Comrade Trump

[BlueK]

What do you mean something that probably doesn't exist? Lots of members of congress have seen it now and commented about it (over 200 have read it according to NPR). Do you think they are all lying about it? That is funny. If the stuff you are reading is saying that the memo doesn't exist then you may need to find a new news source, BK.

The optics of the dems trying to keep this memo from being released is only going to hurt them just like Hillary's email scandal. If they think it is a bunch of garbage then they should be the ones pushing to have it released along with all the source material to embarrass the GOP'ers. Here is their chance to show everyone the GOP is full of dumbasses and they are blowing it.

The GOP is in the majority. They can't release it? The comments you linked to are undoubtedly scarier than the actual contents, or it would public by now. The real story is Trump is about to be interviewed by Mueller, and even the his closest allies know there is no way in hell he can avoid committing perjury in that setting. #"truthful"hyperbole -- aka snake oil salesman with orange hair.

...holding out hope you can someday return to libertarianism

[BlueK]

Nunes can't release a memo until he is done fabricating it.

And he still has to set up the secret meeting late at night by the bushes outside the White House.

[frank ryan]

What do you mean something that probably doesn't exist? Lots of members of congress have seen it now and commented about it (over 200 have read it according to NPR). Do you think they are all lying about it? That is funny. If the stuff you are reading is saying that the memo doesn't exist then you may need to find a new news source, BK.

The optics of the dems trying to keep this memo from being released is only going to hurt them just like Hillary's email scandal. If they think it is a bunch of garbage then they should be the ones pushing to have it released along with all the source material to embarrass the GOP'ers. Here is their chance to show everyone the GOP is full of dumbasses and they are blowing it.

You fall hook, line an sinker for everything the GOP puts on the line. You should look into Nunes, and his credibility and closeness to Trump, before you hop aboard his hype train. You'd also do well to view the words of the House Freedom Caucus members with a bit more disgust than others, they are loonies.

The democrats haven't seen the memo, only Republicans. They aren't suppressing it, they are just calling it bullshit.

[Uncle Ted]

You fall hook, line an sinker for everything the GOP puts on the line. You should look into Nunes, and his credibility and closeness to Trump, before you hop aboard his hype train. You'd also do well to view the words of the House Freedom Caucus members with a bit more disgust than others, they are loonies.

The democrats haven't seen the memo, only Republicans. They aren't suppressing it, they are just calling it bullshit.

Frank, call up your Dems friends and tell them to call Nunes' bluff and to release the memo immediately instead of just blaming it on the Russian Bots again...

Fi5eBDBkWKShXBc3RSxwN-FE_x87GUccG-ABRwx-pVg.jpg

The Dem congressmen and women can go see the memo just like any one else in congress.

[Uncle Ted]

Embedded Tweet

Embedded Tweet

[Uncle Ted]

Democrats prepare their own memo on surveillance to counter Republican document



The political battle over a hotly controversial memo involving surveillance entered a new phase on Wednesday as Democrats announced they have drafted their own, competing document.


The original, classified memo was prepared by House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, a Tulare Republican, and made available to every member of Congress last week. Republicans who read the four-page document said it reveals shocking information about the investigation into President Trump, which began during the campaign, but Democrats have dismissed it as a distortion.

Now that Republicans are pushing to make their memo public, Democrats want their own version available as well.
[...]

http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-n...htmlstory.html

Wow... that was quick:

[Uncle Ted]

Why the dems pushing to regulate social media and #fakenews is a slippery slope...

Dianne Feinstein Ignores GOP Lawmakers, Blames #ReleaseTheMemo on Russians and Social Media Instead
[...]
Feinstein and Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) are upset because a bunch of Russian-operated Twitter accounts may have jumped on this and attempted the magnify the hashtag campaign's reach. The two of them have sent a letter to Twitter and Facebook pretty much demanding that they investigate the extent of the Russian involvement in the hashtag campaign. And they want a response in three days:

If these reports are accurate, we are witnessing an ongoing attack by the Russian government through Kremlin-linked social media actors directly acting to intervene and influence our democratic process. This should be disconcerting to all Americans, but especially your companies as, once again, it appears the vast majority of their efforts are concentrated on your platforms. This latest example of Russian interference is in keeping with Moscow's concerted, covert, and continuing campaign to manipulate American public opinion and erode trust in our law enforcement and intelligence institutions.

Feinstein is confusing a symptom for a problem, as politicians often do when they have agendas to pursue. It's absurd to hold Russia responsible for the hashtag in any meaningful sense, given that Republican lawmakers were openly, overtly screaming it from the rooftops, on Twitter, and in front of every news camera they could see. A source familiar with how Twitter works told The Hill that the growth of the hashtag appeared to have happened organically. If Russian trolls and bots were involved, they were at most magnifying a conflict that was already underway. They didn't set this fire, and they weren't the chief force spreading it.

Feinstein's political machinations here are twofold. She's trying to make the case that the feds must regulate social media because of foreign involvement in American elections; and second, she's using the familiar guilt-by-association logical fallacy to discredit her political opponents.

Feinstein's love of censorship is well known. She flat-out wants to suppress online content that she deems dangerous. This lack of respect for Americans' speech rights and privacy is one of the few things she has in common with Trump.

As for the guilt-by-association issue, it's remarkable how little people on either side are interested in engaging the surveillance issues that undergird this fight and instead want to make it all about attacking or defending Trump. I've already mocked Republicans acting outraged about the Nunes memo because a bunch of them just voted to expand the feds' power to snoop on American citizens for purposes unrelated to terrorism and espionage. On the very same day this hashtag campaign was launching, Trump signed that bill into law.

The discussion of actual surveillance policy got drowned by constant efforts to either discredit Trump (by any silly memes necessary) or to discredit the FBI investigation. What's most obnoxious about Feinstein and Schiff's response here is how it simply does not engage the complaint that the surveillance state might have abused its powers when it snooped on and possibly unmasked the identities of people in Trump's orbit.

Personally, based on my experience covering the federal surveillance apparatus, I doubt the Nunes memo actually reveals illegal conduct by federal officials. That's actually part of the problem—it's too easy for the feds to legally justify secretly snooping. Nevertheless, the Nunes memo should be declassified and released, as should the secret court warrant request that serves as the memo's foundation. Could there be a better example for the American public to be able to pick apart the consequences of our federal surveillance state than by learning exactly how it spied on the staff of a candidate for president?

But no: When Feinstein actually had the opportunity to make surveillance laws better, she abandoned her own amendment and signed on to terrible legislation. And now she wants to make this all about Russian meddling in American elections, and to use that as an excuse for more censorship. We need more sunlight, not more secrecy.

http://reason.com/blog/2018/01/24/fe...akers-to-blame

I just wish the mods around here would get rid of all the #FakeNews that russian bots named Frank Ryan and BlueK post.

[BlueK]

Why the dems pushing to regulate social media and #fakenews is a slippery slope...


http://reason.com/blog/2018/01/24/fe...akers-to-blame

I just wish the mods around here would get rid of all the #FakeNews that russian bots named Frank Ryan and BlueK post.

I don't want censorship of Russian bots. I just want to keep my right to point out what the source of the fake news is. It would be fun, and actually socially responsible if Facebook splattered a big red "Russkies" sign next to everything that comes from there so people at least have more information about the origin of their "news" before they send it to all their friends. Feel free to disagree and make the argument that the Russians are looking out for our best interests if you want to.

[BlueK]

I'm sure Ted will enjoy this piece not sponsored by Russian bots. Fun reading.

http://theweek.com/articles/750337/r...ull-illuminati

"If you're fortunate enough not to be a regular consumer of Fox News, conservative talk radio, or the more colorful outposts of conspiracy theorizing popular on the right, you might think that Robert Mueller is an experienced prosecutor leading a methodical investigation into the Trump campaign's ties to Russia. At the end of that investigation, you probably think, Mueller will present his findings, there either will or won't be evidence of serious wrongdoing, some people might be indicted (a couple already have), and whatever the outcome of those criminal cases, our political system will have to sort out what to do about the whole matter, if anything.

But if you do watch Fox or listen to Rush Limbaugh or read websites like Breitbart, you're living in an entirely different reality, in which there's a massive and sinister conspiracy at work and the only appropriate response is to live every moment of every day on the verge of outright panic. In this bizarre fantasy world, the FBI — as conservative an agency as you'll find in the federal government — is actually an organization committed to destroying Donald Trump, so gripped is it with pro-Democratic bias.

Jonathan Swan of Axios reported on Tuesday that Attorney General Jeff Sessions has been pressuring FBI Director Christopher Wray to fire his deputy director, Andrew McCabe, who has become a particular target of President Trump's. (Trump is consumed with the fact that McCabe's wife ran for state office in Virginia as a Democrat, which he seems to believe proves that McCabe is conspiring against him at Hillary Clinton's behest.) The pressure got so intense that Wray reportedly threatened to resign if Sessions tried to remove McCabe. Sessions is not only under pressure of his own from Republicans to purge the Justice Department of anyone who isn't a Trump loyalist, it wouldn't be surprising if he's desperate to show the president that he can help protect him from the Russia probe, as Trump has said plainly he wishes Sessions would do.

Trump's enemies, apparently, lurk everywhere."

[BlueK]

Oh man, there isn't really an anti-Trump FBI "secret society?" Bummer. That sounded like a fun club.

https://www.cnn.com/2018/01/25/polit...sis/index.html

[Uncle Ted]

Oh man, there isn't really an anti-Trump FBI "secret society?" Bummer. That sounded like a fun club.

https://www.cnn.com/2018/01/25/polit...sis/index.html

Mods... do your job and delete these Russian Bot posts!

[frank ryan]

Oh man, there isn't really an anti-Trump FBI "secret society?" Bummer. That sounded like a fun club.

https://www.cnn.com/2018/01/25/polit...sis/index.html

Stop, Ted's said we post fake news. Our extremist right-winger politicians like Ron Johnson are our last defenders of truth.

[frank ryan]

Mods... do your job and delete these Russian Bot posts!

Did you get a twitter notice?

[Uncle Ted]

Oh man, there isn't really an anti-Trump FBI "secret society?" Bummer. That sounded like a fun club.

https://www.cnn.com/2018/01/25/polit...sis/index.html

We should now be able to see if they were joking or not... they should have taken a page out of Hillary Clinton's playbook and smashed those phones with an hammer:

DOJ recovers missing text messages between anti-Trump FBI agents Strzok and Page

The Department of Justice has recovered missing text messages between anti-Trump FBI officials Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, the DOJ’s inspector general said Thursday.


In a letter sent to congressional committees, Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz said his office “succeeded in using forensic tools to recover text messages from FBI devices, including text messages between Mr. Strzok and Ms. Page that were sent or received between December 14, 2016 and May 17, 2017.”


“Our effort to recover any additional text messages is ongoing,” Horowitz said. “We will provide copies of the text messages that we recover from these devices to the Department so that the Department’s leadership can take any management action it deems appropriate.”
[...]

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2018...-official.html

[creekster]

I'm sure Ted will enjoy this piece not sponsored by Russian bots. Fun reading.

http://theweek.com/articles/750337/r...ull-illuminati

"If you're fortunate enough not to be a regular consumer of Fox News, conservative talk radio, or the more colorful outposts of conspiracy theorizing popular on the right, you might think that Robert Mueller is an experienced prosecutor leading a methodical investigation into the Trump campaign's ties to Russia. At the end of that investigation, you probably think, Mueller will present his findings, there either will or won't be evidence of serious wrongdoing, some people might be indicted (a couple already have), and whatever the outcome of those criminal cases, our political system will have to sort out what to do about the whole matter, if anything.

But if you do watch Fox or listen to Rush Limbaugh or read websites like Breitbart, you're living in an entirely different reality, in which there's a massive and sinister conspiracy at work and the only appropriate response is to live every moment of every day on the verge of outright panic. In this bizarre fantasy world, the FBI — as conservative an agency as you'll find in the federal government — is actually an organization committed to destroying Donald Trump, so gripped is it with pro-Democratic bias.

Jonathan Swan of Axios reported on Tuesday that Attorney General Jeff Sessions has been pressuring FBI Director Christopher Wray to fire his deputy director, Andrew McCabe, who has become a particular target of President Trump's. (Trump is consumed with the fact that McCabe's wife ran for state office in Virginia as a Democrat, which he seems to believe proves that McCabe is conspiring against him at Hillary Clinton's behest.) The pressure got so intense that Wray reportedly threatened to resign if Sessions tried to remove McCabe. Sessions is not only under pressure of his own from Republicans to purge the Justice Department of anyone who isn't a Trump loyalist, it wouldn't be surprising if he's desperate to show the president that he can help protect him from the Russia probe, as Trump has said plainly he wishes Sessions would do.

Trump's enemies, apparently, lurk everywhere."

Given that the universe seems to like balance, it only makes sense there would be a 'yuge' imaginary left wing conspiracy to push against the imaginary vast right wing conspiracy. Besides, when you're in power maybe someone really is always out to get you.