By
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April 14, 2018
the rich asshole prematurely declared 'mission accomplished' in Syria, but the bombings he unleashed have not changed the Syrian threat, while the rich asshole remains under federal investigation.
the rich asshole has declared “mission accomplished” after authorizing U.S. bombing of targets in Syria, but the situation remains as unresolved as it has ever been.
the rich asshole also said the strike was “perfectly executed” and that he “could not have had a better result.”
Reuters, however, reported that the strikes are “unlikely to alter the course of a multi-sided war which has killed at least half a million people in the past seven years.”
The attack left Assad in power, did not threaten his power, and just like the strikes in 2017, is unlikely to have any impact on his capacity to use chemical weapons.
In reality the strikes were timed to the rich asshole tweets and statements that ratcheted up the likelihood of military action but continue to show there is no strategy for dealing with Syrian aggression. There is no mission to be “accomplished.”
The morning after the bombing, the Syrian government released video of a bombed-out research lab accompanied by footage of President Bashar al-Assad arriving for work. The video was captioned “morning of resilience.”
Reuters also noted that according to Syrian allies, the buildings that were hit were evacuated in advance of U.S. strikes.
British prime minister Theresa May, who supported the strikes, noted in her address to her nation that the strikes were “limited and targeted.”
Rep. Ted Lieu (D-CA) explained the futility of the strikes, writing, “In addition to the US attack being unconstitutional, the Pentagon has no real strategy in Syria. Last year’s strike did not deter Assad. Why would this strike?”
He added, “And since @realDonaldTrump stated that US will not stay in Syria, the Russians, Iran & Assad can just wait us out.”
The last round of strikes occurred as the rich asshole began to face heat over his campaign’s involvement with Russian operatives.
the rich asshole operatives are now facing serious charges and prison time, while his own activities to cover up his past are continuing to come to light in court.
He issued a pardon out of thin air to reward a Republican operative who perjured himself, a sign to those who are being pressured to turn on him.
Now he has used the military to attack Syria, without any strategy or clear objective connected to the action. As an avid TV news watcher, the rich asshole is aware that military events have a tendency to push other news out of the picture.
But none of this is truly working for him. His actions are being called out and challenged in real time, and the emptiness of his gambit is clear to millions of Americans.
What Fresh Hell?: the rich asshole’s wagging the dog edition
some rich asshole during CNN debate (Photo: Screen capture via video)
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Welcome to another edition of What Fresh Hell?, Raw Story’s roundup of news items that might have become controversies under another regime, but got buried – or were at least under-appreciated – due to the daily firehose of political pratfalls, unhinged tweet storms and other sundry embarrassments coming out of the current White House.
We were hoping that some rich asshole would be get distracted by some petty grievance and forget to bomb Syria, but those hopes were dashed late Friday night when the US, backed by France and the UK, launched Operation Desert Stormy*, and attacked several targets in Syria.
CNN reports that “ there is a view among the rich asshole’s national security team that the President’s tweets earlier this week — including one threatening US missiles ‘will be coming, nice and new and ‘smart’’ — forced their hand and made some type of strikes inevitable… ‘Once the President tweeted what he tweeted we have to go forward,’ one senior administration official said.”
The one silver lining is that the attack followed a week when the rich asshole was so unhinged, and it is such an obvious case of wag the dog – this was the eighth suspected Chemical weapons attack in Syria since the rich asshole took office – that at least so far we’ve been spared the punditry about how the rich asshole is finally acting presidential by blowing up brown people in some far-flung shithole country. Another potential comfort is that since the rich asshole doesn’t give a damn about Syrian deaths or war crimes, perhaps we won’t see the usual escalation and mission creep. Let him declare mission accomplished and be lauded as a great hero by the conservative press. If he follows through on his desire to withdrawal US troops, it might all end with a really bad but not catastrophic outcome.
Let’s be very clear what Trump’s actual policy preference is: He wants to make a big show in Syria—but still leave “others [to] deal with” the broken pieces of an extraordinarily brutal civil war, and then continue shutting out as many refugees as possible thedailybeast.com/can-trump-puni…
“Within 90 minutes” of the attacks, reports The New York Times, “the Russian ambassador to the United States warned of ‘consequences’ for the allied attacks.”
The incident, capping a week that was unusually chaotic even for this regime, highlights something that we’d always taken for granted with other presidents – even bad ones: the ability to tune out what the president is doing. The White House has traditionally hummed along in the background, occasionally making news that normal people going about their business took notice of. This president, with his bizarre twitter rants, narcissistic rages and the sleazy characters with which he’s surrounded himself, is different. He is a constant presence in our lives, omnipresent on our TVs and in our newspapers. He is unpredictable to the extreme, leaving us all to wonder what the fuck he’s going to pull next. For half of the population – and much of the world – he’s a key source of stress.
A couple of years ago, I spoke with Stephen Bezruchka, an epidemiologist at the University of Washington’s Department of Global Health. He said that the medical community is only starting to understand how stress effects our health. “Stress is our twenty-first century tobacco,” he told me. “As we understand more about stress biology and the impact it has on our lives, we are going to have to wage a campaign to reduce the amount of stress in our lives.” In one survey, people in the US reported the fourth highest levels of stress in the world, and that survey was conducted long before the rich asshole came down that gilded escalator and started blathering on about Mexico sending us their rapists.
It would be difficult to quantify the potential public health effect caused by the rich asshole-related stress, but it must be significant.
And consider this: Fox News viewers must have felt the same way – felt the same sense of dread – about Barack Obama, a thoughtful and cautious center-left president who served for eight years without (real) scandal. For them, the guy who was known as “No Drama Obama” was a foreign interloper – a crypto-Muslim, or perhaps a Satanist– who was bent on destroying America as we know it.
I’ll confess that I’ve experienced a kind of low-level background hum of anxiety since the 2016 election. But I am privileged. I’m white, and I’m in the middle class. I can only imagine the stress the rich asshole, and Trumpism, is generating among immigrant communities and communities of color. We may well see an entire generation of marginalized people suffering from PTSD.
the rich asshole may break from Republican orthodoxy on trade, and he prefers air-raid sirens to dog-whistles, but in his treatment of the poor and people of color, he’s simply turned it up to 11. Here at What Fresh Hell?, we’ve noted that the rich asshole’s Department of Education, Housing and Human Services and DOJ have all scaled back or simply stopped enforcing anti-discrimination laws.
Let’s look at some of the Hell he’s unleashed – or attempted to unleash – on the powerless just this week.
*****
Paul Waldman reports for The Washington Post that Congressional Republicans are expanding work requirements for food stamps, which offer food-insecure households and average benefit of about $33 per week (and is already limited to a three-month period for most non-disabled working-age adults without children).
Waldman says that while “there’s an intuitive appeal to the idea” of imposing work requirements for public benefits, “once you take a close look at this idea, you quickly realize just how incredibly cruel it is, and how it is specifically designed to get as many people as possible kicked off food stamps, which means more Americans going hungry.”
*****
On Tuesday, the rich asshole signed an executive order “that will force recipients of federal assistance—benefits for housing, food, and healthcare—to demonstrate their employment to be eligible for aid. The move, widely anticipated by welfare agencies and eagerly awaited by conservatives, represents a significant change to the social safety net,” reports Kriston Capps for Citylab.
“The Executive Order’s main policy prescription is to take basic assistance such as Medicaid, food assistance, and housing away from people who are not working or in job training or other employment programs,” said Sharon Parrot, senior fellow for the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, in an email. “But the evidence shows that such requirements have few long-term positive effects on employment and often result in families losing help they need to afford the basics.”The Center just released a paper showing how work requirements could cause Medicaid enrollees to lose their healthcare entirely—even among enrollees who are employed.
The regime is also considering drug-testing food stamp recipients, a stupid and punitive policy that has been demonstrated again and again to cost far more than it saves by denying benefits to people who use drugs.
*****
All of this is happening against a backdrop of the rich asshole toying with the idea of trying to undo the spending bill he just recently signed to claw back billions of dollars from “foreign aid and nondiscretionary domestic programs targeted in the president’s recent budget” – read “programs that help the poor” – according to Politico.
*****
Meanwhile, right-wing provocateur and former member of the rich asshole’s disbanded Voter Suppression Voter Fraud Commission is “facing a federal lawsuit… over dubious allegations of massive voter fraud in Virginia,” according to Pema Levy at Mother Jones.
Adams…is the president and general counsel of the Public Interest Legal Foundation (PILF), which in 2016 and 2017 published two reports alleging that thousands of “aliens” had committed felony voter fraud in Virginia and, in indexes to the reports, published personally identifiable information about those people. But many of Adams’ would-be criminals are in fact eligible voters, including all of the plaintiffs.In the lawsuit, a local Virginia chapter of the League of United Latin American Citizens and four individuals allege that Adams and his legal firm violated state defamation laws, as well as federal civil rights laws that protect against voter intimidation. The lawsuit alleges that the reports Adams published are a form of voter intimidation against the people named in the report, and put them at risk by publishing their personal information alongside the allegation that they are felons.
*****
Akilah Johnson reports for The Boston Globe that “the ACLU of Massachusetts announced Wednesday that it had sued the rich asshole administration, alleging the federal government is pulling a ‘bait and switch’ by detaining and threatening to detain undocumented immigrants who are following a legal path to seek permanent residency through their American spouses.”
Yes, we are throwing people who are going through the legal immigration process into detention.
*****
But why? Who could be in favor of such a brutal policy?
Just filed: We’re suing @ICEgov for refusing to produce the contract they awarded private prison contractor GEO, apparently in return for GEO‘s illegal super PAC contributions.
Oh.
*****
What will these people experience? The Intercept reported this week that it had obtained over 1,200 complaints of abuses by immigrants in detention. Alice Speri writes, “The sheer number of complaints — despite serious obstacles in the path of those filing them, as well as the patterns they reveal about mistreatment in facilities nationwide — suggest that sexual assault and harassment in immigration detention are not only widespread but systemic, and enabled by an agency that regularly fails to hold itself accountable.”
*****
Before the rich asshole took office, a study found that only 14 percent of detained immigrants have access to legal counsel. According to the National Immigrant Justice Center, “detained immigrants are 11 times more likely to pursue relief when they have legal counsel and are twice as likely to obtain relief than detained immigrants without counsel.”
This week, Maria Sacchetti reported for WaPo that the DOJ, under Jeff Sessions, is “temporarily” halting “a program that offers legal assistance to detained foreign nationals facing deportation while it audits the program’s cost-effectiveness, a federal official said Tuesday.”
This is a program run by non-profits that doesn’t actually offer legal representation, but simply informs detained immigrants of their rights and refers them to free or low-cost counsel.
*****
Meanwhile, since the regime seized control of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in a kind of coup and handed the reins to Wall Street’s boy, Mick Mulvaney, “it has not recorded a single enforcement action against banks, credit card companies, debt collectors or any finance companies whatsoever,” according to an analysis by the Associated Press. Predatory lenders basically have a green light to rip off the poor under the rich asshole.
*****
That’s just one week of stories about Trumpublicans’ war on the poor and foreign-born. And stories like these have come along virtually every week of the rich asshole’s presidency.
* Credit to Bill Maher for “Operation Desert Storm.
Was the rich asshole ‘wagging the dog’ with strikes in Syria?
It looks like a case of life imitating cinema.
Earlier this month, President some rich asshole announced plans to withdraw U.S. troops from Syria, telling his top military aides that America’s strategic goals no longer warranted U.S. military involvement there.
Just days later, the US military was raining bombs down in the capital city Damascus, in what was described as a vital military operation. The strikes late Friday — early Saturday Syrian time — were carried out in coordination with allies Britain and France.
So, what explains the administration’s sudden shift to once again viewing Syria as a vital American security concern?
the rich asshole over the past week pointed to the April 7 chemical weapons attack on civilians as the main impetus for the American military response.
But the last several days have also seen the rich asshole’s domestic problems multiply as the investigation by special counsel Robert Mueller into the rich asshole campaign’s ties to Russia and that country’s 2016 election interference envelopes his close aides.
That, in the minds of some, has raised the specter of a political calculus — an effort to “wag to dog” — in the Syria operation.
The expression “wag the dog” means to create a crisis in order to divert attention from a more pressing or perilous scandal. It came into popular parlance as the administration of Bill Clinton struggled to respond to the crisis over his affair with White House intern Monica Lewinsky.
The 1997 film Wag the Dog was released as controversy threatened to engulf Clinton’s presidency. The dark comedy, which starred Dustin Hoffman and Robert De Niro, dealt with the plot hatched by a U.S. president and his top adviser to concoct a military intervention in Albania to distract public’s attention from a torrid sex scandal.
Around the same time, Clinton launched a military operation targeting Al-Qaeda fighters, bombing a chemical plant in Sudan, among other targets. It was never definitively determined that Clinton was in fact trying to draw attention away from his troubles, but suspicions to that effect have swirled ever since, and the expression “wag the dog” has become part of American political lexicon.
Was the rich asshole’s order to launch strikes taken from the Wag the Dog playbook? At this stage, it’s impossible to say with any certainty. But over the past week, the president has seen his personal “attorney” and close confidant Michael Cohen drawn into the scandal. The FBI raided Cohen’s home, office, and hotel room, as the Mueller investigation draws ever closer to the president.
MSNBC television anchor Rachel Maddow raised the prospect of the rich asshole using the bombing to detract from the Russia scandal on her program late Friday, which aired shortly after the bombing had commenced.
“There are national security consequences to having a presidency that is as chaotic as some rich asshole’s presidency — a presidency that is as consumed by scandal and criminal intrigue as his presidency is. It has national security consequence,” she said on her Rachel Maddow Show program.
Because it will inflect what other actors and other countries perceive to be the resolve and intention behind the strikes. twitter.com/alexburnsnyt/s…
“If the president of the United States is believed to have issued the order to launch this strike tonight, even in part because people think he wanted to distract from a catastrophic domestic scandal that is blowing up at home at the same time, the perception that the president may have ordered these strikes in part because of scandal will affect the impact and the effectiveness of these military strikes — unavoidably,” she Maddow said. “Even if the tail is not wagging the dog.”
A guest on her show, retired military Col. Jack Jacobs, when asked about the overlap in timing between the Russia probe and the Syria bombing. “I don’t believe in coincidences … You can’t discount the wag the dog factor in this particular case any more than you can discount any other factor,” he said.
And an outspoken congressional critic of the rich asshole’s didn’t mince words either in accusing the rich asshole of using the strikes to deflect from widening scandals at home.
Rep. Jared Huffman (D-CA) said the “desperate” US president showed with the Syria bombing that he is “not above using war” to try to detract from the Russia probe.
https://twitter.com/JaredHuffman/status/984957310647832582
By
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April 14, 2018
'We must take into consideration that he is taking military action out of frustration with the [Russia] probe.'
Veterans are questioning the rich asshole’s motives for launching an airstrike in Syria late Friday night, noting his “instability” and raising the prospect that he could be using bombs to distract from his troubles on the domestic front.
After days of saber-rattling and Twitter threats, the rich asshole announced the airstrike just hours after news broke that his longtime personal lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen had made a trip to Prague in 2016, confirming a key part of the Steele dossier and providing what may be the strongest evidence yet of collusion between the rich asshole campaign and Russia.
The timing of the announcement did not go unnoticed by Jon Soltz, an Iraq War veteran and chairman of VoteVets, who pointed out that “there is a ‘Wag the Dog’ element to all of this.”
“These strikes seem to be as motivated by the raid on Michael Cohen’s office, as much as they are by any pictures of the Syrian massacre that some rich asshole caught on Fox and Friends,” Soltz said in a statement.
He also noted that, given the rich asshole’s track record, there is a very real possibility that the rich asshole could be using the strikes in Syria to distract from the ongoing Russia investigation.
“Given the severe instability of this president,” Soltz said, “we must take into consideration that he is taking military action out of frustration with the Justice Department’s probe.”
VoteVets also pointed out that the rich asshole only mentioned a response to Syria “after Fox and Friends challenged him to do so.”
Former U.S. Attorney Damon Martinez, a congressional candidate with 15 years of service in the Armed Forces, expressed similar concerns about the rich asshole’s recklessness.
“President the rich asshole’s erratic behavior & blatant disregard for the seriousness of his job has left the U.S. without a Secretary of State or confirmed Ambassador to multiple neighboring Middle Eastern countries in the midst of his rush to escalation in a volatile part of the world,” Martinez said in a tweet.
“This is yet another reckless decision that betrays our democratic process and endangers the lives of men and women in uniform,” he added.
the rich asshole claims he authorized the strikes in response to Syria’s use of chemical weapons last weekend. However, the Syrian regime has reportedly used chemical weapons against civilians at least seven times in 2018 alone — but the rich asshole never responded to any of those atrocities.
The last time the rich asshole launched airstrikes in Syria was a year ago, just as the Russia investigation started to heat up.
As Rachel Maddow noted Friday night, regardless of the rich asshole’s motives, the utility of the airstrikes will be diminished by the widespread perception — at home and abroad — that the rich asshole may have made the decision to authorize military action “to distract from the catastrophic domestic scandal that is blowing up at home at the same time.”
“There are national security consequences to having a presidency as chaotic as the rich asshole presidency,” she added.
the rich asshole has already diminished America’s reputation. Now, his scandals threaten to diminish the capability of our military, too.
What Fox News’ ratings reveal about the 2018 midterms
Laura Ingraham speaking at the Values Voter Summit, photo by Gage Skidmore.
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Embattled conservative cable personality Laura Ingraham returned to Fox NewsMonday night with significantly less advertisers after mocking 17-year-old Parkland shooting survivor David Hogg for being rejected by his preferred colleges last month. And her return to the spotlight was overshadowed by the decision of two more brands who decided to join the choir in yanking their ads from “The Ingraham Angle” as they fielded uncomfortable questions from consumers in the wake of the broadcast.
This article originally appeared in Salon.
On the other side of the political spectrum, while both Fox News and CNN lost viewers between 2017 and 2018, the audience for liberal haven MSNBC has skyrocketed by 30 percent. And with midterm elections quickly approaching, Democratic strategists feel encouraged about this changing tide in cable news – and the implications it has about the future of American politics.
“While Fox News held its standing as cable TV’s No. 1 network both for total day and prime time, MSNBC finished second in both categories, enthusing Democrats who see the rise of the network — powered by the liberal commentary of star host Rachel Maddow — not just as a reflection of energy within their base, but as a tool to help candidates in the coming elections,” Politico reported.
Politico offered a compelling parallel. Fox News scored its largest average audiences since its launch in the first quarter of 2010, as the Barack Obama administration approached its first midterm election cycle. That fall, Republicans gained a whopping 63 seats in the House. Given the partisan divide in cable news today, it is not far-fetched to imagine there is a strong link between viewership and voter sentiment.
While “The Ingraham Angle” remains one of the five most-watched programs in cable news, Nielson data indicates that viewership has done little to shield Ingraham from fleeing advertisers. Hogg called on advertisers to boycott Ingraham’s show after her distasteful remark — and CBS reports that at least 19 advertisers, or about 50 percent of her total on-air sponsors, have now pulled their advertisements on account of her comments. (This number excludes Blue Apron and SlimFast, the two companies that yanked ads on Tuesday.)
One of the few still funding Laura Ingraham. #BoycottBlueApron#BoycottIngrahamAdvertisers pic.twitter.com/BpWD4N8ASW
We were unaware that our ad would be running on The Laura Ingraham Angle last night. We will no longer be advertising on the show, and will be working with our media buying partners to more closely monitor where our ads appear going forward.
Ingraham’s apology came just a day after her dig against Hogg, but it proved largely ineffective in retaining advertisers. Although, it is worth noting that Ingraham has a long history of voicing harmful and offensive opinions, among them that Mexican immigrants enter the U.S. “to murder and rape our people”; undocumented people who attempt to cross the border after deportation should be shot; and black athletes should “shut up and dribble.” The Fox News host has also likened same-sex marriage to incest and polygamy. Yet, apparently, these tirades were not incendiary enough for advertisers to walk away.
Ingraham’s language, which mirrors much of the rhetoric used by President some rich asshole, points to contemporary right-wing politics anchored more by feelings of resentment and attacks on minorities – including people of color, immigrants, the LGBTQ community, Muslims and the poor – rather than arguments rooted in fact. And given how inextricably linked Fox News and the rich asshole have become, with the network a significant mouth piece for the president and its hosts fervently parading pro-the rich asshole messaging, a decline in viewership for Fox News could be inferred as a direct correlation to disapproval for the president.
the rich asshole’s approval ratings may also reflect people’s opinions of Fox News. The network’s number, from the first quarter of 2017 to the first quarter of 2018, are down 16 percent, according to Nielson. the rich asshole’s approval rating continues to hover around 40 percent.
“These numbers show that Republican campaigns can’t count on Fox News to reach their voters as much as they could have a year ago,” Democratic strategist Pete Giangreco told Politico. “They are going to have to use data to find out where those viewers have gone in order to continue to reach them in 2018.”
Fox still pulls in 1.4 million total average viewers, but MSNBC now follows closer behind at the one million mark. “I think there are a lot of people out there who are dramatically troubled by the direction of the country, and they would like to be reminded that a) they’re not alone, and, b) there is an alternative,” Stuart Stevens, the Republican strategist at the fore of Mitt Romney’s 2012 campaign and a rich asshole critic, told Politico. “I basically consider MSNBC the ‘it doesn’t have to be this way’ channel.”
The reality that the two, top-rated cable news networks espouse views on opposite ends of the political spectrum, compounded with CNN’s 13 percent drop in viewers, indicates a notable shift in modern news and politics. As much as people want to agonize over political division, there is becoming little interest in the balance of old that continues to be championed by CNN.
Report about Michael Cohen’s secret trip to Prague corroborates key Steele dossier claim
Mueller reportedly has evidence that the rich asshole's attorney has been lying.
On Friday, McClatchy reported that special counsel Robert Mueller possesses evidence that the rich asshole’s longtime personal attorney, Michael Cohen, “secretly made a late-summer trip to Prague during the 2016 presidential campaign.”
If true, the report corroborates a key claim in former British spy Christopher Steele’s partially unverified dossier detailing the rich asshole campaign’s contacts with Russians.
While the McClatchy report doesn’t detail what evidence Mueller has, it notes that “investigators have traced evidence that Cohen entered the Czech Republic through Germany, apparently during August or early September of 2016 as the ex-spy reported.”
It’s unclear who Cohen met with or what he did in Prague, but his reported trip there came shortly after Paul Manafort abruptly resigned from his role as the rich asshole campaign chairman amid news he had secretly received $12.7 million in secret payment from a pro-Putin Ukrainian political party.
According to the Steele dossier, Cohen traveled to Prague to meet with Russian officials and Eastern European hackers in late August or early September.
“[T]he agenda comprised questions on how deniable cash payments were to be made to hackers who had worked in Europe under Kremlin direction against the CLINTON campaign and various contingencies for covering up these operations and Moscow’s secret liaison with the RICH ASSHOLE team more generally,” the dossier says.
When the contents of the dossier were first published by Buzzfeed in January 2017, then-president-elect the rich asshole dismissed the entire document as “false and fake.” Cohen denied that he had ever been to Prague, and used his denial of that specific claim as evidence that the whole dossier is fake news.
In recent months, the rich asshole has repeatedly attacked the credibility of the dossier, and used his attacks on it to try and discredit the entire Russia investigation.
The Fake News is beside themselves that McCabe was caught, called out and fired. How many hundreds of thousands of dollars was given to wife’s campaign by Crooked H friend, Terry M, who was also under investigation? How many lies? How many leaks? Comey knew it all, and much more!
The Mueller probe should never have been started in that there was no collusion and there was no crime. It was based on fraudulent activities and a Fake Dossier paid for by Crooked Hillary and the DNC, and improperly used in FISA COURT for surveillance of my campaign. WITCH HUNT!
Disproven and paid for by Democrats “Dossier used to spy on Trump Campaign. Did FBI use Intel tool to influence the Election?” @foxandfriends Did Dems or Clinton also pay Russians? Where are hidden and smashed DNC servers? Where are Crooked Hillary Emails? What a mess!
the rich asshole’s allies in Congress have also used the dossier to try and discredit the entire Russia investigation. The so-called “Nunes memo” released by Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee alleges the FBI inappropriately relied on the dossier to obtain a FISA warrant to surveil the rich asshole foreign policy adviser Carter Page.
Not only would evidence that Cohen indeed traveled to Prague reveal he’s been lying, but it would discredit the argument the rich asshole and his allies in Congress have been using to discredit the Russia investigation. It could also constitute smoking gun evidence that the rich asshole campaign colluded with Russia during the presidential campaign.
The most salacious claim in the dossier is that Russia is in possession of a tape of the rich asshole participating in lewd sex acts in a Moscow hotel. An excerpt of former FBI director James Comey’s new book released this week contradicts an alibi the rich asshole has used to deny such a tape exists.
McClatchy’s report about Cohen’s trip to Prague comes at the end of an eventful week for the rich asshole’s longtime personal attorney. On Monday, his home, office, and hotel room were raided by FBI agents. the rich asshole and Cohen’s lawyers went to court Friday in an effort to block the Justice Department from reading seized documents.
On Friday evening, the New York Time reported that the rich asshole and his advisers “have concluded that a wide-ranging corruption investigation into his personal lawyer poses a greater and more imminent threat to the president than even the special counsel’s investigation.”
‘Bad information and bad story’: the rich asshole lawyer Cohen fires back at report Mueller has proof he was in Prague
the rich asshole attorney Michael Cohen (CNN screen grab)
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Longtime some rich asshole counselor Michael Cohen denied a new report that he actually had been in Prague despite his denials.
The report, by McClatchy, said that federal investigators have evidence Cohen had traveled to Prague during the 2016 presidential campaign.
That allegation was made in the infamous Steele Dossier and has been central to denials of Russian collusion by the rich asshole supporters.
“Bad reporting, bad information and bad story by same reporter Peter Stone @McClatchyDC,” he tweeted on Saturday. “No matter how many times or ways they write it, I have never been to Prague. I was in LA with my son. Proven!”
Bad reporting, bad information and bad story by same reporter Peter Stone @McClatchyDC. No matter how many times or ways they write it, I have never been to Prague. I was in LA with my son. Proven! mcclatchydc.com/news/politics-…
This is not the first time Cohen has taken to Twitter to deny traveling to Prague.
Here are some of his other denials:
For more than a year, I have sworn under oath, appeared on tv and provided written and verbal statements to press...I have never been to #Prague and none of the allegations about me in the #RussianDossier are true. #finally #truth @RepAdamSchiff @RepSwalwell
we know his take. the agent developed the memos that were compiled in the dossier. not liking a story doesnt make it untrue twitter.com/JCMARINE90/sta…
.@ChrisCuomo @JCMARINE90 @realDonaldTrump The dossier is complete garbage. #Trump never videoed and I have never been to Prague. Get over it
.@RepPeteKing: "If there's any collusion issue here, to me it's the @FBI, it's the Clinton campaign, it's the Russians for that matter." #SundayFutures pic.twitter.com/xtaXkBacfL
Thank you @RepPeteKing for acknowledging the #FakeDossier including that I was never in Prague. The guilty parties will ultimately be identified and hopefully prosecuted. RT
Cohen doubles down on claim he's never been to Prague after Mueller report
BY JACQUELINE THOMSEN - 04/14/18 12:08 PM EDT
President the rich asshole’s longtime personal lawyer Michael Cohen on Saturday responded to a report that special counsel Robert Mueller has evidence that Cohen went to Prague during the 2016 election, slamming it as “bad reporting.”
“Bad reporting, bad information and bad story,” Cohen tweeted, calling out the reporter behind the story by name.
“No matter how many times or ways they write it, I have never been to Prague. I was in LA with my son. Proven!”
Bad reporting, bad information and bad story by same reporter Peter Stone @McClatchyDC. No matter how many times or ways they write it, I have never been to Prague. I was in LA with my son. Proven! mcclatchydc.com/news/politics-…
McClatchy reported Friday that Mueller has evidence that Cohen traveled to Prague in the summer of 2016, a claim first made in the so-called Steele dossier compiled by former British spy Christopher Steele.
The document alleged that Cohen had secretly traveled to Prague during the 2016 campaign and met with a prominent ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, purportedly Konstantin Kosachev.
It’s not clear whether Mueller has evidence of such a meeting.
Cohen denied that he had been to Prague shortly after the dossier was publicly released early last year:
I have never been to Prague in my life. #fakenews
The McClatchy report Friday came after federal prosecutors confirmed that Cohen has been under criminal investigation for months.
FBI agents raided Cohen’s office and hotel room on Monday, parly on a referral by Mueller.
‘Where’s Jared?’ MSNBC’s Joy Reid mocks the rich asshole Middle East expert Kushner’s absence during Syria attack
MSNBC host Joy Reid -- screenshot
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MSNBC host Joy Reid elicited smirks of derision from her panel on Saturday morning when she pointed out that President some rich asshole’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, was MIA during all the Syria saber-rattling depute being the man tasked with bringing peace to the Middle East.
Speaking with national security expert Malcolm Nance, the AM Joy host pointed out that the situation in Syria was complex and fraught with danger, before making light of Kushner’s absence and his lightweight geopolitical experience.
“We don’t have an ambassador in Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Qatar,” MSNBC host Ayman Mohyeldin reminded the AM Joy host. “In addition to the fact that we do not have a secretary of state. So you don’t even have the diplomatic food soldiers waking up in capitals of Arab cities saying to the governments, ‘here is what we need from you and here is what we can offer to you to get on board.'”
“There’s a diplomatic vacuum,” he continued you’re asking what happens in terms of the message we’re sending, we’re not sending any messages.”
Reid then turned to Nance.
‘But Malcom, we have Jared!” the MSNBC host smirked. “Jared’s job was to solve all the Middle East problems. He is bestties with the de facto ruler of Saudi Arabia. He is pitching loan ideas to Qatar. So where is Jared?”
“Well, to be honest, who cares?” Nance shot back, making the panel laugh. “Because he is not a player in this. What has happened here — our diplomacy is a giant vacuum, not just in the Middle East, but around the world. Many ambassadors have not been appointed and virtually no undersecretaries are sitting in their positions.”
“That means [Defense Secretary] General Mattis and the Defense Department are the de facto diplomats in this engagement,” he warned. “They are speaking and doing diplomacy with a hammer. And if that’s the case, then we’re going to be fighting these wars a very long time.”
Watch the video below via MSNBC:
Haley: Pictures of dead children in Syria chemical attack 'not fake news'
BY MAX GREENWOOD - 04/14/18 11:45 AM EDT
U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations (U.N.) Nikki Haley accused Russia on Saturday of orchestrating an aggressive disinformation campaign following a suspected chemical weapons strike in Syria, but insisted that Moscow could not cover up the attack.
"We can all see that a Russia disinformation campaign is in full force this morning," Haley said at a U.N. Security Council meeting after retaliatory U.S.-led strikes in Syria. "But Russia’s desperate attempts at deflection cannot change the facts."
"The pictures of dead children were not fake news," she added. "They were the result of the Syrian regime’s barbaric inhumanity. And they were the result of the regime and Russia’s failure to live up to their international commitments to remove all chemical weapons from Syria."
Haley's comments came hours after President the rich asshole, in concert with the United Kingdom and France, launched "precision strikes" on targets in Syria believed to be associated with the country's alleged chemical weapons program.
The allied strike on Syria came days after a suspected chemical weapons strike in the Damascus suburb of Douma that officials in the U.S. and several Western countries have blamed on the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad.
Syria and its allies, Russia and Iran, have denied that Assad's government used chemical weapons in the attack, which left more than 40 people dead.
The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons on Saturday launched an investigation into the alleged chemical strike in Douma.
Moscow, Damascus and Tehran condemned the Friday night strikes on chemical weapons production facilities in Syria, accusing the U.S., France and the U.K. of violating international law and committing an aggression against a sovereign country.
The Pentagon said Saturday that a Russian disinformation campaign had already begun in response to the allied strike in Syria.
‘Michael Cohen right now is radioactive’: Stormy Daniels’ attorney shreds ‘flat out stupid’ the rich asshole fixer
Joy Reid interviews Michael Avenatti on 'AM Joy'
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The attorney for adult film performer Stormy Daniels blasted some rich asshole counselor Michael Cohen as being “radioactive” during a Saturday appearance on MSNBC’s AM Joy.
“So CNN reports that the FBI has seized recordings between Michael Cohen and the former attorney for your client,” host Joy Reid noted. “What does that mean to your case and/or the federal case?”
“It’s pretty outrageous you have an attorney that is engaged potentially in illegal recording of conversations,” Avenatti argued. “Not only that, it’s stupid.”
“It’s just flat out stupid,” he continued. “I mean, I am constantly amazed with each passing day of the lack of intelligence that has been demonstrated by this man, this attorney, Michael Cohen.”
“I’m more amazed that this is the guy that the President of the United States would pick as his fixer,” he added.
The attorney also made a prediction about the number of women covered by NDAs.
“I am confident that we’re not talking about two or three or five or seven different women, we’re going to get well into the double digits when it’s all said and done,” he predicted. “And I’m confident that the documents that have been obtained by the FBI, in connection with these raids, are going to show a lot of women.”
“Michael Cohen right now is radioactive,” he observed. “Anybody who had any contact with him — on anything that was not 100 percent above board — at this point in time, this morning, should be very, very nervous.”
“Because what we learned in court yesterday, Joy, was that according to his lawyers, we’re talking about documents that may span 30 years, that were obtained by the FBI in connection with these raids,” Avenatti explained. “They describe the documents as thousands, if not millions, of pages of documents subject to the attorney/client privilege, including audio recordings.”
“This is going to get very, very bad for Michael Cohen,” he concluded.
Watch:
Pentagon claims successful strike on all targets in Syria
BY ELLEN MITCHELL - 04/14/18 11:23 AM EDT
Pentagon officials on Saturday claimed that U.S. and western airstrikes on Syria the previous night "successfully hit every target" as President the rich asshole declared "mission accomplished" in retaliating over the apparent use of chemical weapons in Syria.
“Last night’s operations were successful. We met all of our objectives, we hit all of our targets successfully. No allied aircrafts were engaged. It was a successful mission,” Defense Department chief spokeswoman Dana White told reporters at the Pentagon.
The United States joined French and British forces on Friday night in launching 105 missiles from numerous air and naval locations at three different targets in Syria, including facilities near the capital of Damascus as well as in Homs in northern Syria.
The strike was an to attempt to take out vital chemical weapons facilities run by the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad and was meant as retaliation for an apparent chemical attack in a Damascus suburb last weekend that killed dozens of civilians.
“The strikes went to the very heart of the enterprise, to research to the development, to storage. So we are very confident that we have significantly crippled Assad’s ability to produce these weapons,” White said.
Lt. Gen. Kenneth F. McKenzie Jr., the director of the Joint Staff who spoke alongside White, called the strikes “precise, overwhelming and effective” in deterring Assad from further use of chemical weapons.
He also gave more details on the equipment and missiles used to carry out the strike.
The United States hit the first target, the Barzah Research and Development Center, with 76 missiles, including 57 Tomahawk land-attack cruise missiles and 19 joint air-to-surface standoff missiles.
McKenzie said the target — a military research center for chemical and biological warfare technology located in the greater Damascus area — was destroyed, citing initial assessments.
“This is going to set the Syrian chemical weapons program back for years,” he said.
The U.S. and its allies also fired 22 missiles at the Him Shinshar chemical weapons storage site — the primary location of Syria’s sarin gas — and seven missiles at the Him Shinshar chemical weapons bunker. Both locations are near Homs, roughly 100 miles north of Damascus.
The strikes were delivered from British, French and U.S. air and naval platforms in the Red Sea, the northern Arabian Gulf and the Eastern Mediterranean.
The U.S. used the USS Monterey Ticonderoga-class guided-missile cruiser, Arleigh Burke-class destroyers the USS Laboon and USS Higgins and the USS John Warner Virginia-class submarine to fire all Tomahawk missiles.
The U.S. also used two B-1 Lancer bombers to fire 19 joint air-to-surface standoff missiles.
“All weapons hit their targets at very close to the designated time on target of about 4 a.m. in Syria,” McKenzie added. “These attacks on multiple axis were able to overwhelm the Syrian air defense system.”
In addition, the U.S.-led mission “flew a variety of defensive counter air, tanker and electronic warfare aircraft in support of these operations.”
While the Syrian government employed 40 surface-to-air-missiles in response, “none of our aircraft or missiles involved in this operation were successfully engaged by Syrian air defenses,” McKenzie said.
“As of right now, we are not aware of any civilian casualties,” he added, but acknowledged that the defense launched by the Syrians may have led to unaccounted deaths.
The Pentagon also has no indication that Russian air defense systems were used to deter the strike, but McKenzie said “we’re ready for it. We’re postured both in the region and globally. We’re on the balls of our feet and we’re ready for anything.”
the rich asshole on Saturday morning touted the mission as a success.
“A perfectly executed strike last night. Thank you to France and the United Kingdom for their wisdom and the power of their fine Military. Could not have had a better result. Mission Accomplished!” the rich asshole tweeted.
White also stressed that the U.S. mission in Syria remains defeating the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), but said the U.S. will not stand by while Assad attacks “innocent Syrian people.”
“Our focus remains defeating ISIS. It is not to get involved in the Syrian civil war," she said.
The Friday strike was the second such bombardment the rich asshole administration has authorized in Syria in roughly a year.
Last April the U.S. launched 59 Tomahawk missiles from warships at a Syrian airbase in response to a chemical weapons attack that killed 80 civilians.
WATCH: Pentagon spokesperson put on the spot after the rich asshole calls Syria attack ‘Mission Accomplished”
Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs Dana White -- screenshot
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Assistant to the Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs Dana White was twice put on the spot on Saturday morning for President some rich asshole calling Friday night’s Syria stack “Mission accomplished” as such an early stage.
Speaking to reporters in the Pentagon briefing room, White provided details on the attack before taking questions that occasionally grew contentious.
Noting that President some rich asshole dubbed the attack “Mission Accomplished” in an early morning tweet, one unidentified reporter asked Bell to justify the Twitter outburst.
“A follow up on the question of ‘mission accomplished,'” the reporter asked.”If the mission is to deter President Assad from producing and from spreading chemical weapons, is it possible to know whether that mission, as described, was even accomplished?”
“Last night, operations were successful,” White replied. ” We met all of our objectives, all of our targets successfully. No aircraft were engaged. It was a successful mission. But what happens next depends on what the Assad regime decides to do.”
Another reporter, identified by White as “Tom” pressed even harder for evidence why the raid was needed.
“You said we are very confident about the evidence we have,” he pressed. “Now, Russia and Syria denied any chemical weapons were used. I’m just wondering why you wouldn’t share your evidence with the world. Adlai Stevenson famously went to the U.N.. in 1962 with evidence of the Russian build up in Cuba. Why wouldn’t you do something similar if there’s doubts?”
“There’s no doubt for us,” White shot back
“Why not share the evidence, then?” he pressed. ”
“A lot of this has to do with intelligence,” White demurred. “I’m very happy to show evidence, if i can. But were very confident about the decisions we made.”
Watch the video below via CNN live coverage.
Ex-Bush spokesman to the rich asshole: I would not have declared 'mission accomplished'
BY LUIS SANCHEZ - 04/14/18 11:11 AM EDT
Former White House press secretary for President George W. Bush Ari Fleischer said on Saturday that he wouldn’t have recommended President the rich asshole declare “mission accomplished” after the recent missile strikes against Syria.
the rich asshole touted the joint missile strikes carried out alongside the U.K. and France against Syria’s chemical weapons facilities in a tweet that ended with the now infamous phrase “mission accomplished.”
Fleischer said on Twitter that he would not have recommended that the president end his tweet with the phrase.
Um...I would have recommended ending this tweet with not those two words. twitter.com/realdonaldtrum…
The phrase became famous after Bush gave a speech in May 2003 on board an aircraft carrier with a banner in the backdrop that read "mission accomplished."
The speech came after the rapid end of major combat operations in Iraq. The banner seemed premature, however, after the Iraqi insurgency turned the war into a quagmire with larger than expected casualties and costs.
In a series of tweets, Fleischer also said the history behind the banner has largely been misrepresented.
According to Fleischer, the crew on the USS Abraham Lincoln asked if they could fly the banner to celebrate their return home after having taken part in the longest deployment of any ship in Naval history.
It’s obviously too late and I get the symbolism that came back to bite us months later when the war turned and the insurrection grew, but there is an interesting back story to the “Mission Accomplished” story.
After our advance crew boarded the ship in Hawaii days prior to Bush’s landing on the USS Abraham Lincoln, the Navy crew told us they were returning from the longest deployment of any ship in Naval history. They were proud of what they had done.
After our advance crew boarded the ship in Hawaii days prior to Bush’s landing on the USS Abraham Lincoln, the Navy crew told us they were returning from the longest deployment of any ship in Naval history. They were proud of what they had done.
The crew asked the WH staff if it would be ok to hang a banner saying “Mission Accomplished”. We readily agreed. We hung it in an obviously prominent place that also sent a message as Bush spoke to the nation.
The Bush staff agreed to fly it and “hung it in an obviously prominent place that also sent a message as Bush spoke to the nation”
Fleischer said the banner “was the crew’s message from start to finish” and wasn’t criticized by the press until the insurgency developed later in the year.
Right wing media allies turn on the rich asshole over Syria
April 14, 2018
Tom Porter
Posted with permission from Newsweek
Some of Donald Trump’s most fervent supporters in the media turned on the president Friday over his decision to launch military strikes against Syria in retaliation for an alleged chemical weapons attack.
On Fox News, hosts Tucker Carlson and Laura Ingraham were uncharacteristically critical of the president, questioning Trump’s decision to launch the strikes.
“I guess it feels good because there are horrible things happening there,” Ingraham said, sparring with former White House official Sebastian Gorka. “But what do we really accomplish here tonight in Syria? This is not why Donald Trump got elected."
Noting Trump’s criticism of the Iraq war on the 2016 campaign trail, Carlson remarked “This is clearly not something he ran on, and and it’s inconsistent with a lot of things that he’s said over the years.”
Pro-Trump Far-right media personalities were apoplectic.
“Fuck Trump, and fuck these fucking people,” said Infowars’ Alex Jones, and launched into series of conspiracy theories about the raids before bursting into tears.
“If he had been a piece of crap from the beginning, it wouldn’t be so bad,” Jones said of Trump. “We’ve made so many sacrifices and now he’s crapping all over us. It makes me sick."
BREAKING! TRUMP LAUNCHES WAR ON SYRIA! POTENTIAL WW3!
Backup Feed: infowars.com/show 
#Syria #Trump #Pentagon #Damascus #Russia #Infowarspscp.tv/w/1YpKkEWoDjZJj
In 2015 Jones interviewed Trump as the then presidential candidate sought to cultivate support among far-right media outlets promoting conspiracy theories.
Formerly pro-Trump activist and media personality Ann Coulter retweeted out a series of messages from Infowars' Paul Joseph Watson and others critical of the decision to launch the airstrikes.
"Attacking a foreign nation that has not attacked or threatened America is globalist interventionism. This is not 'America First'. This is not what Trump was elected for," tweeted Infowars' Paul Joseph Watson in a message shared by Coulter.
But not everyone agreed. Senior Breitbart editor Joel Pollak was supportive of Trump's decision.
"I am grateful we have a @POTUS who will not tolerate the use of chemical weapons. #USA," he tweeted Friday night.
The populist outlet formerly run by ex-White House chief strategist Steve Bannon was a key backer of Trump in 2016, but has been critical of the GOP establishment that took the U.S. into the Iraq war.
Many of Trump’s most ardent supporters among the so-called alt-right though have criticized U.S. involvement in foreign conflicts, and have spoken of their admiration for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
the rich asshole declares 'mission accomplished' after strikes against Syria
BY JESSE BYRNES - 04/14/18 08:47 AM EDT
President the rich asshole on Saturday declared "mission accomplished" after approving airstrikes with the United Kingdom and France against chemical weapons production facilities in Syria the previous night.
"A perfectly executed strike last night. Thank you to France and the United Kingdom for their wisdom and the power of their fine Military. Could not have had a better result. Mission Accomplished!" the rich asshole tweeted.
"So proud of our great Military which will soon be, after the spending of billions of fully approved dollars, the finest that our Country has ever had. There won’t be anything, or anyone, even close!" he added in another tweet.
Pentagon spokeswoman Dana White stood by the rich asshole's characterization during a briefing Saturday morning.
"Operations were very successful. We met our objectives. We hit the sites, the heart of the chemical weapons program," she said. "So it was mission accomplished."
"It was a successful mission. What happens next depends on what the Assad regime decides to do," she added when pressed.
the rich asshole quickly caught flak Saturday after using the phrase "mission accomplished," which gained notoriety after former President George W. Bush gave a 2003 speech to declare the end of major U.S. combat operations in Iraq with a banner featuring the phrase displayed behind him. Despite the declaration, the U.S. military has stayed involved in Iraq to this day.
"I didn’t think I could be shocked by a tweet anymore but 'mission accomplished' was so surprising I had to double check that it was not a spoof," Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) tweeted Saturday.
the rich asshole announced late Friday during a televised address at the White House that he had ordered "precision strikes" on targets in Syria associated with the government of Syrian leader Bashar Assad. The strikes targeted three sites near the capital of Damascus and in Homs, roughly 100 miles north.
U.S. defense officials on Saturday said they were still conducting a detailed assessment of the effectiveness of the strikes but characterized them as a success.
"I’d use three words to describe this operation: precise, overwhelming and effective," said Marine Lt. Gen. Kenneth F. McKenzie Jr., director of the Joint Staff.
McKenzie asserted that the U.S.-led strikes had set the Syrian government’s chemical weapons program back “years.”
Syria launched 40 surface-to-air missiles against the strikes, McKenzie said, adding Syria's missiles were “largely ineffective” and most were launched after the strikes from the U.S., U.K. and France took place.
McKenzie also pushed back on reports that the targeted facilities in Syria were abandoned this week amid warnings from Western leaders about imminent military action.
“It is possible some people might have left,” McKenzie said, noting the U.S. chose to strike a 3 a.m. local time. “We weren’t trying to kill a lot of people on the objective.”
Defense Secretary James Mattis on Friday night characterized the strikes as a stronger response to Assad than a strike against a Syrian air base last year following a previous chemical weapons attack. The latest strike involved more than 100 weapons.
"Clearly the Assad regime did not get the message last year," Mattis told reporters in a press briefing at the Pentagon. "This time our allies and we have struck harder."
"We used a little over double the number of weapons this year than we used last year," Mattis added. "We were very precise and proportionate, but at the same time, it was a heavy strike."
Mattis said no additional strikes against Syria are planned, calling it "a one-time shot."
The Pentagon's top spokeswoman emphasized to reporters on Saturday morning that "this operation does not represent a change in U.S. policy."
"We do not seek conflict in Syria, but we cannot allow such grievous violations of international law," she said.
the rich asshole announced the coordinated strikes with France and the U.K. following a week of deliberation and discussions with British Prime Minister Theresa May and French President Emmanuel Macron over an apparent chemical weapons attack last weekend.
The U.S. and other Western countries have blamed Assad's government for the attack in the Syrian town of Douma last weekend that left more than 40 people dead.
Syria and its allies, Iran and Russia, have denied that the Assad government used chemical weapons.
On Saturday, leaders from all three countries denounced the joint U.S.-led strikes, with Russian President Vladimir Putin calling it an "act of aggression." Putin also called for a meeting of the United Nations Security Council.
The Pentagon spokeswoman noted that the airstrikes Friday were carried out by three permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, saying there intended as a message to the Assad government to cease using chemical weapons.
the rich asshole's announcement of new strikes against Syria came less than two weeks after he declared that he wanted to withdraw the roughly 2,000 American troops in Syria fighting Islamic State forces there.
Critics of the move Friday also seized on the president's decision to not seek congressional approval for the strikes.
“President the rich asshole’s decision to launch airstrikes against the Syrian government without Congress’s approval is illegal and – absent a broader strategy – it’s reckless,” said Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.).
Ivanka the rich asshole slammed as fake Secretary of State in Peru
April 13, 2018
Jessica Kwong
Posted with permission from Newsweek
First daughter Ivanka Trump is being accused of acting like the U.S. secretary of state in Peru, where she is attending a conference that her father President Donald Trump canceled his appearance for.
One such attack on Ivanka Trump was posted Friday morning by Scott Dworkin, co-founder of the Democratic Coalition resisting the president. He worked during Barack Obama's 2008 and 2012 presidential campaigns, as well as the "Draft Biden" and "Run Warren Run" campaigns, according to the coalition's website.
Dworkin embedded a video that the first daughter posted on social media, in which she says in a peppy tone, “Buenos días, I am here in Lima, Peru, for the Summit of the America conference. I’m really excited about my first stop, which is the Lima Stock Exchange, where I’m going to be with some incredible women business leaders from right here in Lima, Peru.”
“Here she is, our new Secretary of State, @IvankaTrump repping us in Peru. This is an international disgrace. Congress didn’t confirm her for the gig. She isn’t qualified. Has zero true diplomatic experience,” Dworkin tweeted. “America is a laughingstock.”
Here she is, our new Secretary of State, @IvankaTrump repping us in Peru. This is an international disgrace. Congress didn’t confirm her for the gig. She isn’t qualified. Has zero true diplomatic experience. America is a laughingstock. #TrumpResign #AMJoy
The watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) tweeted, “Ivanka Trump doesn’t speak Spanish, doesn’t have foreign policy experience, and doesn’t have a full security clearance. Why is she representing the United States at an international summit in Peru?”
Ivanka Trump does not speak Spanish and did not have any government experience prior to becoming a senior White House adviser.
James Comey is a proven LEAKER & LIAR. Virtually everyone in Washington thought he should be fired for the terrible job he did-until he was, in fact, fired. He leaked CLASSIFIED information, for which he should be prosecuted. He lied to Congress under OATH. He is a weak and.....
@Comey has a security clearance. How about fake Secretary of State, @IvankaTrump, and that crook son-in-law, Kushner?
It is not the first time that Twitter users have suggested Ivanka Trump is acting like a fake secretary of state. CREW last month tweeted that the president sent his daughter to meet South Korea’s Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha after abruptly ousting Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.
When President Trump’s Secretary of State is fired and can’t meet with South Korea, Trump sends his daughter, who doesn’t have a full security clearance but does have business interests in the country.thehill.com/policy/interna…
Ivanka Trump on Wednesday said she would announce an economic empowerment program in Peru for women in the region, and that her husband and fellow senior White House adviser Jared Kushner would accompany her on the trip. The president said Vice President Mike Pence would fill in for him at the two-day summit.
the rich asshole supporters slam decision to launch strikes against Syria
BY JACQUELINE THOMSEN - 04/14/18 08:08 AM EDT
Prominent supporters of President the rich asshole are expressing skepticism over his decision to launch airstrikes against Syria, slamming the move as overly aggressive and unnecessary.
Fox News hosts Tucker Carlson and Laura Ingraham both questioned the rich asshole’s decision Friday to launch strikes in retaliation for a chemical weapons attack last weekend that the U.S. has attributed to the Syrian government.
Carlson noted the move was inconsistent with the president’s message during his 2016 campaign, and Ingraham said she found that intervention in other countries could be risky, as shown in the Iraq War, according to the Daily Beast.
Michael Savage, a prominent conservative radio host and author, tweeted that “sad warmongers hijacking our nation” following news of the strike.
We lost. War machine bombs syria. No evidence Assad did it. Sad warmongers hijacking our nation
Infowars’s Alex Jones broke down in tears while speaking out against the military action.
“If he had been a piece of crap from the beginning, it wouldn’t be so bad,” Jones said of the rich asshole. “We’ve made so many sacrifices and now he’s crapping all over us. It makes me sick."
Conservative commentator Ann Coulter also shared her opposition to the strike, retweeting a series of other conservative or right-wing figures who condemned the move and resurfacing the rich asshole's own past tweets against military action in Syria.
And far-right figures Mike Cernovich and Laura Loomer also ripped the rich asshole over the military strike in Syria.
At least I won’t feel bad when he gets impeached.
the rich asshole announced Friday that he had ordered “precision strikes” against Syria over an apparent chemical weapons attack by Syrian leader Bashar Assad's forces. The strikes targeted areas linked to Syria’s chemical weapons program.
the rich asshole attorney Michael Cohen lied about Prague trip: Mueller
April 14, 2018
Tom Porter
Posted with permission from Newsweek
The U.S. special counsel in the Russia probe has evidence that President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer Michael Cohen traveled to Prague in 2016, refuting Cohen’s claim that he never visited the Czech capital and bolstering an intelligence dossier that first described the trip, McClatchy reported on Friday.
Investigators for Special Counsel Robert Mueller have evidence that Cohen entered the Czech Republic through Germany in late summer 2016, McClatchy reported, citing two unnamed sources.
Germany and the Czech Republic are part of the 26 nation Schengen Area of European nations that operate with open borders.
The news agency said it was unclear whether Mueller’s investigators have evidence that Cohen met with a prominent Russian as the dossier claimed.
Mueller is investigating alleged Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election and possible collusion with the Trump campaign. Russia has denied meddling in the election and Trump has said there was no collusion.
The special counsel and an attorney for Cohen did not immediately respond to requests for comment from Reuters. Cohen has vehemently denied for months he traveled to Prague in 2016 or colluded with Russia during the 2016 presidential campaign.
"I have never been to Prague in my life," he tweeted in January, 2017, with a photograph of his U.S. passport.
The dossier by former British intelligence agent Christopher Steele alleged that Cohen met with Russians closely allied to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Agents with the Federal Bureau of Investigation raided Cohen’s New York office and home this week, partly based on a referral from Mueller.
They were seeking information on payments made by Cohen to porn star Stormy Daniels, who has said she had sex with Trump in 2006, a person familiar with the matter said.
Investigators have also looked for a possible broader pattern of fraud, tax evasion, money laundering and other crimes in Cohen’s private dealings, including his work for Trump and real estate purchased by Russian buyers.
the rich asshole uses George W. Bush’s infamous war slogan ‘Mission Accomplished!’
An inexplicable choice of words to describe air strikes in Syria.
The morning after President some rich asshole ordered airstrikes on Syria — apparently without legal standing to do so — he tweeted out a self-congratulatory “Mission Accomplished!”
President George W. Bush used the same slogan when he stood aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln announcing an “end” to the U.S. invasion of Iraq, which officially lasted from March 20 to May 1, 2003. But the conflict would drag on for more than a decade, killing hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and Americans, including civilians, and unleashing ISIS from a power vacuum that ensued.
The moment — especially the phrase ‘Mission Accomplished’ — dogged Bush for the remainder of his presidency.
the rich asshole launched the air strikes in response to the country’s dictator, Bashar al-Assad, using chemical weapons against civilians in Douma on April 7. British and French forces joined the strikes, and the coalition targeted three sites where chemical weapons stored and developed, according to the Pentagon.
This is what happens when Brian Kilmeade is your favorite historian and you get most of your written information from Fox News chyrons pic.twitter.com/52U70CZvBE
Pentagon official defends Trump's "mission accomplished" tweet: "It *was* mission accomplished." pic.twitter.com/veuF0RC39s
“We are prepared to sustain this response until the Syrian regime stops its use of prohibited chemical agents,” he said in a statement issued after the strikes began.
Bush stood aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln, having flown in on a fixed-wing aircraft that made an arrested landing on the surface of the carrier — a considerable and needless expense given it was stationed off the coast of San Diego and therefore reachable by helicopter.
Bush glad-handed with Navy personnel before changing into a suit and making his infamous speech.
“Our mission continues,” he told the assembled crowd on the aircraft carrier in 2003. The speech was also broadcast. “We do not know the day of final victory, but we have seen the turning of the tide… Major combat operations in Iraq have ended.”
In fact, the conflict only begun: President Barack Obama withdrew the last combat troops in Dec. 2011, but sectarian violence and the ISIL insurgency continued to escalate. Obama sent U.S. troops back, and as late as 2014 U.S. and coalition forces were operating air strikes inside Iraq’s borders.
Conservative CNN guest busts the rich asshole for why he employs Cohen: ‘He does unsavory business with unsavory people’
President some rich asshole's longtime personal attorney Michael Cohen (Screen capture)
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During a CNN panel discussion on President some rich asshole’s enduring relationship with personal attorney Michael Cohen, an editor from the Weekly Standard said that the president responds well to Cohen because his specialty is dealing with “unsavory people.”
Speaking with host Victor Blackwell, Kelly Jane Torrance was asked about Cohen’s reported habit of recording his phone calls with clients and other lawyers.
“Let’s face it, there might be some good reason that Michael Cohen was recording his conversations,” Torrance explained. “And that’s because he’s doing a lot of unsavory business with some unsavory people. ”
“I have to say, some rich asshole talks about how he hires the best people,” she continued. “Well Michael Cohen is not your typical high-powered lawyer. This guy did not graduate from Harvard or Yale — he graduated from Western Michigan Cooley University Law School which, apparently, a couple of years ago had the worst entering class that legal academia had ever seen.”
“This guy deals with a lot of sectors not known for transparency and not known for great dealings. We’re talking taxi cab medallions and things like that,” she elaborated. “The fact that he’s recording his calls might mean he’s dealing with a lot of unsavory people. When you think about it, these recordings could be very big because the things that the search warrant said they’re investigating is wire fraud, bank fraud, possible campaign finance violations.”
Watch the video below via CNN:
‘Never say Mission Accomplished’: Internet roasts the rich asshole for comparing Syria attack to Bush’s botched Iraq war
Former President George W. Bush (left) and current President some rich asshole (right). Images via Creative Commons.
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President some rich asshole’s choice of words used to celebrate his military strikes drew hearty mockery after the commander-in-chief declared “Mission Accomplished” in war-torn Syria.
“A perfectly executed strike last night,” the rich asshole bragged on Twitter early Saturday. “Mission Accomplished!”
In May of 2003, then President George W. Bush declared victory in the Iraq War below a “Mission Accomplished” banner on the USS Abraham Lincoln.
President Bush flashes a “thumbs-up” after declaring the end of major combat in Iraq as he speaks aboard the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln off the California coast, in this May 1, 2003 file photo. Six months after he spoke on an aircraft carrier deck under a banner proclaiming “Mission Accomplished,” President Bush disavowed any connection with the war message. Later, the White House changed its story and said there was a link.
President the rich asshole’s choice of words did not go unnoticed, with many commentators focused upon how President W. Bush came to regret his photo-op as the war dragged on for years.
Here are a selection of some of the best comments:
A perfectly executed strike last night. Thank you to France and the United Kingdom for their wisdom and the power of their fine Military. Could not have had a better result. Mission Accomplished!
Mission Accomplished?! You mean like this pic.twitter.com/k6maPMhLHh
Mission Accomplished. Scooter Libby. John Bolton.
We’re going to party like it’s 2003... twitter.com/realdonaldtrum…
The term "mission accomplished" was ultimately damaging for Pres. George W Bush but apparently not a concern for Pres. Trump twitter.com/realDonaldTrum…
"Mission Accomplished" is definitely a very good phrase to use about a military intervention in the Middle East twitter.com/realDonaldTrum…
Where have I heard Mission Accomplished after bombing a Middle East country?twitter.com/realdonaldtrum…
“Mission accomplished.” This guy has exactly zero self awareness. Also, it looks like he tipped off Russia. twitter.com/realdonaldtrum…
Um...I would have recommended ending this tweet with not those two words. twitter.com/realdonaldtrum…
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