Mega-Thread: Trump Focused Discussion

[Orbitus]

That too! He knew he was screwed, because "Once you get these special counsels your presidency is over" or something to that effect. Congress or not, a cloud hung over his presidency and still does over a very, very serious charge of conspiring with a hostile foreign nation to steal an election. He'll never get the stain of collusion out despite the fact that that was the one thing Mueller's report actually did vindicate him on.

Trump is who he is so I don't think it moves the needle one way or the other for very many people. But I do imagine he's got to be pretty much fed up with this by now.

The fact that you think the Mueller report vindicated him, in any fucking way, means you are fucking delusional. It specifically lays out at least 2 instances of collusion, that just didn't rise to conspiracy levels. And it specifically lays out at least 10 instances of obstruction that Mueller could not exonerate him on. But, you probably got your bullshit narrative from Andrew McCarthy.

[Felya]

Sure it was. When you read the full quote. And I mean, there was no collusion, so what would he even be saying that for other than the political consequences?

Uhm... does political consequences somehow invalidate obstruction? I am sorry that the FBI didn’t assume Trump is an idiot, to ignore his behavior as just massive insecurity over political consequences.

Edit: I guess I should say "the full section" of the Mueller report. It's a few sentences, but ends with this:

"Everyone tells me if you get one of these special counsels it ruins your presidency. It takes years and years and I won't be able to do anything. This is the worst thing that ever happened to me."

Hillary didn’t behave like this through 8 investigations and neither did Bill during impeachment. Trump doesn’t get a temporary insanity plea...

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Collusion isn't really a legal thing.

Conspiracy is a legal thing and conspiracy was proven for anyone not the sitting POTUS. The problem with shoving your head in the sand is you cannot see the facts.

I think it’s pretty clear case of obstruction, when Trump is holding infrastructure discussion hostage. What’s more important, infrastructure or protecting Trump’s finances from scrutiny?

[Masark]

Trump doesn’t get a temporary insanity plea...

What about permanent?

[Felya]

What about permanent?

I assume the poster I was replying to cares about protecting Trump’s finances and wouldn’t want to have his finances going to the state, because Trump is just mentally incompetent. All these hospitals wasting money on a cure for cancer, when affluenza is the real enemy... /s

[Dontrike]

If I was Trump I'd be pissed off too, I gotta be honest. He's had his entire first two years hamstrung by a BS allegation that others,

You and your ilk have said this for two years. Why do you believe Trump could have gotten anything done without the investigation? Republicans controlled everything for two years and still nothing got done, so do please say where you get this fantasy that Trump "does work" from.

He wasn't able to work out deals with foreign leaders, trade deals etc., because they would ask him, "Will you be around to see the deal through?"

You have a source for this? I'm sure they ask him "What's wrong with you?" combined with the actual laughter we've heard as they laugh at Trump. Again, where do you get these fantasies?

Trump can't get anything done because he's a poor deal maker, can't work with others, has a horrible work ethic, and he barely knows how to pronounce the places he is in.

Talk about infuriating. And now they want to do it all over again. Requesting testimony from all the same people, all the way back to Hope Hicks. Cory Lewendowski and God knows who else is probably on the long list of people Congressional Democrats want to trot out before their committees.

Oh no, we know the president tried to obstruct justice and they still investigate!? Aw, poor corrupt politician. We should stop and have a fundraiser for his failed charity, which closed down for being corrupt.

I'm sure this puts the crosshairs on me, that I'm a terrible person for speaking for Trump, but all I'm saying is, if I was Trump, I'd be livid.

He's furious all the time because his stupidity is showing now more than ever.

[Zan15]

Finding lead in toys or backdoors in computer hardware that has already been shipped to the US is not the same thing as auditing factories in China to determine whether they are polluting the environment and to what extent; which is what he suggested.

They are not even remotely similar, don't be disingenuous.

Odd that you left out the auditing of their finances from your retort.

They are similar. Just because one is way harder does not make it similar.

[Dontrike]

Trump is who he is so I don't think it moves the needle one way or the other for very many people. But I do imagine he's got to be pretty much fed up with this by now.

Considering he's guilty as fuck and more than two dozen investigations still await him I'd say I'd be irritated too that I would be found guilty eventually.

[Dead Moose Fandango]

I'll put it this way. I'd sooner support Hitler than Trump. Y'know why? Hitler is dead.

[Dacien]

Citation needed*

Because it seems more like it's the result of him simply being a fucking awful "dealmaker". I mean, we've seen how easily he's manipulated during meetings with Congressional leadership (remember when Feinstein got him to agree to signing a clean DACA and McCarthy nearly had a heart attack?). Remember when Trump saluted a North Korean general? Remember when he canceled wargames with South Korea while receiving nothing in return from North Korea? Well, except a "very nice note"? The "grand accomplishment" of the USMCA that's functionally NAFTA 1.2?

It was in that John Dowd interview from a few weeks ago. Although he might have just said that those words were spoken to Trump, not necessarily that actual deals fell through. If that's the case I'll preemptively correct myself here.

[I Push Buttons]

Odd that you left out the auditing of their finances from your retort.

They are similar. Just because one is way harder does not make it similar.

I mean the US Securities and Exchange Commission has had challenges auditing the finances of companies that operate in China all the same...

They have been complaining about it for years... Here is a statement on it from last year:

'Statement on the Vital Role of Audit Quality and Regulatory Access to Audit and Other Information Internationally—Discussion of Current Information Access Challenges with Respect to U.S.-listed Companies with Significant Operations in China'

...

Restrictions on Access to Books and Records Maintained in China

While international cooperation and coordination have increased significantly in many parts of the world in recent years, the SEC and PCAOB still face challenges from laws and practices that can impede strong regulation, supervision, and enforcement. For example, both the SEC and the PCAOB currently face significant challenges in overseeing the financial reporting for U.S.-listed companies whose operations are based in China—a market where U.S. investors’ interest has increased and is significant. The business books and records related to transactions and events occurring within China are required by Chinese law to be kept and maintained there. China also restricts the auditor’s documentation of work performed in the country from being transferred out of China.

China’s state security laws are invoked at times to limit U.S. regulators’ ability to oversee the financial reporting of U.S.-listed, China-based companies. In particular, Chinese laws governing the protection of state secrets and national security have been invoked to limit foreign access to China-based business books and records and audit work papers. As a result, for certain China-based companies listed on U.S. stock exchanges, the SEC and PCAOB have not had access to the books and records and audit work papers to an extent consistent with other jurisdictions both in scope and timing.

...

But I don't see what auditing companies' finances has to do with the point I made, which is what possible reason would China have to give (different) US regulators unfettered access to their factories in a scheme that could literally only harm their own interests?

[Breccia]

Number of children who died in Trump's concentration camps is now six.

[Felya]

Number of children who died in Trump's concentration camps is now six.

They need a Trojan horse, but a woman’s womb, instead of a horse...

[Dontrike]

Number of children who died in Trump's concentration camps is now six.

I'm sure all the Trumpsters are barely contained glee over this.

[Zan15]

But I don't see what auditing companies' finances has to do with the point I made, which is what possible reason would China have to give (different) US regulators unfettered access to their factories in a scheme that could literally only harm their own interests?

I already told you. They get access to the largest most profitable market in the world with zero tax penalty.
They don't report, or are caught lying...poof.
What's bigger than that.


Besides if this keeps up eventually we will have no trouble tracking things like this eventually.

https://www.vox.com/energy-and-envir...pollution-data

Its a huge start in holding companies and countries responsible.

I mean the US Securities and Exchange Commission has had challenges auditing the finances of companies that operate in China all the same...

They have been complaining about it for years...

?

They have problems auditing the finances of companies that operate in the United States and keeping up with the huge "surprise" fraud that happens all the time. I mean hello Enron, WorldCom, Tyco, HealthSouth, and the like.

We did not throw up our hands and give up did we?

[Bodakane]

Number of children who died in Trump's concentration camps is now six.

There's a terrible joke about the right being in favor of extremely late term abortions if you're brown and that joke's sole purpose would be to highlight their unmitigated hypocrisy.....but I honestly just so fucking hate them all at this point there's no point in bothering.

[Flower Milk]

http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/...deal-dies.html

President Trump issued an unplanned and seemingly impulsive public declaration today that he would boycott all infrastructure negotiations with Democrats unless they stop investigating his misconduct. “I walked into the room, and I told Senator Schumer, Speaker Pelosi, I want to do infrastructure, I want to do it more than you want to do it. I’d be really good at it, that’s what I do,” he said. “But you know what? You can’t do it under these circumstances. So get these phony investigations over with.”

As he has done so often, Trump is inverting the traditional pattern of behavior for his office. The usual move for a president facing investigation or impeachment is to piously declare that he is putting the nation’s business first and to urge everybody to focus on whatever policy matter is at hand. But instead, now the president is saying policy must come to a halt because of the investigations.

What’s more, his demand is completely uncategorical. Trump is not merely objecting to impeachment proceedings, which have not even begun, but to all investigations. ABC News reports aides “tried to stop him for marching to the Rose Garden for that event,” but Trump “was mad from first thing this morning,” and “comments by Speaker Pelosi pushed him over the edge.” In other words, just the kind of coolheaded strategy we have come to expect from this president.

What makes this demand especially comical is how badly he reads the incentives. Trump has always had a distorted view of the Democrats’ incentives. They may like the idea of spending money on infrastructure, but a deal would help Trump enormously — both by pumping stimulus into the economy and by allowing him to recapture the centrist deal-making identity he ran on in 2016. Trump’s unpopularity in office owes itself in large part to his heavy reliance on a traditional plutocratic Republican agenda of tax cuts for the rich, trying to repeal Obamacare, and allowing the business lobby to self-regulate.

An infrastructure deal would be a lifeline for Trump. It’s probably the one thing he could do to bump up his approval rating. So now he’s holding a gun to his own approval ratings. If Democrats don’t stop doing the thing that makes Trump less popular, he won’t do the thing that makes him more popular! And in so doing, he will rob himself of his best argument against the investigations — that they are a distraction from real work — by personally taking responsibility for the lack of any progress off Congress’s shoulders and onto his own.

Holding the country's crumbling infrastructure hostage. Nice.

Are you okay with this, Trump supporters?

[Orbitus]

http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/...deal-dies.html



Holding the country's crumbling infrastructure hostage. Nice.

Are you okay with this, Trump supporters?

Course they are, they have been living like this forever. Look at some of the places in Alabama and Mississippi.

[Xarkan]

http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/...deal-dies.html



Holding the country's crumbling infrastructure hostage. Nice.

Are you okay with this, Trump supporters?

Does that even make sense

"I want this more than you but i am going to not do it in the hopes that you give me what i want in another case so i can return to get what i want in this case"?

[Breccia]

Does that even make sense

No.

Besides the fact that Trump isn't even personally involved with the investigations (he has lawyers for that, or the Treasury), and therefore the investigations shouldn't be affecting his ability to do his job, that's his own campaign promise that the Democrats willingly agreed to work with -- and which Trump even offered concessions if they would. He wanted their help.

It's possible he was called out for working with the Democrats, but God only knows by whom.

[Dontrike]

http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/...deal-dies.html



Holding the country's crumbling infrastructure hostage. Nice.

Are you okay with this, Trump supporters?

I've said it before and I will say it again there is no reason why Trump will not work with infrastructure, it helps him only and it's a win-win situation. Some of the most asinine thinking I've ever seen from one person. It's very possible he is trying to lose on purpose.