard the tape of Trump setting up the criminal payment with Cohen."

I've heard it

it's not clear what they are talking about

"In addition the prosecutor has other recordings, bank and phone records, emails and text messages corroborating Cohen's statement that he made the payments to Trump's mistresses to influence the election at the direction of Trump."

here Priya lies

if you don't believe me, read the Washington Post editorial page this morning

they say it's not clear if this is true

I guess they don't have the same resources as a foreign troll

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!

Wow!

"No honest informed person can deny Trump committed a crime and a massive fraud on the American public to be elected president."

no honest lawyer actually thinks a campaign violation was committed

1. it's probably not a campaign expense

if it were, virtually everything a client does to project an image would be

get a haircut, give his employees a bonus, attend an opera, buy girl scout cookies, et al

this is obviously warped

2. since it's clear Cohen was making the payment for Trump and was to be reimbursed as part of a conventional lawyer-client relationship

under the law, Trump can spend unlimited amounts for his own campaign

"Trump Paid $420,000 to Keep Women Quiet During Campaign, Covered It Up"

here, Priya admits Trump paid the payments through Cohen

they weren't donations by Cohen

the line of reasoning in charging Cohen is so flawed that if this go to court, Mueller might be sanctioned for frivolous litigation

"Can’t wait to hear from all those people who wanted Bill Clinton impeached for lying about his affair with Monica Lewinsky. If lying about a single affair is an impeachable offense, how about lying about multiple affairs"

Clinton wasn't impeached for "lying about a single affair"

he was impeached or lying under oath

"— and could anyone doubt that there are many more out there than just Daniels and Karen McDougal? — then paying them to keep quiet, covering up the payments with fake companies and fake invoices? Indeed, for Trump this seems to have been just business as usual."

yes, it does

which just reinforces the obvious:

these weren't campaign expenditures

"And I’d still love to know how many abortions Trump paid for. I bet it’s a pretty high number."

on this, I'm in rare agreement with Priya

August 23, 2018 1:32 PM  
Anonymous guess who will be re-elected...... said...

President Trump has given himself an A+ for the job he’s done in office thus far.

In a cable TV interview broadcast on Thursday morning, Trump was asked, “What grade do you give yourself so far?”

“I give myself an A+. I don’t think any president has ever done what I’ve done in this short…we haven’t even been two years,” he replied. “Biggest tax cuts in history. Soon to be two unbelievable Supreme Court justices. I’m sure that Justice Kavanaugh will be approved. Justice Gorsuch has been a star. You look at all of the things we’ve done with regulations. The economy is the best it’s ever been in history.”

August 23, 2018 1:38 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Why did Michael Cohen ask the Trump campaign to pay him back $50,000 for "tech services"?

In August of 2016 Cohen submitted an invoice to the Trump campaign for $50,000 for "tech services". "Coincidentally", that is the same time period where the Steel Dossier says Cohen travelled to Europe to meet with representatives of the Russian government to discuss paying for the services of a Russian computer troll farm that was trying to swing the election to Trump. According to the Steele Dossier Cohen and the Russians discussed how to make the payments while keeping them secret so there would be plausible deniability that the Trump campaign had paid for the illegal Russian interference.

If this is true (and it certainly looks as though it is), the Trump campaign is guilty of a conspiracy with a foreign government to rig the election in favour of Trump - this is a wide ranging criminal act.

Desperate Donny likes to claim the Steele Dossier has been discredited but in fact nothing in the Steele Dossier has been proven to be false, and much of it has been proven to be true.

August 23, 2018 1:41 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Laughably pathetic Sarah-Huckabee Sanders, the president's spokesperson, when asked about Trump directing Cohen to commit crimes keeps repeating "There are no charges against the president".

The only reason there are no charges against the president is that it is Justice Department policy that a sitting president cannot be charged with a crime.

So the fact that there are no charges against the president in no way means he didn't commit these crimes.

Keep in mind that this is just Justice Department policy that is subject to change. It has never been determined in a court of law that a sitting president cannot be charged with a crime.


This is why it is the height of corruption for Trump to be allowed to appoint a supreme court justice he selected merely because the nominee has in the past stated that he doesn't believe a sitting president can be charged with a crime.

The Supreme Court may well be asked to answer questions such as whether or not a president can be subpoenaed, charged with a crime, or can pardon himself. Only in a kangaroo court can the accused get to choose those who will sit in judgement of him.

The Trump presidency is rife with corruption and rotten to the core.

August 23, 2018 1:49 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Trump's long time friend, the owner of the National Enquirer, has corroborated Cohen's statement that Trump directed them to commit crimes to influence the 2016 election.

Not that that is really needed as we have all heard the tape of Trump and Cohen discussing how to make the illegal payments to Trump's mistresses to keep them quite and massively defraud the American public during the 2016 election and in addition there are other recorders, text messages, email messages, phone and bank records that prove Trump committed multiple crimes related to his perverting the outcome of the 2016 election.

August 23, 2018 1:53 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

In the backdrop of all this criminal liability for Trump, the Southern Distract of New York is going after Trump, his three kids and the Trump corporation over the crooked Trump foundation that was supposed to be a charity.

Trump and his campaign repeatedly used funds given to the charity for their personal use and failed to carry out the most basic of legal oversight of the foundation required by law.

Ooooooo, this is getting good!

August 23, 2018 1:55 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Attorney General for New York announces lawsuit against Donald J. Trump "Charity" foundation and its board of directors for extensive and persistent violations of state and federal law.

August 23, 2018 2:30 PM  
Anonymous Jesus said...

Let he who hasn't raw dogged a porn star just after the birth of his fifth child with his third wife cast the first stone.

August 23, 2018 2:59 PM  
Anonymous toes on the water, ass in the sand, not a worry in the world, cold beer in my hand, life is good said...

"Desperate Donny likes to claim the Steele Dossier has been discredited but in fact nothing in the Steele Dossier has been proven to be false, and much of it has been proven to be true."

the consensus is now that it was all false

it was a tool to start a witch hunt against Trump, which has gone surprisingly bad

I would have guessed that someone as wealthy as Trump would have something that a rabid prosecutor could make something of, but nothing

Lanny Davis, a long-time Clintonite now says the section of the dossier that puts Cohen in Prague is false

keep in mind that Cohen is highly motivated to give Mueller something

further, Lanny Davis also says, contrary to reports, that Trump did not know about the Trump Tower meeting in advance

meanwhile, our little friend Priya keeps spouting lies from cable news clowns at CNN and CNBC

no, Trump did not violate any campaign finance laws

and here comes Brett Kavanaugh

August 23, 2018 4:25 PM  
Anonymous more about Comey's lies said...

When then-FBI Director James Comey announced he was closing the Hillary Clinton email investigation for a second time just days before the 2016 election, he certified to Congress that his agency had “reviewed all of the communications” discovered on a personal laptop used by Clinton’s closest aide, Huma Abedin, and her husband, Anthony Weiner.

At the time, many wondered how investigators managed over the course of one week to read the “hundreds of thousands” of emails residing on the machine, which had been a focus of a sex-crimes investigation of Weiner, a former Congressman.

Comey later told Congress that “thanks to the wizardry of our technology,” the FBI was able to eliminate the vast majority of messages as “duplicates” of emails they’d previously seen. Tireless agents, he claimed, then worked “night after night after night” to scrutinize the remaining material.

But virtually none of his account was true, a growing body of evidence reveals.

In fact, a technical glitch prevented FBI technicians from accurately comparing the new emails with the old emails. Only 3,077 of the 694,000 emails were directly reviewed for classified or incriminating information. Three FBI officials completed that work in a single 12-hour spurt the day before Comey again cleared Clinton of criminal charges.

“Most of the emails were never examined, even though they made up potentially 10 times the evidence” of what was reviewed in the original year-long case that Comey closed in July 2016, said a law enforcement official with direct knowledge of the investigation.

Yet even the "extremely narrow" search that was finally conducted, after more than a month of delay, uncovered more classified material sent and/or received by Clinton through her unauthorized basement server, the official said. Contradicting Comey’s testimony, this included highly sensitive information dealing with Israel and the U.S.-designated terrorist group Hamas. The former secretary of state, however, was never confronted with the sensitive new information and it was never analyzed for damage to national security.

Even though the unique classified material was improperly stored and transmitted on an unsecured device, the FBI did not refer the matter to U.S. intelligence agencies to determine if national security had been compromised, as required under a federally mandated “damage assessment” directive.

The newly discovered classified material “was never previously sent out to the relevant original classification authorities for security review,” the official, who spoke to RealClearInvestigations on the condition of anonymity, said.

Other key parts of the investigation remained open when the embattled director announced to Congress he was buttoning the case back up for good just ahead of Election Day.

One career FBI special agent involved in the case complained to New York colleagues that officials in Washington tried to “bury" the new trove of evidence, which he believed contained the full archive of Clinton's emails — including long-sought missing messages from her first months at the State Department.

If the FBI “soft-pedaled” the original investigation of Clinton’s emails, as some critics have said, it out-and-out suppressed the follow-up probe related to the laptop, sources for this article said.

“There was no real investigation and no real search,” said Michael Biasello, a 27-year veteran of the FBI. "It was all just show — eyewash — to make it look like there was an investigation before the election.”

August 23, 2018 4:52 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Trump's "power" lies in his ability to give folks angry with their own failures someone to blame: minorities, the press, the law, gays, and women

-------------------------------------

At 1:10 a.m. a perfectly innocent man jolts awake in a cold sweat of terror, seizes his phone from the litter of burger wrappers in his bed, hits Caps Lock, and screams into the cyber void, as perfectly innocent men do.

@realDonaldTrump "NO COLLUSION - RIGGED WITCH HUNT!"

August 23, 2018 5:07 PM  
Anonymous Manafort will be pardoned after Mueller wraps up said...

Trump's attorney, Rudy Giuliani, said Thursday that Trump asked for advice on whether to pardon his former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort.

Giuliani said that Trump sought advice while Manafort's financial fraud trial was taking place, and that the president felt that Manafort was being mistreated by federal prosecutors.
tol
The president's lawyers advocated against issuing a pardon in this case, saying Trump should wait until after special counsel Robert Mueller concludes his Russia probe, according to Giuliani, who said that Trump agreed.

Giuliani's remarks come two days after Manafort was convicted on eight charges of bank and tax fraud.

Guiliani said that Trump sought the advice as he grew agitated over Manafort's exposure on charges unrelated to his work for Trump. Guiliani and fellow attorney, Jay Sekulow, counseled Trump to wait to see if special counsel Robert Mueller released a potentially damaging report regarding the Russia investigation.

“We told him he should wait until all the investigations are over,” Giuliani told the Post. “This Special Counsel case is a strange case. It won’t be decided by a jury. It will decided by the Justice Department and Congress and ultimately the American people. You have to be sensitive to public optics."

Trump has issued strong support for Manafort since Tuesday’s conviction. He praised Manafort as “brave” shortly after he was found guilty of five counts of tax fraud, two counts of bank fraud and one count of failing to disclose a foreign bank account.

August 23, 2018 5:10 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

The entire media-political-government-power complex camped along the Potomac River in this humid August heat officially lost its collective mind this week.

In an orgy of political drama playing out in courtrooms up and down the Acela corridor, President Trump’s lawyer and his one-time campaign manager stand convicted of various crimes. In this fever worse than Joe McCarthy’s Red Scare, President Trump — therefore — has been officially declared guilty by association!

Paul Manafort, Mr. Trump’s campaign manager for six minutes during the summer of 2016, was found guilty of a host of crimes dating back more than a decade relating to his various business ventures, none of which has anything to do with President Trump.

What is interesting about the case against Mr. Manafort is that prosecutors had declined to pursue some of the charges way back when. But that was BEFORE Mr. Manafort betrayed the political establishment by working for Mr. Trump’s presidential campaign.

Once he committed that cardinal sin, all bets were off.

That is why so many people see this whole crusade as a dangerous and dishonest political prosecution. It is not Paul Manafort that people care about. It is the idea that Mr. Manafort got shoved through a political-criminal meat-grinder all because he worked for Donald Trump.

Where was this prosecutorial zeal when it came to Hillary Clinton and her illegal bathroom email server or all the obvious global pay-to-play shakedowns by the Clinton Foundation?

If people in Washington honestly want to understand the hostility and distrust American voters have for their federal government, they must admit that this stinks to the high heavens.

Then there is former Trump lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen, who has turned on the president like a scalded cur dog.

In case anyone wonders if Mr. Trump has lost his wickedly funny sense of humor, hold your nose and take a peek at Twitter.

“If anyone is looking for a good lawyer, I would strongly suggest that you don’t retain the services of Michael Cohen!” Mr. Trump crowed hours after Mr. Cohen pleaded guilty to a range of charges relating to his taxi cab business and law practice, including legal work he did directly for Mr. Trump.

Mr. Cohen’s lawyer? Lanny Davis, who became famous representing former President Bill Clinton during his endless saga of scandals.

Political incest, anyone? Pass the barf bag.

Again, this is why nobody trusts politics in America anymore. This is why people voted for Donald Trump.

Mr. Trump might be all these horrible things that people say about him. A loud, brutish, bullying narcissist. But at least he is NOT a Washington politician.

As for the charges against Michael Cohen, Mr. Trump’s former lawyer claims Mr. Trump ordered him to pay a porn actress and a Playboy model for their silence. This, Mr. Cohen claims, is a violation of campaign finance. (Yeah, like Michael Cohen knows the first thing about campaign finance laws.)

And then Mr. Trump was not exactly forthcoming about it. Really?

Well, here is a NEWS FLASH: Donald J. Trump did pay a porn actress and a former Playboy model for their silence. And not a single person in all of America ever doubted that is exactly what happened from the first moment they heard about any of it.

And they don’t care! You know why?

Because at least Donald Trump still isn’t a dirty, self-dealing, dishonest Washington politician.

August 23, 2018 5:38 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Mother Teresa Shelter Kicks Woman Out for Being Gay

My friend Hemley Gonzalez. who has devoted his life to building a secular alternative to Mother Teresa’s charities in India, writes about one of her shelters in Amsterdam, which kicked out a Ugandan woman who fled her home country out of fear for her life because she is a lesbian. So they doubled down on the bigotry and hatred.

A Ugandan asylum seeker in Amsterdam was not allowed to return to a shelter hosted by the Missionaries of Charity after its nuns discovered she had been to a Pride parade, reports NL Times…

Justine (whose last name has not been identified) fled Uganda to the Netherlands last year because of persecution she faced for being a lesbian. She moved into a 24-hour shelter hosted by Missionaries of Charity for safety on Friday while her lawyer worked on her asylum application. That same day volunteered for RozeLinks (an LGBTQ advocacy branch of the Dutch green party) to help set up their Canal Pride boat for Amsterdam pride.

“When she returned to the shelter on Friday and told the nuns where she had been, she was told that she was not allowed to sleep in the shelter,” Rozelinks board member Savana Koolen who spoke with Justine and one of the nuns told the local newspaper Het Parool.

“She was told that her presence would be dangerous to the other women and children who slept there. Unless she denies being a lesbian from now on, she had to leave,” the nuns told Justine, according to Het Parool.

This isn’t charity, it’s bigotry. And it highlights the importance of building secular alternatives that do not engage in discrimination. She is a human being, period. The fact that she’s gay should be totally irrelevant to the situation. If you believe in providing shelter and safety to those who need it, then set your religious hatreds aside and help everyone. Or just shut down.

August 23, 2018 5:51 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

"She was told that her presence would be dangerous to the other women and children who slept there."

Lesbian woman with no home and probably tired from a day of working on a boat has to GTFO, but I bet they throw the doors wide open for any priest that wanders into the area drawn by the smell of children.

Religious bigots put up a facade claiming their bigotry is due to "sincerely held religious beliefs" but that's obviously bullshit - the only people they are "concerned" about refusing service to are LGBT people. It never crosses their minds to discriminate against other "sinners" like divorced people, those of other religions, unmarried cohabitating couples and so on. They are really motivated by the need to feel superior to someone and LGBT people come readily to mind because we've been seeking to get the same rights the bigots have always had and to the unjustly privileged equality feels like oppression.

August 23, 2018 5:52 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

President Trump’s longtime attorney Michael Cohen pointed a finger at his old boss Tuesday, saying he committed two campaign finance crimes at the direction of Trump when he arranged six-figure payoffs for women alleging affairs.

"His crime was the president's crime," Cohen attorney Lanny Davis, a Democrat who represented former President Bill Clinton in the 1990s, told Fox News Wednesday.

But legal experts say Cohen didn't actually commit a campaign finance crime, leading to speculation about why he pleaded guilty, and what his confession may mean for Trump.

The criminal case against Cohen dealt largely with unrelated tax and bank fraud charges. The campaign finance charges were the only ones directly related to Trump, and in pleading guilty he accepted a contentious legal theory that payoffs to porn star Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal were campaign contributions.

Among election law experts, however, there’s doubt that Cohen committed a crime. Skeptics say silencing the women may have helped Trump during the 2016 campaign, but also protected Trump's family and company from embarrassment, meaning it wasn't an election contribution.

Experts point to the failed prosecution against former Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C., whose wealthy supporters gave money to his mistress Rielle Hunter to silence her.

“The big fish here is Trump, and this is a long way toward trying to ‘get Trump,’ so to speak,” said Bradley Smith, a former chairman of the Federal Election Commission.

But Smith, a professor at Capital University Law School who is "not a big fan of Trump," said Cohen’s plea doesn’t torpedo the president, given the legal question is unsettled.

“I think it is not a crime to pay a mistress in this way, because it’s not a campaign expense, even though it is something that potentially benefits the campaign,” he said.

Smith said campaign finance offenses are generally dealt with civil fines unless the offense is “knowing and willful,” a difficult standard when precedent is unsettled. “Knowing and willful is what makes it criminal, absent the knowing and willful it’s just a civil violation and you get a fine,” he said.

August 23, 2018 6:18 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

David Warrington, a Republican attorney who formerly worked with the Trump campaign, said he believes prosecutors may have sought Cohen’s plea to the campaign finance counts to help special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation.

“Slapping on the campaign finance violation, maybe somebody in the prosecutors office thinks that helps them build a narrative in the Mueller investigation, even though this was done by the Southern District of New York,” he said.

Warrington also believes that the alleged campaign finance crimes aren’t actually crimes, and questions the legal guidance of Davis.

“Lanny Davis had his client plead guilty to a crime that isn't a crime,” Warrington said. "Who’s Lanny Davis really working for, Michael Cohen or the Clintons?”

Trump made the same argument Wednesday, tweeting, "Michael Cohen plead guilty to two counts of campaign finance violations that are not a crime."

Other experts believe the Cohen plea implicating Trump may be intended primarily for political effect, potentially empowering an impeachment push among Democrats, should they regain control of Congress in the November election.

"The idea that this is a campaign contribution or expenditure is highly speculative," said attorney Cleta Mitchell, a Republican election law expert, saying that she believes Cohen's plea was not motivated by legal strategy, but by political motivations.

Hans von Spakovsky, a former member of the FEC, said that "I believe the Justice Department would have a hard time prosecuting any such claim" that payoffs were campaign expenses.

Davis did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Smith, the former Republican FEC chairman who is not a Trump supporter, said he's concerned about prosecutors' actions.

“I find the whole thing kind of disturbing – what seems to be almost a determination to use whatever laws we can find to get Trump because a lot of people know Trump’s such a bad guy, he must be violating the law, and even if he’s not, we have to get him anyways," he said.

August 23, 2018 6:19 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

White House blocks bill that would protect elections

No surprise there. Trump knows that without Russian hacking of the election Republicans will be destroyed in the mid-terms

August 23, 2018 6:32 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...


Political analyst: White, suburban women are 'fleeing the Trump party'


Political analyst Bill Schneider said Thursday that white, suburban women increasingly want nothing to do with President Trump, and are "fleeing the Trump party" ahead of November's midterm elections.

"My gut is that you're seeing a lot of affluent, white suburban voters, well-educated, particularly women, fleeing the Trump party," Schneider told Hill.TV's Jamal Simmons on "What America's Thinking."

"They don't want to have anything to do with Donald Trump, especially now. They don't like him. They don't like his attitude. They don't like the way he governs. His signature attitude is defiance, that is what defines him, and that's very ugly," he continued.

Republicans face an uphill battle leading up to the midterms to defend a raft of previously safe GOP congressional districts.

Recent polls have shown Trump and Republicans struggling with the types of suburban, moderate voters needed for the party to retain the House. The party's struggle to appeal to suburban districts could be further exacerbated by a loss of white, women voters.

White suburban women have appeared to vote more Democratic ahead of the midterms, including in hotly contested elections like that of Ohio's 12th Congressional District. The district, which had been solidly Republican since 1983 and which Trump won by 11 points in 2016, has yet to declare a winner.

An NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll released earlier this year showed support for Republicans maintaining control of Congress dipped among suburbanites polled, dropping 7 points from 50 percent in February to 43 percent in March.

The same survey found that Republican support among white voters in the sample dropped 3 points since March.

August 23, 2018 6:39 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...


Analyst: Trump's appeals to his base will end up driving more Democrats to the polls


Political analyst Bill Schneider said on Thursday that President Trump's appeals to his base will end up inadvertently driving Democrats to the polls in November.

"A lot of Democrats don't regularly vote in midterms. They want to vote right now. They're angry," Schneider told Hill.TV's Jamal Simmons on "What America's Thinking."

"It's all about Donald Trump. And Donald Trump is different from most other presidents — previous presidents. He really isn't acting like the president of the United States as much as he is acting like the president of his base, part of the United States, and he's enraging Democrats by doing that," he continued.

"Democrats are ready to vote right now and this is going to bring them to the polls," he said.

Trump has inserted himself into the campaign trail ahead of the midterm elections, which are expected to turn into a referendum on his first two years as president.

Democrats are aiming to take back the House, and possibly the Senate, while also making inroads in state and local elections.

Surveys have shown wide Democratic enthusiasm ahead of the midterms.

A recent Pew Research Center survey, seen on Hill.TV, found that surveyed voters backing Democratic candidates in the midterms are more politically active than those respondents who are backing Republicans.

August 23, 2018 6:42 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

http://www.people-press.org/2017/10/05/the-partisan-divide-on-political-values-grows-even-wider/">70% of Americans say gayness should be accepted


More and more as time goes by anti-gay bigots like Wyatt/Regina/bad anonymous are becoming the fringe of American society.

The moral arc of the universe is long, but it bends towards justice.

August 23, 2018 6:50 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Millions of Texas voter records exposed online

TechCrunch reports:

A massive trove of voter records containing personal information on millions of Texas residents has been found online. The data — a single file containing an estimated 14.8 million records — was left on an unsecured server without a password. Texas has 19.3 million registered voters.

It’s the latest exposure of voter data in a long string of security incidents that have cast doubt on political parties’ abilities to keep voter data safe at a time where nation states are actively trying to influence elections.

August 23, 2018 7:14 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Trump knows that without Russian hacking of the election Republicans will be destroyed in the mid-terms"

I think Priya may be the only person on the planet that thinks that Trump won the election because of Russian help

does anyone else know of someone?

"Political analyst: White, suburban women are 'fleeing the Trump party'"

they said the same in October 2016

didn't turn out that

btw, signs are increasing that blacks, of all genders, are fleeing the Dem party

""My gut is that you're seeing a lot of affluent, white suburban voters, well-educated, particularly women, fleeing the Trump party," Schneider told Hill.TV's Jamal Simmons on "What America's Thinking.""

this guy has the nerve to say something this stupid without any data to back it up?

my gut tells me that Americans don't want to return to the failed economics of the Dems

"Republicans face an uphill battle leading up to the midterms to defend a raft of previously safe GOP congressional districts."

fortunately, the Dem party has a tendency to shoot itself in the foot

it's always suspenseful to see how they'll do it this time

maybe they'll have Hillary go around and campaign for all their candidates

you remember her, don't ya?

the gal that put Goresuch and Kavanaugh on the Supreme Court of the United States of America!!

"Analyst: Trump's appeals to his base will end up driving more Democrats to the polls

Political analyst Bill Schneider said on Thursday that President Trump's appeals to his base will end up inadvertently driving Democrats to the polls in November."

this clown again

question: who did he think would win in November 2016?

"http://www.people-press.org/2017/10/05/the-partisan-divide-on-political-values-grows-even-wider/">70% of Americans say gayness should be accepted

The moral arc of the universe is long, but it bends towards justice."

that's why there's a global backlash against the gay agenda!!

"It’s the latest exposure of voter data in a long string of security incidents that have cast doubt on political parties’ abilities to keep voter data safe at a time where nation states are actively trying to influence elections."

voter data safe?

it should be public information!!

August 23, 2018 10:12 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

BREAKING: The Manhattan district attorney's office is considering pursuing criminal charges against The Trump Organization and two senior company officials in connection with Michael Cohen's hush money payment to adult film actress Stormy Daniels.

The legal liability against all Trump's closest people is picking up steam and its looking more and more like no one associated with Trump will be left unscathed.

You can bet all of Trump's people won't have any loyalty left to him as they're charged with and convicted of crimes.

Trump's entire career has been based on close dealings with mob criminals in both Russia and the States. Breaking the law and paying people off to avoid prosecution has been his modus operandi for decades. His empire is collapsing around him and its inevitable he's going to go down with it.

August 23, 2018 10:15 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"BREAKING: The Manhattan district attorney's office is considering pursuing criminal charges against The Trump Organization and two senior company officials in connection with Michael Cohen's hush money payment to adult film actress Stormy Daniels."

and what would those criminal charges be?

Priya's delusions are getting funnier every day!!

August 23, 2018 10:49 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

A Reminder That Trump Still Hasn't Released His Tax Returns

President Donald Trump keeps making excuses about why he won't release his tax returns.

On Tuesday, Michael Cohen, President Donald Trump’s former lawyer and longtime fixer, pleaded guilty to eight criminal charges, including tax fraud and making false statements to a bank.

On the same day, Paul Manafort, Trump’s former campaign chairman, was convicted on eight counts, including five tax fraud charges.

Trump, meanwhile, still hasn’t released his tax returns. Every president since Richard Nixon has done so, although Gerald Ford made public a summary of his taxes rather than the actual forms.

On Wednesday, he tweeted how unfair it was that Manafort was facing repercussions for a “12 year old tax case.” He seemed awfully adamant that authorities shouldn’t go after such old tax crimes. Interesting.

For years, Trump has made up excuses about why he can’t show the public his financial information. In 2011, when he was pushing conspiracy theories about President Barack Obama’s birthplace, he said, “Maybe I’m going to do the tax returns when Obama does his birth certificate.”

In January 2016, he said that even though he had “very big returns,” he would “absolutely” release his information to the public once he had everything “all approved and very beautiful.”

But eventually, his campaign settled on the excuse that he can’t release his returns because he’s being audited.

The IRS does automatically audit the returns of both the president and the vice president under reforms instituted in the Watergate era. But the IRS has said “nothing prevents individuals from sharing their own tax information” ― including being under audit.

In other words, Trump is free to release his returns at any time. Hmm -- wonder why he won't.

[Pretty much everyone knows why Trump won't release his tax returns - they'll show his corruption and indebtedness to Russia - Priya]

August 24, 2018 12:48 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Georgia County Can't Back Up Its Excuse For Plan To Disenfranchise Black Voters

Officials in a majority-black Georgia county accused of trying to close almost all polling places to make it harder for black people to vote claimed last week that the locations couldn’t be used because of accessibility problems for people with disabilities.

But Randolph County doesn’t have a single recent report, analysis or document supporting the idea that it needs to close seven of its nine polling places due to accessibility issues, a lawyer for the county told HuffPost on Tuesday in response to a public records request.

HuffPost requested records from the county dating back to March 1, 2018. The county hired Michael Malone, an outside elections consultant now pushing for the closures, on April 2. But according to the county, it has no written record of evidence to back his recommendations.

“There is no document, report or analysis studying the handicap accessibility of polling places in Randolph County and the cost of fixing them within the time frame specified in your open records request,” Hayden Hooks, an attorney with the firm Perry & Walters, which represents Randolph County, wrote in an email. The county has no record of such a document in the past year, Hooks added.

The county’s admission “proves that their alleged concern about [Americans with Disabilities Act] compliance is a sham,” said Sean Young, legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Georgia, which has threatened to sue the county if it closes the polling locations. “This is not about ADA compliance, because if it were, they would have produced a study or analysis of what they believe are ADA violations and what can be done about them.”

The southwest Georgia county has a population of just over 7,000, more than 61 percent of whom are African-American. It tends to lean Democratic. Barack Obama carried the county in 2008 and 2012, as did Hillary Clinton in 2016.

Just over 30 percent of Randolph County residents live below the poverty line. The ACLU has said the county’s black voters are less likely to own a car and, without public transportation, will have face difficulty traveling longer distances to reach the polls.

August 24, 2018 12:48 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

That's the corruption of Republicans for you - they know they can't win an honest fair election so they lie and cheat to prevent minorities from voting.

August 24, 2018 12:49 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Trump, meanwhile, still hasn’t released his tax returns. Every president since Richard Nixon has done so, although Gerald Ford made public a summary of his taxes rather than the actual forms."

which means most Presidents haven't released their returns

under the law, a citizens tax returns are confidential

that doesn't change when you become President

that Trump has resisted this media entitlement is to his credit

"That's the corruption of Republicans for you - they know they can't win an honest fair election so they lie and cheat to prevent minorities from voting."

the trend is that minorities are moving away from the Dem party

August 24, 2018 5:26 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

It was obvious before, but now there’s no doubt that the national media never cared about Russia “collusion” and that their breathless coverage of special counsel Robert Mueller is purely about taking an axe to President Trump.

Immediately following the convictions Tuesday of Paul Manafort, who served as one of Trump’s 2016 campaign managers, and Michael Cohen, Trump’s former lawyer, the media declared it a “win” for Mueller’s limitless probe.

The “win” amounts to multiple convictions of tax evasion and bank fraud by Manafort and a plea deal on the same things for Cohen, who also, supposedly most consequentially, claimed in his deal that Trump told him to pay off women to stay silent about their alleged affairs with him, a would-be violation of campaign finance laws.

None of it has to do with “collusion” or Russia, but it’s a win for the investigation that’s supposed to be looking at ... collusion and Russia.

“Everything that happened in a pair of courtrooms hundreds of miles apart strengthened the hand of special counsel Robert S. Mueller III and weakened that of the president of the United States,” wrote Washington Post politics reporter Dan Balz.

CNN legal analyst Jennifer Rodgers said Wednesday that the convictions are, “Definitely a win for team Mueller and not team Trump.”

The New York Times editorial board reacted to the convictions with a self-assured proclamation that “only a complete fantasist … could continue to claim that this investigation of foreign subversion of an American election, which has already yielded dozens of other indictments and several guilty pleas, is a ‘hoax’ or ‘scam’ or ‘rigged witch hunt.’”

What about a “bait and switch”?

The New York Times in its own editorial inadvertently admitted that’s what the Mueller probe has so far turned out to be.

This “investigation of foreign subversion of an American election” has turned up the payoff of porn actresses (by an American) and tax evasion that has taken place for years, well before the election (also by an American).

When do those nefarious Russian emojis come into play? Or, as we were previously bored at length to care about, the emails?

August 24, 2018 8:23 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Most of the media are willing to admit that the Manafort convictions have nothing to do with Trump or the election so they’re hanging their hopes on Cohen’s claim that he acted on behalf of Trump to hush up the Playmate Karen McDougal and Stormy Daniels about the alleged affairs.

Point No. 1: If Trump violated campaign rules, he deserves a big welcome to the fun club of people who have been accused or convicted of doing the same, including Rosie O’Donnell, Dinesh D’Souza, former Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., and former Sen. John Edwards.

Edwards was using donor money to hide a mistress (who eventually had his child) while his wife was battling cancer.

Jackson Jr. was using campaign funds to buy a bunch of celebrity memorabilia.

Trump? He’s accused of using his own money to reimburse Cohen for the money paid to Daniels and McDougal right before the 2016 election, which he may or may not have been required to publicly disclose.

And as Trump tweeted Wednesday, even former President Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign ended up with hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines for violating convoluted campaign rules.

Point No. 2: As the liberal Atlantic magazine pointed out in July, “The question for legal purposes is whether Trump would have made [these payments] even if he had not been a candidate.”

McDougal’s own public comments suggest it’s likely Trump would have done so, regardless of whether he had been running for president.

In February, the New Yorker published a note by McDougal, the veracity of which she confirmed, and in which she described her supposed relationship with Trump.

“Over the course of the affair, Trump flew McDougal to public events across the country but hid the fact that he paid for her travel,” wrote Ronan Farrow, who authored the New Yorker piece.

Farrow added, “McDougal describes their affair as entirely consensual. But her account provides a detailed look at how Trump and his allies used clandestine hotel-room meetings, payoffs, and complex legal agreements to keep affairs—sometimes multiple affairs he carried out simultaneously—out of the press.”

“No paper trails for him,” McDougal said of Trump in her note. “In fact, every time I flew to meet him, I booked/paid for flight + hotel + he reimbursed me.”’

So ahead of the election, Trump allegedly tried to hide an affair, just as he apparently would have tried to do more than a decade ago (and, as the New Yorker story suggests, in all the years since).

Media: Yup, put a W up on the board for Mueller’s Russia investigation; that one counts!

CNN and MSNBC are naturally eager to book Michael Cohen’s lawyer, Lanny Davis, to do little teases about what Cohen knows about Russia and what he’s ready to tell Robert Mueller.

“Mr. Cohen has knowledge on certain subjects that should be of interest to the special counsel, and is more than happy to tell the special counsel all that he knows,” Davis said Tuesday on Rachel Maddow’s show. “Not just about the obvious possibility of a conspiracy to collude and corrupt the American democracy system in the 2016 election … but also knowledge about the computer crime of hacking and whether or not Mr. Trump knew ahead of time about that crime and even cheered it on.”

If Cohen has anything of value, maybe Davis should be discussing that directly with Mueller and not on TV?

But that’s not the way the media and the anti-Trump lawyers are working.

In late March, Michael Avenatti, the TV celebrity who presumably still practices law and is still representing Stormy Daniels, tweeted a photo of a disc with the cryptic suggestion that it contained information about Trump.

Nothing came of that tape. But a lot more of Avenatti’s balding head ended up on your TV and now he’s pretending to run for president.

The convictions of Manafort and Cohen are only a “win” for Mueller if you’re no longer pretending to care about the Russia collusion thing that he’s supposed to be looking for.

Now we know that the media aren’t.

August 24, 2018 8:24 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

The president is popular despite the 24/7 attacks by talking heads on cable networks, eager for ratings. According to CNN, “President Trump’s approval rating outpaces former presidents Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan at the same point in their presidencies.” That news was glossed over by the mainstream media so they could move right back to name-calling and an obsession with Trump’s Twitter feed.

The polls indicate that President Trump is hitting remarkable highs in popularity. Rasmussen has him at a historic high 50 percent approval rating. The Washington Post reports that he is the most popular president in the modern era among Republicans, with the only exception being President George W. Bush immediately after the 9/11 attacks. A booming economy is a big reason.

Other reasons for the president’s popularity in the face of a media conspiracy to beat him down (see the Boston Globe’s call for hundreds of Trump-bashing op-eds last Thursday) are his accomplishments on foreign policy and dismantling the Obama regulatory anchor that once slowed economic growth. The White House put out a list of Trump’s 500 days of greatness on June 4; this comprehensive list of kept promises includes “the American economy is stronger, American workers are experiencing more opportunities, confidence is soaring, and business is booming.” On foreign policy, President Trump has used the Reagan mantra of “Peace Through Strength” to leverage diplomatic talks with North Korea and Russia; on Iran, the president tossed aside Obama’s bad nuclear deal and offered direct talks with Iranian leaders with no pre-conditions to commence negotiations.

One underreported aspect of the supercharging of the American economy is the result of President Trump’s push to dismantle harmful, unnecessary regulations. In 2017, he kept his promise to eliminate regulations by a two-to-one ratio, including regulations harming farmers, energy producers, and the elements of Dodd-Frank that hurt regional banks and credit unions. The repeal of the Obama individual health-insurance mandate, which taxed Americans who could not afford skyrocketing prices for health care, also provided relief to middle- and low-income Americans.

Yet another element of the economic revival was the passage of President Trump’s tax cuts. That legislation provided $3.2 trillion in gross tax cuts and a doubling of the child tax credit. The top tax rate was lowered from 35 percent to 21 percent, to help make American businesses more competitive and to put Americans back to work. Democrats are against more tax cuts for middle Americans that would take even more money out of the hands of Washington and put it into the hands of working, middle-class voters.

August 24, 2018 9:09 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

As much as Democrats like to trash the Trump economy — exemplified by the new leader of the Democratic lurch to the left, soon-to-be U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (R-N.Y.) — they have not been successful in gaslighting the American people into believing that current economic growth is bad for America. Nearly three million jobs have been created since President Trump took office, including 304,000 manufacturing jobs and 337,000 construction jobs, and the unemployment rate has dropped to 3.8 percent, the lowest rate since April 2000. Job openings have reached 6.6 million, the highest level recorded. Gallup polled and found that 67 percent of Americans believe it is a good time to find a quality job – the highest number since Gallup started asking the question. When Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) was confronted with a question about consumer confidence hitting an 18-year high, she lied by claiming that consumer confidence has not been restored.

It is clear that the Democratic Party and many in the media can’t accept the fact that President Trump is popular, in part because the economy is booming. Many seem to be rooting for a recession for purely partisan reasons, and some are even trying to trick the American people into believing the Democratic Socialist argument that capitalism is bad and all these economic indicators are meaningless. For them, more jobs, higher consumer confidence and a growing economy is bad.

Americans know better, so expect the predicted “Democratic wave” this fall to be a small ripple, one in which voters send a message to Washington — it’s “the economy, stupid.”

August 24, 2018 9:09 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

The Mueller investigation that started out with such a trumpet-blast of portentous Wagnerian prophecy of impending revelations of treason, has fallen to the asininity of getting a sleazy lawyer who has pleaded guilty to a smorgasbord of criminal frauds to declare that candidate Trump told him to pay hush money to a woman he had allegedly had a sexual encounter with 10 years before the election, and that this was an illegal campaign contribution and attempt corruptly to influence the outcome of the presidential election.

There had never been any hint of impropriety by Trump in the matter—no coercion, no payment on the night, and the best that could be done for titillation was when Stormy, a generally engaging and peppy businesswoman, though she found nothing exceptionable in the future president’s conduct, or in “his junk,” claimed to have lightly spanked him with a copy of Time that had his picture on the cover. As S&M goes, this is pretty thin gruel.

It has come to this. Robert Mueller, former director of the FBI, before it became the dirty tricks division of the Democratic National Committee, could have exonerated a lot of people who were defamed with imputations of treason in “colluding” with Russia. He could have had some members of his investigative team who were not rabid Democrats. He could have investigated all the Democratic Party’s skullduggery with Russia, starting with the infamous Steele dossier, the false FISA warrants, the lies under oath to Congress and the FBI. He could have adopted the view that he should find out if crimes were committed, and if not, to say so, as normal prosecutors do. But he just kept spiraling down like a deep-diving sewer rat. He succumbed terminally to the Archibald Cox-Lawrence Walsh-Ken Starr madness that his duty was to destroy the chief target, no matter what level of professional degradation he reached trying to do so, the facts be damned.

There is no believable evidence that Trump authorized an illegal payment. Cohen is just the latest example of the utter corruption of the plea bargain system: a light sentence for possibly real offenses in exchange for extorted, false, supposedly inculpatory evidence that Mueller can serve to the demented Adam Schiff-Eric Swalwell Democratic congressional school of preemptive Trump-lynching as grounds for impeachment.

Trump engaged Cohen to spare him Stormy’s threats of raw meat publicity for the impartial press, (where the New York Times formally had announced their partiality in news stories in the national interest), in the last week of the election campaign. Cohen did so, invoiced Trump, and the client paid the invoice. It is not clear how specific Trump’s instructions were. Cohen leaked a recording of a conversation a few weeks ago to incite the fear that he might have taped some indiscretion of Trump, (totally unethical for a lawyer to do that with a client).

This cannot seriously be construed as a campaign contribution, as was found in the John Edwards case, where there had been an extensive affair and a child resulted while Edwards was running for vice president. And it certainly is nowhere near the “high crime or misdemeanor” the Constitution requires to remove someone from federal office.

August 24, 2018 9:17 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

The Democrats will achieve new depths of misplaced righteousness as they carry forward the icons of their past leaders in uxorial fidelity, the hall of fame of upholders of connubial values: Thomas Jefferson, John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson, and William Jefferson Clinton, like Infants of Prague (the city Michael Cohen never visited). This ghastly charade, which began as the vengeance of the Democrats on the impudence of the country for electing the Republican candidate, as well as Hillary Clinton’s excuse for her astounding loss of a won election, is finally entering its last chapter.

The following events should now occur, and I believe most of them will. In this last gasp of Mueller’s warlock-hunt, the president in keeping with the energetic midterm campaign he promised, should finally order the release of all the material the Justice Department is withholding which congressional committees have demanded, and he should reduce at once by two years the sentences of all federal prisoners who are nonviolent first offenders.

This would assure the immediate release of tens of thousands of people. American prisons are stuffed with innocent and grossly over-sentenced victims of the criminal sausage factory who were railroaded by the crooked prosecutorial system, of which fired FBI director James Comey, his egregious lawyer Patrick Fitzgerald, fired FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe, and Mueller are shining exemplars. Apart from being a just measure, it would accelerate the tidal drift of African-American voters from the Democrats who have done nothing but strengthen their welfare dependency since Lyndon Johnson, to President Trump, who has shown his determination to reform the fascistic American criminal justice system with its North Korean conviction levels and stark racial imbalances.

Trump should campaign on these points: You, the people, are the jury. If you want to decriminalize policy differences and avoid impeachment trials for inoffensive acts such as authorizing a lawyer to facilitate discretion by someone over a decade-old uncontroversial one evening encounter, vote Republican. If you want to keep your tax cuts and relative regulatory liberty, vote Republican. If you do not want open borders where millions of unscreened people, a significant number of them violent and dangerous, will enter illegally, clog our welfare rolls, and be encouraged to vote (Democratic) regardless of their illegal status, vote Republican.

If the Democrats win control of the House of Representatives by more than a few members, they will probably try to impeach the president but will have no chance of removing him in a Senate trial on this nonsense. If the Republicans retain the House and add to their majority in the Senate, minus feckless members such as Bob Corker (R-Tenn.), Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.), and even Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), the president will put the rest of his program through, as the Democrats begin the agonizing reappraisal that awaits them.

That party has come to a dead end, as former intelligence chiefs James Clapper and John Brennan publicly fall out over Brennan’s charge against Trump of “treason.” They hung all their hopes on Mueller, who has shot his pathetic bolt. Their face is the cheery countenance of their 28-year old nitwit socialist Bronx congressional candidate, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Their voice is the Cuomo brothers: Andrew says America was never great and Chris says the country should support the Antifa thugs in their ninja suits. This is the inspiration of the Democrats: the wit of the Cuomos; a wit composed of the reflections of two halfwits.

Whatever the results on election night, the president should fire Attorney General Jeff Sessions, his deputy Rod Rosenstein, and Special Counsel Robert Mueller as soon as the polls have closed—there’s nothing impeachable about firing incompetent people, some of whom are behaving unconstitutionally.

You would never guess it from the fatuous ululations of triumph of his enemies, but Trump has won already

August 24, 2018 9:21 AM  
Anonymous non-smoker said...

In light of Michael Cohen’s plea deal, Democrats and the liberal news media are out for blood. Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Md., called for a congressional hearing to “obtain sworn testimony directly from Mr. Cohen.” Time magazine proclaimed: “Trump is in trouble. Here’s how much worse it can get.”

Except he’s not, and it won’t get “worse.” Actual campaign-finance experts, outside the liberal outrage mob, generally agree: Even if Cohen’s activities are campaign-related — though they probably aren’t — they amount to a Federal Election Commission speeding ticket.

President Donald Trump didn’t violate campaign-finance law; the payments made to Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal came from his personal finances, not campaign funds, for something he believed was unrelated to the campaign. As the president told Fox News, “They didn’t come out of the campaign; they came from me.”

At the very worst, even if re-characterized to be campaign-related, the “violation” amounts to underreporting relatively insignificant contributions from a candidate to his own campaign.

But the liberal mob never misses an opportunity to undermine the Trump presidency, lobbying for an endless investigation into President Trump. All this after the Mueller investigation has already cost roughly $20 million — and no Russian collusion found.

Why should Congress perpetuate this witch hunt? The Mueller investigation has morphed from chasing after paid-for allegations of Russian collusion to chasing down Paul Manafort’s and Michael Cohen’s transgressions — a testament to the investigation’s ineffectiveness. However justified, albeit politically motivated, the underlying prosecutions of Manafort and Cohen may be, they stem from business dealings long before there was a Trump campaign.

Mueller and his team of Democratic lawyers should either produce actual evidence of collusion or pack it up.

There’s no fire here; there isn’t even any smoke. In the face of a booming economy, the left is just running out of ways to attack President Trump — and hoping you won’t notice.

August 24, 2018 10:25 AM  
Anonymous Someone doth protest too much said...

Lack of smoke or fire didn't stop Republicans from multiple Bengahzi investigations that ended up indicting absolutely... no one.

Before you start throwing around the "witch hunt" claim and complaining about how much was spent, take a long hard look at the blatant character assassination that the rabid right-wing media machine has leveled towards Hillary.

Pizzagate was only the tip of the ice burg. If you believe half of the conspiracy theories the right wing media promulgates, the Clintons have some how managed to quietly murder all sorts of people that got in their way and somehow evaded any prosecutions for it.

Then of course, there were the drug-induced illusions that Obama was actually born in Kenya, and despite the fact that he had been attending a Christian church for decades, he was really, secretly, a Muslim. And his wife was really a man.

Trump's partners should have been locked up years ago for their crimes. Maybe then, Trump wouldn't have been able to pull of his biggest con ever over half of America's voters.

Keep trying to minimize Trump's crimes while you can. In the meantime, the rest of us will sit here patiently waiting for Mueller to finish his job.

I've got plenty of popcorn.

And Mueller has shown no signs yet that he's done taking people court, convicting them, or getting them to plead guilty.

August 24, 2018 2:53 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

"And Mueller has shown no signs yet that he's done taking people court, convicting them, or getting them to plead guilty."

Hear Hear, good anonymous!

August 24, 2018 3:10 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Mueller is just rolling these crooks up like rice and beans in one big Treason Burrito.

He's plucking them off one by one. He's rolling up the whole Trump syndicate from all directions.

Its just so damn fun to watch!

He did the same thing to John Gotti.

August 24, 2018 3:10 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

@realDonaldTrump "Fake news! Witch Hunt! Hoax! Sad! 18 Angry Dems. Hillary smells! #MAGA"

August 24, 2018 3:28 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Think of how many people have kept quiet for the mango mussolin through the years. He foolishly assumed he'd have the loyalty of the federal government employees who do NOT work for HIM but for the U.S. - an absolutely epic micalculation born of ignorance, greed and a lifetime of lack of accountability.

Trump is a product of America's culture of impunity for the wealthy

"He stands out from the pack, essentially, in how deeply he embraces the ethic of impunity, bragging about it to Billy Bush or screwing over small-time contractors as a routine business practice."

August 24, 2018 3:37 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Allen Weisselberg, Trump Organization CFO, granted immunity by prosecutors in Michael Cohen investigation.

Lawrence O'Donnel "HUGE: Trump's life of (tax) crime is passing before his eyes."

August 24, 2018 3:40 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

"Alan did very little actual CFO'ing for me. I barely know the Jew" - Trump, in about five minutes.

August 24, 2018 3:42 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

By the time Mueller releases his report on Russiagate Trump will be saying "I wasn't even president, I was the coffee boy."

August 24, 2018 3:57 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

No doubt Wyatt/Regina/bad anonymous defended Nixon until the bitter end too. Like Trump no doubt they still think Nixon was the hero of the Watergate story and the people who brought him down are the villains.

August 24, 2018 4:15 PM  
Anonymous Trump said 'flipping' in criminal cases should be outlawed, but he's offered to cooperate with the FBI before said...

President Donald Trump decried the his former personal lawyer Michael Cohen "flipping" on him by pleading guilty to 8 federal crimes and went as far to say flipping should be "outlawed", in a Wednesday interview with Fox News.

But Trump himself has a long history of cooperating with law enforcement going back to the 1980s.

"I know all about flipping. For 30, 40 years I have been watching flippers," he told "Fox & Friends" host Ainsley Earhardt in the interview that aired Thursday.

Cohen struck a deal with federal prosecutors in the Southern District of New York on Tuesday to plead guilty to charges of tax evasion, bank fraud, and making illegal corporate and campaign contributions to influence the 2016 election, directly implicating Trump by claiming he committed those crimes "at the direction" of the candidate.

"If you can say something bad about Donald Trump and you will go down to two years or three years, which is the deal he made, in all fairness to him, most people are going to do that," Trump said of Cohen's plea deal. "And I have seen it many times. I have had many friends involved in this stuff. It's called flipping and it almost ought to be illegal."

Yet, on at least two occasions in the 1980s, Trump reportedly testified to avoid persecution and actively offered to cooperate with law enforcement to quash criminal activity.

The casino

As Buzzfeed News reported in January 2017, Trump offered to "fully cooperate" with the FBI to monitor potential organized activity in his Atlantic City casinos as far back as 1981.

An FBI memo from that year details Trump and his brother Robert raising concerns with the Bureau about building a casino in the New Jersey gambling hotspot given reports of widespread mob activity, and discussing plans to place undercover agents in the casino.

"Trump stated in order to show that he was willing to fully cooperate with the FBI, he suggested that they use undercover agents within the casino," the memo read. "At this point, [an agent] initiated steps with the Newark office ... to begin planning an undercover proposal concerning the proposed Trump casino."

It's worth noting there is an important distinction between a defendant making a plea deal in a criminal case and a business owner offering to work with law enforcement to thwart potential illegal activity.

The jewelry store

In the mid 1980s, Trump was one of several celebrities reportedly caught up in a sales tax evasion scheme with luxury Fifth Avenue jewelry boutique Bulgari.

To avoid the hefty New York state and city sales taxes on high-end jewelry, authorities said customers would order jewelry to be shipped to a different state without such steep sales taxes, The New York Times reported in 1985.

The store would then ship an empty box to an out-of-state address while customers walked out of the store with the items without having paid the proper taxes.

Authorities said Trump avoided paying sales tax on about $65,000 worth of jewelry, United Press International reported in 1986. Henry Kissinger, Frank Sinatra, and Mary Tyler Moore were also named in the probe.

When authorities in New York state caught onto the scheme, Trump reportedly testified against the employees at Bulgari Jewelry in order to protect himself from criminal prosecution that could have put his real estate license in jeopardy.

A former state prosecutor told ABC News that Trump and other customers helped build the case against the store. The boutique and two of its executives ended up pleading guilty to criminal charges, and paid $2 million in fines, The New York Times reported at the time.

Experts sound the alarm

..."The question everyone should be asking right now: What does Trump have to hide?" Mariotti added. "If you have nothing to hide, you don't fear 'flippers.'"

August 24, 2018 5:48 PM  
Anonymous Go Mo Co! said...

‘Surrender Donald’: A highway overpass along the Capital Beltway goes political

August 24, 2018 5:53 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

This is clearly the worst week of the Trump presidency...

so far.


Its only going to get worse for Trump from here on in. More is going to come out from Cohen, more is going to come out from David Pecker, more is going to come out from Weisleberg, the Manafort trial is upcoming that is going to bring out more about Trump's conspiracy with Russia to rig the election.

Things are going to get worse and worse for Trump, lol!

No one deserves the crash and burn that's happening now than Trump.

The moral arc of the universe is long, but it bends towards justice!

August 24, 2018 7:14 PM  
Anonymous Need more popcorn said...

So we know that the NRA was financed and infiltrated by Russia in their work to get Rumple Orange Skin elected, and now the NRA is complaining that the Rumpster is being "Al Caponed."

It just BEGS the obvious question: "What does the NRA know about the Russia - Trump collusion that has them complaining that they're bringing him down on campaign finance violations???" What should we REALLY be bringing him down on. Is it really stuff as bad as Al Capone? Better? Worse?

Do tell us, comrades.


Earlier this month, Donald Trump claimed gangster Al Capone was treated better than his former campaign manager Paul Manafort, who was found guilty of numerous crimes earlier this week.

On Friday, National Rifle Association spokeswoman Dana Loesch referenced the 1920s mob boss in an attempt to defend the president and ― spoiler alert! ― it was kind of bizarre.

Speaking on the group’s streaming platform NRATV on Friday, Loesch attempted to say Trump’s alleged infidelities are the reason he’s facing legal battles, but that Democrats are using campaign finance laws as an excuse to go after him.

"They’re trying to Al Capone the president. I mean, you remember, Capone didn’t go down for murder. Eliot Ness didn’t put him in for murder. He went in for tax fraud.

Prosecutors didn’t care how he went down as long as he went down. The same goes for Democrats. Whatever avenue is needed to bring down the president, they’ll take it."

wStory pointed out that Loesch’s attempt to blame Trump’s potential legal troubles on the Democrats had serious flaws:

It should be noted here that Special Counsel Robert Mueller is a Republican. Attorney General Jeff Sessions is a Republican, appointed by a Republican president, confirmed by a Republican Senate. Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein is a Republican, appointed by a Republican president, confirmed by a Republican Senate. FBI Director Christopher Wray is a Republican, appointed by a Republican president, confirmed by a Republican Senate.

Yeah, it's all the Democrat's fault.

What ever happened to the "party of personal responsibility?"

August 24, 2018 10:44 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"This is clearly the worst week of the Trump presidency...

so far."

foreigners have only CNN to judge America by

this week is when it became clear that Mueller not only has nothing on Trump in connection with Russia but not on anything else either

despite obtaining all the records of, and getting the full cooperation of, Trump's personal lawyer, who was so intimidated that he plead guilty to clearly bogus campaign finance charges, Mueller has drawn a total blank on Trump

meanwhile, the Dems and media are hoping to find a way to stretch this out to November, but it's not going to work

come the last week of October, voters will be pretty fed up with the Russia hoax

the media keeps coming up with someone who has flipped and will finally tell everything about Trump

last week, it was Doug McGahn, White House counsel, who was fully cooperating with the special prosecutor

ooo, they said

Trump's dead now

then, it turned out Trump told McGahn to fully coooperate

(actually, Trump will never be credibly charged with obstruction of justice because he has told every official to fully cooperate and provided every document asked for -and that's a lot of documents)

then, earlier this week, the media said they finally had Trump because his friend, the head of the National Enquirer, was granted immunity and is telling everything

and, yesterday, the CFO of the Trump Organization was granted immunity and is going to spill all of Trump's secrets

it's become a joke

meanwhile, Lanny Davis, sleazy Clinton lawyer, one of the slimiest creatures in the swamp, has been running around contradicting Cohen's previous statement about whether Trump knew about the Trump Tower meeting

and, last night, Chris Cuomo, who earlier this week was part of the cable news clown show concerning the Cohen plea, slipped and admitted that the campaign finance violations, that Trump is accused of, is not proven

Dems are scared that the blue wave will never break on shore

they have reason to be scared

This is clearly the worst week of the Trump resistance movement...

so far.

August 25, 2018 10:03 AM  
Anonymous the steele dossier is fake, the economic boom is real said...

Voters in three conservative states where Senate Democrats are up for reelection want their senators to support Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, according to a new poll.

GOP pollster North Star Opinion Research found that people in Indiana, West Virginia and North Dakota want their senators to confirm the high court nominee. Democratic Sens. Joe Donnelly of Indiana, Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota are all up for reelection this fall.

The poll found that 60 percent of registered voters in North Dakota want Kavanaugh confirmed, compared to 23 percent who do not. In Indiana, 56 percent of voters want the nominee approved compared to 32 percent against. And 51 percent of West Virginians want Kavanaugh confirmed compared to 32 percent in opposition. Independents in each state favored Kavanaugh by similar margins.

Heitkamp, Donnelly and Manchin all voted for Supreme Court justice Neil Gorsuch, and are being targeted by Republicans to do the same for Kavanaugh. Each is under attack from their Republican opponent for not announcing support for Kavanaugh.

Nationally, a Quinnipiac Poll this month found 44 percent of those surveyed support confirmation, compared to 39 percent who are against.

August 25, 2018 10:28 AM  
Anonymous Reality Check said...

"despite obtaining all the records of, and getting the full cooperation of, Trump's personal lawyer, who was so intimidated that he plead guilty to clearly bogus campaign finance charges, Mueller has drawn a total blank on Trump"

There you go again, spinning made-up excuses without any regard to even the most obvious facts.

Cohen wasn't just some clueless idiot on the street who got caught trying to shoplift something from Walmart.

Cohen has been a New York LAWYER for DECADES. He got banks to loan him MILLIONS of dollars. No doubt he knows a lot of other RICH LAWYERS. Lawyers like that don't get intimidated into ANYTHING involving legal matters. They know how to clog up the courts for years with expensive legal battles - often making the other side give up just because they run out of money. Unfortunately for Cohen, that's not likely to happen for him.

If Cohen had half a chance of getting a jury to decide in his favor, he had the skill, resources, and ability to make it happen.

The fact that he plead guilty means he knew he broke the law, and no reasonable jury was going to see otherwise. His best hope was to plead the obvious, and hope for the mercy of the judge. He's not a stupid guy. He just wasn't as smart as he thought he was.
The longer you practice breaking laws, the greater the chance you have of getting caught. Well, he finally got caught. He did what was best for him and his family given the disastrous circumstances he put himself in.

But you and Alex Jones keep spinning conspiracy theories - Republicans are stupid enough to buy all that crap - and people like Jones can even make a living at it.



August 25, 2018 12:34 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Wyatt/Regina/bad anonymous probably also believe that Hillary Clinton ran a pedophile ring out of the basement of a pizza place that doesn't have a basement and that Trump has secretly arrested 100,000 pedophiles and is saving the world.

August 25, 2018 1:02 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

So Congress had a bipartisan bill ready to go that would help protect the mid-term elections against hacking by the Russians. One of the key features of the bill was to require state election voting machines to produce a paper backup so votes could be verified to assure there as no changing of vote tallies. Makes perfect sense but the Trump Administration stepped in and pushed Republican congress members to drop the bill. Clearly the Trump administration wants to allow Russians to hack the midterm elections knowing they'll be the beneficiaries of these criminal acts. Republicans are the epitome of corruption.
------------------------------------------

Kremlin sources go quiet leaving CIA in the dark

What Nunes and Trump have wrought: "the outing of an FBI informant under scrutiny by the House Intelligence Committee has had a chilling effect on intelligence collection. Trump encourage the public release of classified documents to discredit the Justice Department, and Republicans on the House Intelligence committee lead by Devin Nunes in order to help Trump threatened FBI officials with impeachment if they didn't break Departmental policy of being silent about investigations and release the information.
--------------------------

Because potatoes are relatively cheap, Scott Walker and the Wisconsin Legislature has made it illegal for Food Stamp recipients to buy potatoes with Food Stamps. This is a move to limit more cheap options for the poor to insure that they have a better chance of going hungry. Many poor children have french fries with ketchup (also banned) for dinner.

Republicans hate the poor and want to hurt them as much as possible. These people are positively evil.

August 25, 2018 1:03 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Hahahahahahahahahahaha!

I Guess the Nobel Peace Prize Is on Hold

And once we’re seeing that Trump prematurely declared that he had fixed a problem that he clearly didn’t. On Friday, he said that he had ordered Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to cancel a planned trip to North Korea because Kim Jong-Un had failed to live up to the promises he made during their summit.

@realDonaldTrump "I have asked Secretary of State Mike Pompeo not to go to North Korea, at this time, because I feel we are not making sufficient progress with respect to the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula..."

But…but…but…what about that Nobel Peace Prize that you said “everyone thinks” you should get? What about all that “you can sleep soundly tonight knowing you’re safe from a Nuclear North Korea” talk? If only someone had warned that you hadn’t actually achieved anything yet? Someone like…oh, me. And everyone else who had watched these same promises be made before and nothing ever actually changes. A thoughtful person who cares about reality would stop making these grand declarations of victory until something is actually achieved, but Trump is not that person. He’s a carnival barker. He just wants attention and praise and he’s happy to lie and exaggerate to get them.

August 25, 2018 1:11 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

The only reason Trump hasn't been charged with multiple crimes after the Cohen guilty pleas is that he is president and it is Justice Department policy that a sitting president shouldn't be indicted.

Its a certainty that if it were anyone else in the U.S. other than the president who had directed Cohen to commit crimes to influence the election they would be charged with multiple crimes.

August 25, 2018 1:15 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"There you go again, spinning made-up excuses without any regard to even the most obvious facts."

my only assertion is that Mueller intimidated Cohen into pleading guilty to a bogus campaign finance violations by threatening to bring his family into the fraud charges

it's really not a leap, there is no other feasible reason Cohen would have done it

he's guilty of the fraud charges although there are thousands of lawyers doing the same and getting away with it

Cohen's mistake was to work for an enemy of the deep state

when I heard this theory that paying a women for silence about an affair was a campaign expenditure, I knew intuitively that it couldn't be right

I've since learned that the law has an exception for personal expenses that a candidate makes that also preserve his image

so, getting a haircut and buying a suit are not campaign expenses even though they promote a candidate's image

paying off women who might disclose affairs also falls in this category as there are personal reasons to keep such things secret and Trump has always tried to maintain this discretion, dating back to long before he was a candidate

honestly, that Mueller would play such a game with a clear law is grounds for dismissal

look up the law, and get back to us about your wild characterizations

August 25, 2018 1:30 PM  
Anonymous Oh look, tRump fucked up again said...

In victory for unions, judge overturns key parts of Trump executive orders

A federal judge late Friday dealt a victory to federal employees and the unions that represent them, invalidating overnight key provisions of a series of Trump administration executive orders aimed at making it easier to fire employees and weaken the unions.

The overnight ruling by U.S. District Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson in Washington was a setback to the White House’s efforts to rein in the power of federal unions. Though federal employees’ pay is set by Congress, their unions have retained significant power even as private-sector unions have been in decline.

The three executive orders, issued just before Memorial Day, had sought to severely restrict the use of “official time” — on-duty time that union officials can spend representing their members in grievances and on other issues. The rules also limited issues that could be bargained over in union negotiations. And it rolled back the rights of workers deemed to be poor performers to appeal disciplinary action against them.

Jackson took issue with key elements of each order and enjoined the administration from enacting them.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment Saturday.

The American Federation of Government Employees, the largest of the dozen unions to sue the administration over the executive orders, applauded the ruling. It called it a victory for public-sector unions and the protections Congress gave federal employees in 1978 when it guaranteed civil servants the right to bargain collectively over working conditions in the government.

“President Trump’s illegal action was a direct assault on the legal rights and protections that Congress specifically guaranteed to the public-sector employees across this country who keep our federal government running every single day,” AFGE’s national president, J. David Cox Sr., said in a statement.

August 25, 2018 2:54 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Its only fair that Attorney General Jeff Sessions and the Republican lead House Intelligence committee get off their asses and open an investigation into Trump's emails that will take at least four years and require dozens of committees.

August 25, 2018 4:13 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Wyatt/Regina/bad anonymous said "my only assertion is that Mueller intimidated Cohen into pleading guilty to a bogus campaign finance violations by threatening to bring his family into the fraud charges"

Hahahahahahahahahahaha!

You stupid Fuck! Once again I have to correct you on the operation of American politics and the judicial system.

First off, Mueller didn't handle the investigation into Cohen's campaign finance violations, that duty was given to the Southern District of New York - Mueller had nothing to do with it. Now you're left absurdly claiming that not only is the unimpeachable Mueller corrupt but that the entire Republican dominated Justice system is corrupt - no one buys that.

Secondly, if the campaign finance violations were "bogus" there's no way the Judge in the case would have signed off on Cohen's guilty plea and Cohen certainly wouldn't have agreed to plea guilty as he wouldn't have had the slightest fear that his family was going to be convicted of "bogus" charges.


Thirdly, bank records, emails, recordings and text messages irrefutably show that Cohen made a campaign contribution far beyond the personal limit he was allowed to and AMI media also made a campaign contribution they weren't allowed to do by law. There is absolutely no doubt that these people broke the law, its an open and shut case with air tight evidence - there is no case to be made that there is the slightest doubt that acts were committed by Cohen and AMI that were campaign finance violations.


Fourthly, the idea that because Trump months later repaid the illegal campaign contributions this makes those illegal acts go away is no more true than it would be true that if you robbed a bank and months later went and gave the money back to the bank you wouldn't be guilty of robbery.

You two are pretty stupid but not even I believe you're stupid enough to believe your own bullshit on this one. You're simply telling absurd lies because you don't want to admit the obvious - Cohen committed crimes at the direction of Trump to corruptly influence the 2016 election and that makes Trump an unindicted co-conspirator who isn't being charged solely because justice department policy is that a sitting president shouldn't be charged with crimes he's committed.

If it were anyone else in the States other than the president who had directed Cohen to commit these crimes they would have been charged with multiple crimes.

August 25, 2018 4:31 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"“President Trump’s illegal action was a direct assault on the legal rights and protections that Congress specifically guaranteed to the public-sector employees across this country who keep our federal government running every single day,” AFGE’s national president, J. David Cox Sr., said in a statement."

imagine if government workers thought of their job as a calling to serve the public instead of their own interests

"Its only fair that Attorney General Jeff Sessions and the Republican lead House Intelligence committee get off their asses and open an investigation into Trump's emails that will take at least four years and require dozens of committees."

moronic statement from a foreigner

the resistance had already conducted a baseless investigation of Trukmp

they've shot the wad

I was at a Metro stop yesterday, waiting for a bus, which was late

to wear down boredom, I picked a couple of the little newspapers in the boxes there and took a look

one was THE BLADE

flipping through, it was mostly gay propaganda crap (I had thought there might be some good entertainment reviews, or something)

then, I saw a personal advice column

some gay guy wrote in and said he was new to the area and was having a hard time finding any guys that want to get to know him

they all just want to have sex and move on

the advice columnist's response was "yeah, I hear that all the time"

this just confirms what I've said here many times, and I always get accused of being an ignorant bigot:

random promiscuity is a predominant characteristic of the gay community

that's why AIDS is disproportionately present in the gay community

it's why it's so dangerous to teach kids in school that homosexuality is normal

a gay guy writes this to the BLADE and the BLADE agrees with him

homosexuals are randomly promiscuous

case closed

August 25, 2018 5:01 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"You stupid Fuck!"

Priya is very angry about something

I wonder why

Priya expresses anger in a very low-class, trailer trash sort of way

I wonder why

"Once again I have to correct you on the operation of American politics and the judicial system."

once again?

you've been repeatedly embarrassed by your ignorance of a country you're obsessed with

"First off, Mueller didn't handle the investigation into Cohen's campaign finance violations, that duty was given to the Southern District of New York - Mueller had nothing to do with it. Now you're left absurdly claiming that not only is the unimpeachable Mueller corrupt but that the entire Republican dominated Justice system is corrupt - no one buys that."

Mueller came up with these charges

he passed it off to New York, not that long ago, because he knew how far he was from his original purpose

but the whole thing is very irregular

Mueller needs some Ex-Lax

"Secondly, if the campaign finance violations were "bogus" there's no way the Judge in the case would have signed off on Cohen's guilty plea"

here's a ignorant piece of crap

judges rule on all kinds of things in all kinds of ways

they're like snowflakes and Catholic priests

very inconsistent

"and Cohen certainly wouldn't have agreed to plea guilty as he wouldn't have had the slightest fear that his family was going to be convicted of "bogus" charges."

another ignorant piece of crap

he was guilty of fraud and the prosecutors used the threat to implicate his wife in order to pressure him into agreeing to this flagrant misinterpretation of campaign finance law

"Thirdly, bank records, emails, recordings and text messages irrefutably show that Cohen made a campaign contribution far beyond the personal limit he was allowed to"

if you're talking about paying the women off, he did that on behalf of Trump

it's a normal lawyer-client relationship that precedes Trump's candidacy

if you are going to say that lawyers paying client expenses and billing for reimbursement is a gift, every campaign would be guilty of violations

"and AMI media also made a campaign contribution they weren't allowed to do by law."

this friend of Trump's has been doing this for years prior to Trump getting into politics

August 25, 2018 5:37 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"There is absolutely no doubt that these people broke the law, its an open and shut case with air tight evidence - there is no case to be made that there is the slightest doubt that acts were committed by Cohen and AMI that were campaign finance violations."

that's funny, because most legal scholars disagree with you

the payments are not, under the law, classified as campaign contributions

"Fourthly, the idea that because Trump months later repaid the illegal campaign contributions this makes those illegal acts go away is no more true than it would be true that if you robbed a bank and months later went and gave the money back to the bank you wouldn't be guilty of robbery."

this is a super-ignorant piece of crap

no campaign pays for every expense in cash

indeed, no one does

an agent of a campaign that incurs an expense with the understanding of reimbursement is not making a contribution under the law

"You two are pretty stupid but not even I believe you're stupid enough to believe your own bullshit on this one."

Priya expresses anger in a very low-class, trailer trash sort of way

I wonder why

"You're simply telling absurd lies because you don't want to admit the obvious - Cohen committed crimes at the direction of Trump to corruptly influence the 2016 election"

paying those women for Trump is not a crime

"influencing" an election is the constitutionally protected mission of every political campaign

"and that makes Trump an unindicted co-conspirator who isn't being charged solely because justice department policy is that a sitting president shouldn't be charged with crimes he's committed."

since there was no crie, there could be no co-conspirator

"If it were anyone else in the States other than the president who had directed Cohen to commit these crimes they would have been charged with multiple crimes."

only if, like Cohen, they had committed other crimes

then, they might be pressured into pleading to false charges too

you might notice the head of the Enquirer wasn't indicted

August 25, 2018 5:38 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Oooo, I hit a sore spot with Wyatt/Regina/bad anonymous - they went on a rant fest to vainly try to defend their stupidity.


Hahahahahahahahahahaha!

August 25, 2018 7:54 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

It took a minute to wipe Wyatt/Regina's spittle off my computer.

Let's take a moment to appreciate how fucked up this is:

If you're gay and you work at a catholic school you may be fired. However if you're a priest and you rape children the church will go to great lengths to cover it up and protect you. Much like Wyatt/Regina who hypocritcally try to claim two married men in a monogamous relationship is immoral but somehow they defend to the death an admitted sexual predator who's cheated on every one of his multiple wives.

#christianvalues

August 25, 2018 7:58 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Bill Clinton got impeached for consensual sex.

Donald Trump has committed:

-criminal conspiracy
-obstruction of justice
-election fraud
-sexual assault
-perjury of oath
-bribery
-racketeering
-money laundering
-witness tampering
-jury tampering
-emoluments violations

And Republicans shrug their shoulders.

August 25, 2018 9:05 PM  
Anonymous Keep it simple, stupid said...

"it's really not a leap, there is no other feasible reason Cohen would have done it"

Except of course, for the obvious one... he knows the law a hell of a lot better than conservative internet trolls do and he knows he got caught.

Not everybody who exceeds the speed limit gets a speeding ticket.

That doesn't mean they didn't commit a crime.

Only that they didn't get caught.

And it doesn't absolve the people who do get caught of punishment.

It's as simple as that.

The "law and order" party should know that. But apparently strict adherence to the law only applies to brown people. Rich white people apparently should be able to do whatever they want and get away with it.

No one has ever gotten out of a speeding ticket because a bunch of other people got away with it.

Yet somehow you see what's happening in DC as a major machinations by the nebulous "deep state" out to overthrow your favorite pussy grabber - instead of what it actually is. As pointed out before, most (all?) of the law enforcement authorities dealing with this are Republicans, vetted in and voted on by Republicans. They just happen to be doing their jobs - finally.

The tribalism of the Republican party has left it completely bereft of even a sliver of objectivity, much less any kind of "moral" authority.

I'm looking forward to the day, if it ever comes, when reasonable Republicans take control back over their party and wrest it away from the teabaggers and the Evangelicals. At some point, I gotta believe that some of them in there have gotta say "Enough of this shit, it's time to let the adults run this show again."

August 25, 2018 9:54 PM  
Anonymous A little thinking can go a long way said...

Priya: "Secondly, if the campaign finance violations were "bogus" there's no way the Judge in the case would have signed off on Cohen's guilty plea"

Anonymous: "here's a ignorant piece of crap"

I suspect you meant to say:

"*He's* *an* ignorant piece of crap."

This teachable moment was brought to you by the letter "N," and Kettle B. Black.

August 25, 2018 10:09 PM  

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