In Helsinki, Trump Shows He Is Indeed Guilty of Collusion

[tulc]

https://www.motherjones.com/politic...trump-shows-he-is-indeed-guilty-of-collusion/

Since being elected president, Donald Trump has vociferously claimed he engaged in “no collusion” with Vladimir Putin’s attack on the 2016 US election and that the investigation of any interactions between him and his associates and Russians was a “witch hunt” or a “rigged witch hunt.” Yet his historic Helsinki summit with Putin—and particularly the unsettling joint press conference they held—provided a clear indication that Trump is indeed guilty of one form of collusion: colluding with Putin to cover up Moscow’s criminal assault on American democracy.

I’ve been making this case for over a year, noting that “Trump actively and enthusiastically aided and abetted” Putin’s plot against the United States by supporting Moscow’s denial that it mounted information warfare that undermined the election and helped Trump. Put aside the notion of whether Trump or anyone in his crew schemed with Russians on how to pull this off. Once the attack became public, Trump and his lieutenants continuously maintained it was nothing but a hoax. When the Democratic National Committee in June 2016 revealed it had been hacked by Russian operatives, the Trump campaign issued a statement huffing, “We believe it was the DNC that did the ‘hacking’ as a way to distract from the many issues facing their deeply flawed candidate and failed party leader.” After WikiLeaks released over 20,000 DNC emails right before the start of the Democratic convention the following month, the Hillary Clinton campaign tried to make the point this was Russian sabotage. Donald Trump Jr. and Paul Manafort hit the cable news shows to call this claim absurd. (Yet just weeks earlier, both had attended a secret meeting in Trump Tower with a Russian emissary, after being told this woman was bringing the campaign dirt on Clinton as part of a secret Kremlin plot to assist Trump.)


Trump led the denial charge himself. After being briefed in mid-August by US intelligence that Russia was behind the hack-and-dump operation against the Clinton campaign, he repeatedly declared that there was no reason to suspect Moscow was the culprit. He did this in speeches. And he did this in the debates with Clinton. At their first face-off, he said the perp “could be somebody sitting on their bed that weighs 400 pounds, OK?” And following the Department of Homeland Security and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence’s release of a statement in early October 2016 stating that intelligence showed Russia was indeed behind this attack, Trump still vigorously insisted there was no reason to believe Moscow was involved.

tulc(interesting piece)

 

[Go Braves]

Well, yeah. But they did write that article out informatively.

Time has got a good article about this too:

https://twitter.com/TIME/status/1019905190370119680

 

[SeventyOne]

I think it's more likely the Dems are using the Russian blame story to affect the midterm and next Presidential election, and these haters are just mindless pawns being bent to their will.

One would think Trump sold the Russians 20% of our uranium or something.

 

[tulc]

(snip)

One would think Trump sold the Russians 20% of our uranium or something.

He didn't have to, he's sold them the whole country instead.
tulc(while his base believes every myth they tell them to)

 

[SeventyOne]

tulc(while his base believes every myth they tell them to)

Seriously? You constantly post the stories put out there by other people with no idea what is real and what is not. How would that make me the one believing everything I'm being told? Wake up.

 

[The Barbarian]

One would think Trump sold the Russians 20% of our uranium or something.

Turns out, we didn't do that. A Russian company owns 20% of currently mined uranium, not 20% of uranium in the United States, which is much larger. But since there's a glut of uranium on the market, and prices continue to fall, it's not really much of a concern.

May 24, 2018 at 7:33AM
Being a uranium miner hasn't been easy lately, with the spot price of the nuclear fuel hovering near 14-year lows. It's no wonder, then, that Cameco Corp. (NYSE:CCJ), the largest publicly traded uranium miner in the world, has seen its shares fall more than 70% over the past decade. Earnings results, meanwhile, have dipped into the red over the last two years.
https://www.fool.com/investing/2018/05/24/uranium-price-drops-are-killing-cameco-corp-today.aspx

 

[SeventyOne]

Turns out, we didn't do that. A Russian company owns 20% of currently mined uranium, not 20% of uranium in the United States, which is much larger. But since there's a glut of uranium on the market, and prices continue to fall, it's not really much of a concern.

May 24, 2018 at 7:33AM
Being a uranium miner hasn't been easy lately, with the spot price of the nuclear fuel hovering near 14-year lows. It's no wonder, then, that Cameco Corp. (NYSE:CCJ), the largest publicly traded uranium miner in the world, has seen its shares fall more than 70% over the past decade. Earnings results, meanwhile, have dipped into the red over the last two years.
https://www.fool.com/investing/2018/05/24/uranium-price-drops-are-killing-cameco-corp-today.aspx

Thanks, the point really was that if the way that story is portrayed broke today with the name of Trump associated with it, instead of Clinton, then suddenly these people would be livid. It's the name that's hated, not the issues themselves.

 

[The Barbarian]

Thanks, the point really was that if the way that story is portrayed broke today with the name of Trump associated with it, instead of Clinton, then suddenly these people would be livid.

Some people probably would. But imagine what the right wing would be doing, if Obama had said he was thinking of letting Putin take in an American Ambassador for questioning, or if he said he took Putin's word over that of our intelligence agencies.

Suppose he was caught on tape, bragging about getting away with sexual assault. Suppose it became clear that he paid off a porn star to keep quiet about an affair.

There would have been an impeachment, wouldn't there? And yet, the faked uranium story had the right foaming at the mouth for months.

It's the name that's hated, not the issues themselves.

Given Trump's behavior, I don't think it's his name that has decent people disgusted with him.

 

[SeventyOne]

Some people probably would. But imagine what the right wing would be doing, if Obama had said he was thinking of letting Putin take in an American Ambassador for questioning, or if he said he took Putin's word over that of our intelligence agencies.

Suppose he was caught on tape, bragging about getting away with sexual assault. Suppose it became clear that he paid off a porn star to keep quiet about an affair.

There would have been an impeachment, wouldn't there? And yet, the faked uranium story had the right foaming at the mouth for months.



Given Trump's behavior, I don't think it's his name that has decent people disgusted with him.

At least half of that is conjecture and wishful thinking, and the other half probably is as well.

I've never seen unhinged like I have in the last year and a half. You all just have sex between a billionaire and those who let him have what he wanted because of money, loose morals on both sides but hardly a scandal, and a false collusion narrative. That's it. It's fascinating watching millions of people being led around by the nose and instructed what to be mad at next. It's a great social experiment in the characteristics of insanity.

 

[Jamsie]

Seriously? You constantly post the stories put out there by other people with no idea what is real and what is not. How would that make me the one believing everything I'm being told? Wake up.

trump
"Don’t believe what you see from these people in the fake news. Don’t believe that crap you see from these people, the fake news,” he said, pointing to the journalists in the audience.

“Just remember, what you are seeing and what you are reading is not what’s happening,”

Obviously trump is the only one who actually knows "what is real and what is not". Seriously?

 

[The Barbarian]

At least half of that is conjecture and wishful thinking, and the other half probably is as well.

All a matter of public record. Would you like me to show you?

I've never seen unhinged like I have in the last year and a half.

"Unhinged" might be an exaggeration, but Trump does have some emotional problems.

 

[Gigimo]

At least half of that is conjecture and wishful thinking, and the other half probably is as well.

I've never seen unhinged like I have in the last year and a half. You all just have sex between a billionaire and those who let him have what he wanted because of money, loose morals on both sides but hardly a scandal, and a false collusion narrative. That's it. It's fascinating watching millions of people being led around by the nose and instructed what to be mad at next. It's a great social experiment in the characteristics of insanity.

All the insanity revolves around his "personality" it's hilarious.

 

[Yonny Costopoulis]

All the insanity revolves around his "personality" it's hilarious.

I think it is sad that you believe this unreality.

 

[SoldierOfTheKing]

Collusion towards peace against which there is no law. (Gal 5:22-23)

 

[The Barbarian]

It has now been admitted by Trump and his lawyers that Trump's people met with Russian agents in Trump tower, "to get dirt on Hillary Clinton." It's also now admitted that Trump dictated the memo denying this fact.

Thousands of pages of interview transcripts with the participants of the June 2016 Trump Tower meeting shed new light on how eager Donald Trump Jr. and senior members of the Trump campaign were to obtain damaging information on Hillary Clinton — and how frustrated and angry they were that the material did not come to fruition.
The nearly 2,000 pages of interviews do not appear to contain information that would change the course of special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into Trump's team and Russia. But the transcripts released by the Senate Judiciary Committee fill in new details about how Trump Jr., President Donald Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner and then-Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort were expecting a bombshell from Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya.
Rob Goldstone, the British music publicist who arranged the Trump Tower meeting, told the committee he was anticipating a "smoking gun" from Veselnitskaya when he urged Trump Jr. to take the meeting, even though he thought it was a "bad idea and that we shouldn't do it."
"I just sent somebody an email that says I'm setting up a meeting for someone that is going to bring you damaging information about somebody who was running to become the President of the United States," Goldstone said. "I thought that was worthy of the words 'smoking gun,' yes."
https://www.cnn.com/2018/05/16/poli...-committee-trump-tower-transcripts/index.html

In a confidential letter to special counsel Robert Mueller in January, President Donald Trump's legal team acknowledged for the first time that Trump "dictated" the first misleading statement put out about his son's controversial 2016 meeting with Russians at Trump Tower.
...
The misleading statement, issued in July 2017 to The New York Times, obfuscated the true nature of the June 2016 meeting at Trump Tower, which was attended by Donald Trump Jr., then-Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner, who is now a senior White House adviser, and a group of Kremlin-tied Russians.
https://www.cnn.com/2018/06/02/politics/trump-lawyers-statement-trump-tower-russians/index.html

 

[The Barbarian]

In a confidential letter to special counsel Robert Mueller in January, President Donald Trump's legal team acknowledged for the first time that Trump "dictated" the first misleading statement put out about his son's controversial 2016 meeting with Russians at Trump Tower.
...
The misleading statement, issued in July 2017 to The New York Times, obfuscated the true nature of the June 2016 meeting at Trump Tower, which was attended by Donald Trump Jr., then-Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner, who is now a senior White House adviser, and a group of Kremlin-tied Russians.
https://www.cnn.com/2018/06/02/politics/trump-lawyers-statement-trump-tower-russians/index.html

 

[HannahT]

I think it is sad that you believe this unreality.

The personality factor is rather dumb excuse.

Honestly? If people are become so unhinged over a individual's personality? Chances are they were unhinged prior to meeting them - or being exposed to them. That's just the reality of it.

No doubt you have some small segment that do, but they are in the smallest of minority. Majority of the population to NOT allow themselves to go nuts over someone's personality.

I think people on both sides like to act like idiots because they think there is some 'cool' factor to it. That's more realistic.

 

[The Barbarian]

No doubt you have some small segment that do, but they are in the smallest of minority. Majority of the population to NOT allow themselves to go nuts over someone's personality.

Depends on what that "personality" does. In the case of this particular narcissist:

The Trump Administration Was Warned Separation Would Be Horrific for Children, Did It Anyway
The policy in question, along with related practices, had resulted in the unlawful separation of more than 2,500 children from their parents when it was halted by an executive order and a federal judge last month. As of last week, several hundred of those children had not been reunited with their parents despite a court order from that judge. Apparently, more than 400 parents were deported without being given the chance to be reunited.

Commander Jonathan White is the person currently in charge of attempting to reunite the separated families, per that court ruling. White was a nonpartisan official serving as the Office of Refugee Resettlement’s deputy director for children’s programs up until a few weeks before the “zero tolerance” was launched by Attorney General Jeff Sessions in April.

When Blumenthal asked if any of the panelists had warned the administration of the potentially devastating consequences of that policy, White said that he had.
Cmdr. Jonathan White testified that he warned the Trump administration about the likely effect on children of family separation

Trump administration officials appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday to answer questions about the government’s family separation policy. While much of the hearing was a master class in seeking to avoid blame, there was one incredibly revelatory moment.

Sen. Richard Blumenthal asked the panelists if any of them had warned the Trump administration of how devastating the policy of splitting up families in order to prosecute all undocumented border crossings might be. It turned out, there had in fact been a dire warning of the likely consequences for the children involved.

The policy in question, along with related practices, had resulted in the unlawful separation of more than 2,500 children from their parents when it was halted by an executive order and a federal judge last month. As of last week, several hundred of those children had not been reunited with their parents despite a court order from that judge. Apparently, more than 400 parents were deported without being given the chance to be reunited.

Commander Jonathan White is the person currently in charge of attempting to reunite the separated families, per that court ruling. White was a nonpartisan official serving as the Office of Refugee Resettlement’s deputy director for children’s programs up until a few weeks before the “zero tolerance” was launched by Attorney General Jeff Sessions in April.

When Blumenthal asked if any of the panelists had warned the administration of the potentially devastating consequences of that policy, White said that he had.

“Did any member of this panel say to anyone, maybe this isn’t such a good idea,” Blumenthal asked.

White responded:
"During the deliberative process over the previous year, we raised a number of concerns in the ORR program about any policy which would result in family separation. Due to concerns we had about the best interest of the child, as well as whether that would be operationally supportable with the bed capacity we had."

“You told the administration that kids would suffer as a result, that pain would be inflicted, correct?” Blumenthal then asked.

“Separation of children from their parents entails significant risk of harm to children,” White responded.

“It’s traumatic for any child separated from his or her parents,” Blumenthal continued.

“There’s no question that separation of children from parents entails significant potential for traumatic psychological injury to the child,” White responded.

Blumenthal then asked White what the administration said when he warned them of likely consequences.

White, who left his previous position at ORR on March 15, said that they had advised him that no such policy was being undertaken.

Blumenthal pointed out to White that the policy was eventually launched a few weeks after this date “even though you raised concerns.”

“Yes, we raised concerns about the effect on children as well as the effect on the program,” White said. “At no time during the time that I was in ORR, was there an actual policy announcement of family separation. It was merely a discussion of possible future consequences.”

This was a stunning confirmation from White of something that had already been apparent: There was no intention by the government to reunite these families. Not only did the government not have a plan to reunite the families, though, it was apparently told that these separations were likely to traumatize the children.

The Trump administration launched the policy anyways, and the horror that it was warned about ensued.
https://slate.com/news-and-politics...eparation-would-be-horrific-for-children.html

So yes, even what looks like a minor personality disorder can be a major problem if that person so affected is the president of the United States.

 

[HannahT]

Sadly, there are many circumstances in which children are separated from their parents aside from the circumstance you are quoting.

You have to wonder if the children that came up alone without their parents mental state is if you only wish to focus on one aspect of things. They also were separated.

There are many other circumstances in which children are traumatized as well. When they are? It certainly is NOT due to someone's personality.

So, 'it depends on what the personality does' deal? It really doesn't hold water. The circumstances is what traumatizes children - not the personality.