Mega-Thread: Trump Focused Discussion

[Edge-]

https://www.cnn.com/2019/09/19/polit...ned/index.html

A year after President Donald Trump picked former California Rep. Darrell Issa to run the US Trade and Development Agency, a Senate hearing to consider the nomination was postponed over how to handle questions raised in his FBI file.

In front of Issa, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations committee, Sen. Bob Menendez of New Jersey, pushed for the public hearing to turn to a private session in which every member on the panel could learn of confidential information that only he and chairman Jim Risch, an Idaho Republican, knew to save Issa from any "embarrassment or harm."

"There's information in his FBI background investigation that concerns my greatly, and that I believe members may find problematic, and potentially disqualifying for Senate confirmation," Menendez said. "I firmly believe that every member of this committee should have the opportunity to review that information."

The panel held a vote. While Risch could have proceeded, a split between all Democrats and Sen. Rand Paul, a Republican of Kentucky, and all other Republicans gave him pause. Paul said that Menendez's motion was a "courtesy" to Issa and called Risch's process "terrible," since the senators could learn of potentially sensitive material about the nominee at the same time as the public.

After the 11-to-11 vote, Risch called for a short break and met with Issa, Menendez and others. When Risch returned to the hearing room on Capitol Hill, Issa did not. Risch then called for Issa's hearing to be postponed so that all senators on the panel could review the file.

Another Trump nominee, more vetting problems plaguing their confirmation process. I'm real curious about this FBI file, fuck protecting him from embarrassment, make that shit public. Was he creepin on young boys? Sexting with female staffers? The public should know the dirty laundry of those nominated for these kinds of positions. If they're afraid of it being aired, decline the nomination.

[Rasulis]

https://www.cnn.com/2019/09/19/polit...ned/index.html



Another Trump nominee, more vetting problems plaguing their confirmation process. I'm real curious about this FBI file, fuck protecting him from embarrassment, make that shit public. Was he creepin on young boys? Sexting with female staffers? The public should know the dirty laundry of those nominated for these kinds of positions. If they're afraid of it being aired, decline the nomination.

He'll likely be running to represent my district then. Ugh!

[Shalcker]

5) labeling domestic terrorism as a federal crime

What is the point of this particular item?

[Breccia]

I'm real curious about this FBI file

How did the press, which Trump uses to vet people, get the FBI file?

SARCASM ENDED!

In all seriousness, this is just another case of Trump "only picking the best people" from a selection of corporate cronies, wife beaters, and liars. And even the GOP seems to tire of this.

By the way, this is why you don't waive background checks.

- - - Updated - - -

So you know that spending bill the House and Senate signed?

Nah, just kidding. We don't have it yet.

With 8 days before we need a CR to keep the lights on, the most sand the Democrats have thrown in the gears is "Trump's farm aid isn't going to farmers, it's going to corporations".

"That's just the Democrats being obstructionists."

Well first of all, if the intent of the farm relief for tariffs was to go to larger agribusinesses and not to smaller farmers, I think Trump and the GOP should be brave enough to say so. I think they should say "We want to support large agribusinesses with this federal aid" and state their reasoning for doing so. So far, they've mostly said "We want to help farmers" and then didn't do it. And, if Trump and the GOP want the money to go to actual farmers, they would agree with the Democrats and put that in the spending bill, right now.

But secondly...yep. They 100% are. And it's 100% called for. I've personally cited somewhere between 30 and 50 different articles with different professional, qualified experts who don't use their feelings who all said "Yes the economy is in trouble, yes Trump's words and actions are pushing us that way". Almost all of that was unilateral, the National Security Lol tariffs. Well, guess what? If it's okay for Trump to act like that, I see no problem with the Democrats using the full limit of their own power as well. And Trump will either sign yet another spending bill with no Wall funding (and has other things he doesn't like), or he can shut down the government.

Again.

I don't think O'Connell can block spending bills from hitting the Senate floor. I know he doesn't want to. O'Connell might be willing to take some heat by obstructing everything except judges, but there is only a small difference between "Trump shuts down the government" and "O'Connell shuts down the government because he knows Trump would have if he didn't". He's already at risk for losing his leadership role, and he might lose his job at this rate, he's the least popular person in Washington DC. And while turning on Trump is something he can't afford to do, you can only take so many bullets intended for another person before you die.

[Edge-]

You'll never guess who was involved involved in telling the the DNI not to tell Congress about the whistleblower information.

It was the White House.

Alright, you all probably guessed that.

[Paranoid Android]

We all know it's easy to play Trump. Just give a compliment first.

It would sometimes puzzle me why countries would want to work and cooperate with this buffon, but it is accurate that most countries knew they could manipulate him like no other. Most realized that this would be one of those rare times you could take advantage of the U.S. just by telling a President on how great he is.

[Kujako]

We all know it's easy to play Trump. Just give a compliment first.

I don't know... I would have a REAL hard time doing that.

[Stormspellz]

What is the point of this particular item?

rather self explanatory, except those domestic terrorist tend to be his base, so he avoids the topic and just screams Hillary or brown people

[Breccia]

just by telling a President on how great he is.

Or you could throw him a parade. That worked too.

By the way, it's time again for Guess the Speaker!

In the absence of that whistleblower law, there is no lawful mechanism for an intelligence community employer or contractor to raise a complaint about serious misconduct. The whole point of the whistleblower statute is not only to encourage those to report problems, abuses, violations of laws, but also to have a legal mechanism to do so and not to disclose classified information — because there's no other remedy. That whole purpose is being frustrated here because the director of national intelligence has made the unprecedented decision not to share the complaint with Congress

That is, of course, Adam Schiff (dun dun) calling the whistleblower incident "unPresidented".

Schiff said he is consulting with the House general counsel to determine whether to take the Trump administration to court in order to obtain the complaint. Schiff also said he is considering using Congress' "power of the purse" to exert leverage over the DNI.

See earlier posts about the spending bills. Maguire is due to testify before the HIC and it's even money if he chooses to show up or defy the subpoena.

Trump is calling this Fake News. Of course, saying it's Fake News then blocking the evidence proving such, is like claiming you're rich and suing anyone from seeing your tax returns.

[Belize]

You'll never guess who was involved involved in telling the the DNI not to tell Congress about the whistleblower information.

It was the White House.

Alright, you all probably guessed that.

Oh my gosh, what a stunning revelation.

[Breccia]

You'll never guess who was involved involved in telling the the DNI not to tell Congress about the whistleblower information.

Actually just had a thought: we've seen What He Meant Was used on all kinds of things. Why isn't it being used here? "Oh he didn't really promise anything, it was a figure of speech" or "Well of course he promised to back our allies, who wouldn't?" or "He was joking" or "Help, I have to lie for Trump or they'll kill my family"?

We know Trump has just handed over classified intel and it was "Well he can do that legally". We've seen Trump negotiate with dictators and terrorists and it was "Well you need to talk to bad people sometimes". We've seen Trump have behind closed doors meetings and backchannels with Russia and it was "You think our country's so innocent?"

They're blocking this one.

Why? What's so bad about this particular instance? This has to be something beyond a typical gaff, misstatement, unkeepable promise or even the vile, treacherous behavior of inviting terrorists to Camp David. All of that was released and defended. This one is being locked up in the dark.

What did Trump do, that's so far beyond even what we've seen so far, that the White House is openly breaking the law to conceal?

- - - Updated - - -

Within days of the legitimate government of Afghanistan snubbing Trump, rather than go to a dinner party with the Taliban terrorists, Trump halts $160 million in aid that was slated for Afghanistan.

Afghan government institutions and leaders must be transparent and accountable to the Afghan people

"Um...the State Department does know they're working for Trump, the least accountable and least transparent President in recent history?"

Yes. Yes they do.

Now this is getting ugly. First of all, while I've been told the legit Afghani government isn't all that clean, there will forever be the stain of "did Trump do this to spite them?" over the issue.

But secondly, there's an election coming up next week. The move to withhold funds could be seen as an attempt to throw the current ruling party out of power, by virtue of calling them corrupt as well as ripping up their paycheck.

Again, maybe this move was warranted. Maybe not. But the timing is miserable.

- - - Updated - - -

Sen. O'Connell backs $250 million for state election security.

"What's wrong with that?"

Nothing. It's completely called for. I'm stoked to see it advance.

[kaelleria]

NYT is reporting its not just 1 act... But multiple acts

A potentially explosive complaint by a whistle-blower in the intelligence community said to involve President Trump was related to a series of actions that goes beyond any single discussion with a foreign leader, according to interviews on Thursday.
The complaint was related to multiple acts, Michael Atkinson, the inspector general for American spy agencies, told lawmakers during a private briefing, two officials familiar with it said. But he declined to discuss specifics, including whether the complaint involved the president, according to committee members.

https://a.msn.com/r/2/AAHxDU9?m=en-u...rID=InAppShare

[Breccia]

So you know that spending bill the House and Senate signed?

(literally a few hours later)

House signs CR to keep govt funded to November.

The House on Thursday passed legislation to avert a government shutdown and keep the government funded through Nov. 21.

The bill, which passed in a 301-123 vote, came after some uncertainty that the stop-gap measure would be brought to the House floor by the end of the week after it was yanked at the committee level on Tuesday evening.

The measure, known as a continuing resolution or CR, was unexpectedly pulled from the Rules Committee due to a lack of consensus on provisions including health care extension and aid to farmers dealing with the repercussions of the trade war with China.

The bill text was ultimately released Wednesday evening after bipartisan, bicameral negotiators reached a deal on the provisions.

The Senate is expected to take up the House measure next week.

The final House deal included provisions requiring the Department of Agriculture to provide state-by-state data on the effects of President Trump’s trade war, and extends funding for a slew of health programs including community health centers and Medicaid coverage in U.S. territories.

It also extends the National Flood Insurance Program and authorizations for the Export-Import Bank.

[Edge-]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/natio...476_story.html

Lawyers for Andrew McCabe asserted Thursday that the D.C. U.S. attorney’s office is refusing to say whether a grand jury declined to indict the former acting FBI director and complained of inappropriate media leaks they claimed could only have come from the Justice Department.

So...looking more like a grand jury didn't hand down an indictment against McCabe which...sure makes his prosecution pretty questionable and considerably weakens the governments case if so.

- - - Updated - - -

https://www.politico.com/story/2019/...ocates-1754820

The White House abruptly organized — and then quickly canceled — a meeting Thursday with frustrated conservative policy leaders, to try to tamp down anger about a sweeping vaping ban that’s inflamed the Trump administration’s traditional allies, four individuals with knowledge of the meeting told POLITICO.

...

“I think that the White House didn’t necessarily have an accurate feel for where conservative groups were at on this,” said Blair, who was invited to the meeting and has shared concerns about the vaping strategy with administration officials. “I think there’s a little bit of chaos over at the White House given how strong the pushback has been.”

Bolded for, "No fucking duh, Blair". Seems the rollout of this ban was prepared for as much as anything else the Trump administration has done. In that there was no preparation in place at all.

[Shalcker]

rather self explanatory, except those domestic terrorist tend to be his base, so he avoids the topic and just screams Hillary or brown people

Does he want to have an option of presidential pardon for them if they happen to terrorize immigrants or what?

[D Luniz]

So, Trump is offically using the courts to go full dictator

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/19/n...s-lawsuit.html

Lawyers for President Trump argued in a lawsuit filed on Thursday that he could not be criminally investigated while in office, as they sought to block a subpoena from state prosecutors in Manhattan demanding eight years of his tax returns.

Taking a broad position that the lawyers acknowledged had not been tested, the president’s legal team argued in the complaint that the Constitution effectively makes sitting presidents immune from all criminal inquiries until they leave the White House.

Presidents, they asserted, have such enormous responsibility and play a unique role in government that they cannot be subject to the burden of investigations, especially from local prosecutors who may use the criminal process for political gain.

let's quote St. Ronnie...while its still legal to do so

one of these days you and I are going to spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was like in American when men were free.

[Paranoid Android]

President Trump's attorney Rudy Giuliani denied asking Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden moments before admitting that he had done just that

"So you did ask Ukraine to look into Joe Biden?" CNN's Chris Cuomo pressed.

"Of course I did," Giuliani said.

https://t.co/lCJ274WqzO

https://twitter.com/CNN/status/1174887818038059008?s=19

Good Ole drunk Rudi.

This story seems to have legs.

[Masark]

The WH's new line is that "the President is the ultimate classification authority. And that if he wants to give away classified information to whomever he wants, it's perfectly legal." So, yeah...

That is actually true, for a change. The entire scheme of classified information is established via executive order, starting with Executive Order 10290 issued by Truman and most recently #13526 issued by Obama.

[DarkTZeratul]

That is actually true, for a change. The entire scheme of classified information is established via executive order, starting with Executive Order 10290 issued by Truman and most recently #13526 issued by Obama.

Just because it's technically legal doesn't mean it's even remotely a good thing for the president to be blabbing classified info to foreign dignitaries. Especially those from hostile countries.

[Breccia]

Just because it's technically legal doesn't mean it's even remotely a good thing for the president to be blabbing classified info to foreign dignitaries. Especially those from hostile countries.

Exactly. To put it another way:
1) it's completely legal for me to give the daughter of a construction worker an A in my class.
2) it's completely legal for me to ask a construction worker to ask to lower the price for a job.
3) but if I do both, it's at the very minimum a conflict of interest. If I do the second and suggest a trade for the first, that's a bribe, it's completely unethical, and I should be fired on the spot.

Unrelated: WaPo reports that Team Trump is preparing to move another $3.6 billion of Congressional-approved military funding to the Wall instead.

Unless, of course, the current spending bill has Wall funding in it. Which it won't.