It's Official, Trump's Team Full Contact with Russian Intelligence.

[Fargus]

Dodgy as hell and Wikileaks? Is this just a coincidence or are you actually referring to her being a Satanist bathing in the blood of children?

No, moreso backstabbing Sanders, CF stuff and the DNC's backroom shenanigans. The Satanist stuff is just crap from 4chan and r/The_Donald picking up something inconspicuous and blowing it up to something that it isn't.

[Felya]

It's all political theatre. There is little behind his words, just like when he said he'd put her in jail then decided not to follow-up with anything. Just like when he said he'd drain the swamp, then fill it up again with bankers.

The deflections are just red herrings.

Yes, your deflecting is very strange. You take issue with Trump being called a traitor, before a trial. But, now telling me to ignore Trumo saying she founded ISIS?

No, how about I do the opposite and ignore forum posters, but pay attention to Trump?

[-Nurot]

"The real scandal here is that classified information is illegally given out by "intelligence" like candy. Very un-American!" -Twitter 02/15/2017

All I can do is laugh. That didn't work with the Democrats and the boring, leaked, thousands of pages from the DNC that revealed nothing of than personal bias. It sure as hell won't work now.

[Jtbrig7390]

Different depending on which incident. For Flynn, at the time he was a private citizen, which is why it was technically a violation of a rather old law against private citizens establishing foreign policy relations with other nations. The bigger problem with that, since that law really isn't something that people focus on that much in a global economy, is that he then lied to Pence about never talking about sanctions (after his talk with Russia, Putin did a complete 180 in how Russia would respond which suggests strongly that the conversation clued Putin in on how Trump would approach them), and Pence then went public to defend Flynn. The deeper scandal now involving that are allegations that Trump was aware, but chose to hide it both from the public and from Pence. I think that a Fox news report I read on it said it best: Pence is a slow man to anger, so when he does get angry you know there's something to it.

With the more recent allegations, specifically that Paul Manafort and three other high up people in the Trump campaign coordinated directly with Russian intelligence officers for unnamed reasons, the issue comes up that right now Trump is going very, very, very easy on Russia. He's basically pussyfooting around everything involving them, and it's frankly concerning even from the perspective of him wanting to establish better relations with the other country. So the question right now being raised is quite simply, do Trump's current behavior as president and history of direct interactions with Putin's spy network indicate that his administration is focused on appeasing the Russian government at the express expense of American citizens and economic and geopolitical interests. Private citizens have far more leeway, but as president he took an oath to protect and serve its citizens. That rather basic tenant of what is absolutely required to be president is what is now under siege.

I wouldn't be surprised if Pence is Innocent in all of this and right now hes asking himself what the fuck he got into.


(Can we stop talking about Hillary, Its derailing the thread and fucken pointless)

[ringpriest]

There are two issues, one major and one minor:
1. MAJOR : It is illegal for unauthorised US citizens to negotiate with a foreign government with which the US currently has a dispute with (i.e. Russia).
2. MINOR : the concept of the president elect setting US foreign policy in the period between the election and the inauguration.

PS: MAJOR/MINOR are my opinions... not sure legally the severity of the offences.

There hasn't been any evidence so far of actual treason, although it is definitely scrubbing the surface.

There is also the little matter of allegations (which so far, are nothing more than that) that Trump and his campaign were in discussions for a quid pro quo where he would agree to remove economic sanctions directed at Russia over the interference / invasion of Ukraine in return for a hefty chunk of Rosneft (i.e. a multi-billion dollar bribe). 19.5% of Rosneft (almost exactly the the amount allegedly offered to Trump) was recently privatized, ostensibly in a deal with Qatar and a Swiss company, but the actual ownership remains murky.

[Fargus]

Because she's not. There is no evidence she was. There is, however, evidence of all the stuff being said about the Trump team.

You are not privy to the current FBI investigation regarding the CF, so you cannot say in absolute terms there's no evidence. You are also not privy to all these phone conversations, or what was actually said. So again, whether there is evidence or not will be determined by the proper authority, and not by trial through media.

[Shadowferal]

Look - if Pence becomes president, the world and the US will survive - it may be a tough few years for some people - but in 4 years he can be judged and another chance for real change.

Right now - survival is the core issue, nothing else matters if you don't survive. If Trump and co are allowed to break the constitution today, in four years he might just decide not to have an election.

Make no mistake, I think anyone with an iota of common sense and feeling any sense of patriotism..(apologies to any who see that as an issue) is on the same side today.

[Heaterz 88]

Russia is our greatest ally. or would you cucks rather it be (((Israel)))?

infracted - forbidden topics

[schwarzkopf]

There is also the little matter of allegations (which so far, are nothing more than that) that Trump and his campaign were in discussions for a quid pro quo where he would agree to remove economic sanctions directed at Russia over the interference / invasion of Ukraine in return for a hefty chunk of Rosneft (i.e. a multi-billion dollar bribe).

Indeed, that is sort of why they don't allow it (see #1).

There are so many things wrong with this administration, so many avenues of legal attack - it is just overwhelming.

[Kasierith]

Hillary was assumed guilty from day one. To the point, that it kept her from getting elected. And she didn;t even commit a crime. Hell, there's no evidence anything bad actually happened.

I always found this quite funny. Of the leak scandals, despite how "insecure and dangerous" Clinton's servers were, hackers were able to hit the DNC, the RNC, the state department, several of Clinton's campaign managers, several private citizens connected to Clinton's campaign, and who knows what else. And yet despite wikileaks and such claiming that they totally hacked Clinton's servers (which never panned out at all) there has never been any indication that Clinton's private servers were compromised by foreign or domestic agents.

[Felya]

No, moreso backstabbing Sanders, CF stuff and the DNC's backroom shenanigans.

That just means you don't know what a political party is. Sanders was an independent that caucuses with DNC, while Clinton is a prominent and long standing democrat, whose husband gets pulled out of a hat when ever a democrat needs a boost in an election. You mean to tell me, that democrats colluded for her? Excluding WA of course, where Bernie got delegates a whole 2 months before a public vote. The above is saying you don't understand the primary process, not that anything wrong was done.

The Satanist stuff is just crap from 4chan and r/The_Donald picking up something inconspicuous and blowing it up to something that it isn't.

No, InfoWars, one of the few sources Trump claims is the few honest sources of truth, ran a 3 hour story on it. Wikileaks twitter posted about it. In fact, until the story actually got running, r/The_Donald was trying to downplay it, because it made them look like lunatics and few thought anyone would buy it. But, there we were... 10 years of demonizing Hillary, litteraly worked.

[Orby]

So whats the time on that Doomsday clock now? :P

[Fargus]

Yes, your deflecting is very strange. You take issue with Trump being called a traitor, before a trial. But, now telling me to ignore Trumo saying she founded ISIS?

No, how about I do the opposite and ignore forum posters, but pay attention to Trump?

Are you just wanting to pick an argument for the sake of it?

Trump also said he knows better than generals about military matters, but no one is going to take this kind of comment seriously. What Trump said was silly, so was the person who called him a traitor. Until it's proven in a court of law, I'm going to continue saying that.

[belleflop]

Make no mistake, I think anyone with an iota of common sense and feeling any sense of patriotism..(apologies to any who see that as an issue) is on the same side today.

I'd agree with this. Anyone still on the trump train really is either a troll or willfully ignorant to the seriousness of the situation. My political views align more with republicans than democrats and I find all of this unsettling to the core.

[Kasierith]

I wouldn't be surprised if Pence is Innocent in all of this and right now hes asking himself what the fuck he got into.


(Can we stop talking about Hillary, Its derailing the thread and fucken pointless)

I think with Pence, you get what you see. He's a prototypical, almost epitomic, social conservative lifetime politician who is perfectly content sitting at the top and managing the needs of the consistency as expediently as necessary and overseeing the cogs of government workers keeping everything moving smoothly. I would be very surprised if he were a core member in Trump's deviations into shenanigans.

[Jtbrig7390]

I think with Pence, you get what you see. He's a prototypical, almost epitomic, social conservative lifetime politician who is perfectly content sitting at the top and managing the needs of the consistency as expediently as necessary and overseeing the cogs of government workers keeping everything moving smoothly. I would be very surprised if he were a core member in Trump's deviations into shenanigans.

I'm no fan of Pence and personally I think hes nuts from what I know/seen. But IMO he is by far the better choice between him and Trump.

He knows not to say fuck you to everyone at once. Like you said, I think he would just oversee the cogs of the government and make sure everything runs smoothly.

[Barnabas]

Democrats think they have something when they really don't have anything more than a hope. So before the election trump was under investigation by the intelligence community? If so why? So the intelligence agencies are going forward with wiretaps against private citizens without a subpoena? Democrats are ok with this? I'm calling BS on this "leak." These news agencies are toxic and getting into dangerous waters with these fake charges they levy against politicians.

[Shadowferal]

Democrats think they have something when they really don't have anything more than a hope. So before the election trump was under investigation by the intelligence community? If so why? So the intelligence agencies are going forward with wiretaps against private citizens without a subpoena? Democrats are ok with this? I'm calling BS on this "leak."

A little late to be arguing about particular policies.

[TwoNineMarine]

Thanks for the responses everyone.

I guess I still don't see the legal issue behind this. My understanding is that if they were actually negotiating deals then it's illegal under the Logan Act but if they were simply discussing plans and what not that it's not.

It's a fine line I understand but from everything I've read there hasn't been anything illegal done so far.

It absolutely looks shady though so hopefully they get to the bottom of it to see if there was anything illegal actually done.

[Shadowferal]

Thanks for the responses everyone.

I guess I still don't see the legal issue behind this. My understanding is that if they were actually negotiating deals then it's illegal under the Logan Act but if they were simply discussing plans and what not that it's not.

It's a fine line I understand but from everything I've read there hasn't been anything illegal done so far.

It absolutely looks shady though so hopefully they get to the bottom of it to see if there was anything illegal actually done.

If there's substance here, you have someone that bought the election for the price of easing sanctions. (Worse, Russia could blackmail the president now...if he didn't go all buddy-buddy with him)