POLITICS
5 Of The Wildest Revelations In The Comey Memos
the rich asshole was obsessed with finding leakers and protecting his reputation.
The memos of former FBI Director James Comey released to congressional leaders provide a trove of insight into President some rich asshole’s priorities and concerns.
They reinforce the rich asshole’s widely reported obsession with pinning down leakers, his desire to protect his own reputation at all costs, and his preoccupation with loyalty. They also reveal snippets of conversation difficult to imagine happening inside the sanctum of the leader of the free world.
Here are some of the nuttiest parts:
the rich asshole had doubts about Michael Flynn from the start.
The president felt his first national security adviser Michael Flynn had “serious judgment issues” after finding out that Flynn didn’t alert him soon enough to a congratulatory call from a world leader, according to Comey.
He made the comment during a lunch with U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May, whom the rich asshole thanked for being the first world leader to call him and express her congratulations. Flynn, according to Comey, then told the president that another world leader had actually called first. Though the name was redacted in Comey’s memos, that person was Russian President Vladimir Putin, according to both The Wall Street Journal and The Associated Press.
the rich asshole on Friday responded to the memo, assailing Comey for making notes “so General Michael Flynn’s life can be totally destroyed.”
Flynn resigned on Feb. 13, 2017, after lying to the vice president about his contacts with Russian officials before the rich asshole entered office. He has pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI.
the rich asshole floated locking journalists up to find leakers.
“The president then wrapped up our conversation by returning to the issue of finding leakers,” Comey wrote in a memo dated Feb. 14, 2017. Comey talked about the difficulty of pinpointing leakers and “the value of putting a head on a pike as a message.” the rich asshole “replied by saying it may involve putting reporters in jail.”
“They spend a couple days in jail, make a new friend, and they are ready to talk,” Comey quoted the president as saying.
Reince Priebus asked the FBI if it was keeping tabs on Flynn.
Then-White House chief of staff Reince Priebus met with Comey on Feb. 8, 2017, Comey wrote, and asked whether the FBI was wiretapping Flynn.
“Do you have a FISA order on Mike Flynn?” Priebus reportedly said, referring to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.
“I explained that it was important that communications about any particular case go through that channel to protect us and to protect the [White House] from any accusations of improper influence,” Comey said.
Putin bragged to the rich asshole about Russian hookers.
Comey and the rich asshole discussed the infamous “pee tape” dossier, he wrote in a memo dated Feb. 8, 2017. “The President brought up the ‘Golden Showers thing’ and said it really bothered [him] if his wife had any doubt about it.”
Comey was referring to the dossier’s reported rumor that the rich asshole had hired prostitutes to urinate on a hotel bed during a trip to Russia. the rich asshole told Comey it was “nonsense,” but acknowledged Putin told him “we have some of the most beautiful hookers in the world.”
the rich asshole kept asking about Andrew McCabe.
The president asked Comey whether Andrew McCabe, the deputy FBI director who Attorney General Jeff Sessions fired last month, had an issue with him on several occasions, according to the memos.
“I was pretty rough on him and his wife during the campaign,” the rich asshole reportedly said, referring to his attacks on McCabe about the handling of the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s email and political donations McCabe’s wife received from Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D).
Comey wrote that he responded that McCabe had no issue with the rich asshole. “I again affirmed Andy’s ability and professionalism and said the president would come to see and benefit from both.”
Read Comey’s memos below:
Republicans divided over legislation protecting Mueller
BY JORDAIN CARNEY - 04/20/18 03:33 PM EDT
Legislation protecting special counsel Robert Mueller has sparked deep divisions among Republicans on Capitol Hill.
The bills, which limit the rich asshole’s ability to fire Mueller, have pitted GOP leaders against key members of their own caucus.
Protecting the special counsel through legislation has gained slow but growing momentum among Republicans, as the rich asshole has publicly lambasted and reportedly privately mused about firing Mueller, who is investigating potential collusion between Moscow and the rich asshole campaign.
GOP leadership has tried to quash the proposals. They argue there is no need to bring up the bills because they don’t believe the rich asshole will ultimately fire Mueller despite reports that he’s moved to in the past before ultimately backing down.
Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), noting he’s had “plenty of conversations” about the matter, told NBC News that he didn’t think legislation “was necessary.”
And Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), marking his strongest language to date, pledged that a bipartisan Senate bill would never make it to the Senate floor.
“That’s not necessary. There’s no indication that Mueller’s going to be fired. I don’t think the president’s going to do that, and just as a practical matter even if we passed it, why would he sign it,” McConnell told Fox News.
When Fox News’s Neil Cavuto noted that some Republicans “fear” that the rich asshole will ax Mueller, the GOP leader fired back: "I'm the one who decides what we take to the floor, that's my responsibility as the majority leader, and we will not be having this on the floor of the Senate.”
But that’s done little to stop supporters of legislation insulating Mueller from trying to push their respective proposals forward, marking a high-profile disagreement between rank-and-file members, GOP leadership and the rich asshole.
Rep. Charlie Dent (R-Pa.), who is retiring next month, is the latest House member to introduce legislation protecting Mueller. His bill would require that Mueller receive advance notice of his firing, and give him a path to challenging his firing.
Several House Democrats have also introduced bills to protect Mueller, but Dent’s legislation marked the first time any House Republican besides Rep. Walter Jones (R-N.C.) had signed on to a bill. Meanwhile, a bipartisan Senate bill is expected to come up for a vote in the Judiciary Committee next week, despite McConnell’s opposition to moving the legislation.
“Obviously the views of the majority leader are important to consider, but they do not govern what happens here in the Judiciary Committee. ... If consideration on the floor was a standard for approving a bill, we wouldn't be moving any bills out of this committee,” GOP Sen. Chuck Grassley(Iowa), the chairman of the committee, said during a business meeting.
Grassley chided the media for trying to pit him against McConnell or the rich asshole, who would be unlikely to sign such a bill, arguing he was only trying to do his job as Judiciary Committee chairman.
“I don’t care to be put in the middle of anything. I just plan on doing the work that this committee ought to do,” he said.
The legislation from Sens. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Christopher Coons (D-Del.) would codify that only a senior Justice Department official who has been confirmed by the Senate could fire Mueller.
It would also give Mueller or any other special counsel an expedited review of their firing. If a court ultimately found they weren’t fired for “good cause” they would be reinstated.
The boost of momentum comes as the rich asshole has raged against Mueller and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein following the FBI’s raid of the offices and hotel room of his personal lawyer, Michael Cohen. The action stemmed in part from a referral from Mueller’s team, and Rosenstein reportedly approved the move.
But the rich asshole downplayed speculation that he would fire Mueller or Rosenstein while at his oceanfront Mar-a-Lago hotel in Florida.
"They've been saying I'm going to get rid of them for the last three months, four months, five months, and they're still here," he told reporters.
Republicans have worked overtime to warn the rich asshole against firing Mueller, a former FBI director who is deeply respected in Washington, or Rosenstein, who appointed the special counsel.
Now, with at least Tillis and Graham expected to vote with Democrats to support the Senate’s legislation next week, it is poised to pass out of the Judiciary Committee.
What, if anything, comes after that for the bill is unclear. Republicans have shown little interest in challenging the rich asshole, who remains popular with the party’s base, months before a midterm election.
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), McConnell’s No. 2, said a floor vote would be a “futile gesture” because the president ultimately wouldn’t sign the legislation.
“It’s not constitutional in my view to limit the president’s authority,” he added. “I don’t think he will do it, and I think it would be mistake if he did.”
But supporters of the bill say they will try to gather support for the legislation. Any bill would need 60 votes, including the support of at least 11 Republicans, to clear the chamber.
Tillis said his colleagues should “dispense with the drama” and focus on the long-term merits of the bill as they try to get additional co-sponsors.
“It's something that can lie in the Senate chamber. Facts may lead to passage or not,” he said.
He added separately that despite McConnell’s statements “the reality is it’s on us to get the votes to get it passed.”
Winning over GOP votes in the face of McConnell’s opposition could prove to be a herculean task. The GOP leader is widely respected within the caucus and controls what does — or doesn’t — come to the Senate.
Asked about the “McConnell problem,” Coons quipped: “What McConnell problem? McConnell problem?”
“The more the president does things that are unwise and abrupt,” he said, “the more I think that may persuade Majority Leader McConnell of the importance of preventive action.”
Comey memos expose major problem in the rich asshole’s story about his night at the Moscow Ritz
the rich asshole told Comey he didn't even spend a night there -- but that's not what his bodyguard testified.
Former FBI Director James Comey’s newly released memos indicate that in early 2017, some rich asshole repeatedly tried to refute one of the most salacious allegations in the Steele dossier — that the rich asshole engaged in acts with sex workers at the Moscow Ritz-Carlton during a trip to Russia for the 2013 Miss Universe competition — by claiming he didn’t even spend a night in Moscow.
But the rich asshole’s defense against what he characterizes as “fake news” is directly contradicted by the sworn testimony of his longtime bodyguard, Keith Schiller.
Comey wrote that during a January 28, 2017 dinner with the rich asshole at the White House, the rich asshole brought up the “golden showers thing” and said “[h]e had spoken to people who had been on the Miss Universe trip with him and they had reminded him that he didn’t stay over in Russia for that.”
“He said he arrived in the morning, did events, then showered and dressed for the pageant at the hotel (he didn’t say the hotel name) and left for the pageant. Afterwards, he returned only to get his things because they departed for New York by plane that same night,” Comey’s memo continues.
Then, during a meeting between the two men on February 8, according to Comey, the rich asshole again brought up the “Golden Showers thing.”
the rich asshole “said it really bothered him if his wife had any doubt about it,” Comey wrote. “He then explained, as he did at our dinner, that he hadn’t stayed overnight in Russia during the Miss Universe trip… The President said ‘the hookers thing’ is nonsense but that Putin had told him ‘we have some of the most beautiful hookers in the world.’ (He did not say when Putin had told him this [redacted])”
This is not how Schiller characterized the events in his own testimony.
Testifying before Congress last November, Schiller said that a Russian man he didn’t know offered to send five women to the rich asshole’s hotel room. According to an NBC News report about the testimony, Schiller said that although he interpreted the offer as a joke, he discussed it with the rich asshole as they walked back to his hotel room before each of them turned in for the night.
“Schiller testified that he stood outside the rich asshole’s hotel room for a time and then went to bed,” NBC reported. “One source noted that Schiller testified he eventually left the rich asshole’s hotel room door and could not say for sure what happened during the remainder of the night.”
Comey’s memos recount other claims from the rich asshole that seem implausible in light of what we’ve come to know about the president.
For instance, Comey writes that on two separate occasions, the rich asshole tried to dismiss the dossier’s allegation about his engagement with sex workers in Moscow by asserting that he’s not the type of guy who would pay for sex.
“He then said something about him being the kind of guy who didn’t need to ‘go there’ and laughed (which I understood to be communicating that he didn’t need to pay for sex),” Comey writes about his first meeting with President-elect the rich asshole on January 7, 2017.
But during an interview last month, Karen McDougal — a Playboy Playmate who says she had a consensual affair with the rich asshole beginning the year after he married Melania — claimed the rich asshole offered her money after the first time they had sex.
“After we had been intimate, he tried to pay me, and I actually didn’t know how to take it,” McDougal said, adding that the rich asshole tried to hand her money. “I had never been offered money like that… I looked at him and I said, ‘that’s not me, I’m not that kind of girl,’ and he said, ‘oh… you’re really special.'”
McDougal, corroborating a key aspect of Stormy Daniels' story, says that all her dates with Trump took place at a bungalow in a hotel in California. pic.twitter.com/pkHBfLXC50
McDougal says she "felt terrible" after her first date with Trump because they were intimate and he offered her money. pic.twitter.com/9vgORFCCz9
Comey also writes that the rich asshole told him he has “a beautiful wife,” so the allegations about paying for sex are “very painful” — implying that the rich asshole wouldn’t cheat on her. But in recent months, both McDougal and adult film actress Stormy Daniels have spoken out publicly to detail credible accounts of having affairs with the rich asshole, which they say began in 2006.
‘Who the hell is Wendy?’: Internet unloads on the rich asshole after he attacks the wrong Wasserman Schultz
Democratic National Committee chair Rep. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz (D-FL) talks to 'The Young Turks' on April 14, 2016. (YouTube)
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Apropos to nothing, President some rich asshole on Friday evening tweeted in an apparent attack on Democratic operative and Florida congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz — but got her name wrong, and instead called her “Wendy.”
“Just heard the Campaign was sued by the Obstructionist Democrats,” the rich asshole wrote. “This can be good news in that we will now counter for the DNC Server that they refused to give to the FBI, the Wendy Wasserman Schultz Servers and Documents held by the Pakistani mystery man and Clinton Emails.”
The tweet, which was posted soon after North Korea announced they are ceasing their nuclear tests ahead of peace talks with the rich asshole, was not missed by Twitter.
“Who the hell is Wendy Wasserman Schultz?” reporter Kurt Bardella tweeted.
“Hold up,” Encyclopedia Britannica employee John M. Cunningham wrote. “Is he conflating former DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz with playwright Wendy Wasserstein?”
Hold up, is he conflating former DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz with playwright Wendy Wasserstein? twitter.com/realDonaldTrum…
Check out more responses below:
"Is Wendy Wasserman Schultz" some kind of nickname joke I'm not getting or...just a mistake? twitter.com/realDonaldTrum…
Are you thinking of Wendy Wasserstein, the playwright of Heidi Chronicles fame, and getting her confused with DEBBIE Wasserman Schultz former head of the DNC, sir?
Or are you just a fool? twitter.com/realdonaldtrum…
is there anything more 80s New York than confusing Wendy Wasserstein with Debbie Wasserman Schultz twitter.com/realDonaldTrum…
Just heard the Campaign was sued by the Obstructionist Democrats. This can be good news in that we will now counter for the DNC Server that they refused to give to the FBI, the Wendy Wasserman Schultz Servers and Documents held by the Pakistani mystery man and Clinton Emails.
I know it's 4/20, but are you high?
Who is Wendy Wasserman Schultz? What kind of authentic frontier gibberish is this? pic.twitter.com/gUoVsh3XKM
That time Debbie Wasserman Schultz's previously-unknown twin sister Wendy takes the baton from her ousted sister Debbie and turns life in a litigious hell for Mother Russia, Wikileaks and the Trump campaign. It must be Friday... twitter.com/realdonaldtrum…
I love that Wendy Wasserstein is trending right now. It's about time! #wendywasserstein #feministplaywrights
Wendy Wasserman Schultz, David Dennison, and John Barron walked into a bar....and everything went to hell. twitter.com/realdonaldtrum…
Is Wendy Wasserman Schultz that person who was famous for drinking covfefe at the Bowling Green Massacre, and who was so gloriously memorialized in the Book of Two Corinthians? twitter.com/robertmaguire_…
‘This one touched a nerve’: New Jersey governor responds to the rich asshole’s offshore drilling proposal
New Jersey just passed the nation’s strongest ban on offshore drilling.
On Friday, New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy (D) — surrounded by a bipartisan coalition of local and state lawmakers — signed into law the country’s strongest ban on offshore drilling.
“This was a direct response to the rich asshole administration,” Murphy told ThinkProgress in an exclusive interview prior to the bill signing, referencing the administration’s proposed plan to open up nearly all federal waters to oil and gas drilling. “This one touched a nerve in New Jersey.”
Murphy, who has made environmental and climate action a priority since winning the governorship in 2017, described the offshore drilling ban as the most bipartisan bill he has signed during his first months in office. The bill, which passed unanimously in the state senate, was supported by groups like the Chamber of Commerce and the New Jersey Sierra Club.
The bill does three things to limit the extraction of fossil fuels off of New Jersey’s coast — it bans drilling in state waters, gives more power to the state’s environmental agency to review drilling proposals in federal waters, and bans the construction of infrastructure in state waters meant to help transport gas or oil extracted offshore back onshore.
The bill signing coincided with the eight year anniversary of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, the largest marine oil spill in history. Opponents of offshore drilling in New Jersey cite the potential of oil spills like the Deepwater horizon blowout as proof that offshore drilling could imperil the state’s coastline, which supports tens of thousands of jobs and billions of dollars in non-oil revenue annually.
“The New Jersey shoreline is a $38 billion economic engine,” Murphy said. “It is home to some incredibly rare species. It’s very fragile, but also a very important and lucrative asset for our state. When the rich asshole administration announced its intention to drill offshore, people went crazy on both sides.”
New Jersey isn’t the first state to ban offshore drilling in state waters. In 1994, following years of opposition by local environmental groups and the Santa Barbara oil spill of 1969, the California state legislature banned new offshore drilling leases in state waters, which typically run several miles from the shore out to sea (anywhere from three to nine nautical miles, depending on the state). But New Jersey is the first state to explicitly ban infrastructure in state waters, which could dissuade fossil fuel companies from drilling in federal waters by raising the cost of extraction.
Without being able to rely on infrastructure like pipelines, for instance, to bring oil from federal waters to transportation vessels onshore, companies would be forced to utilize massive floating tanks or transfer the fossil fuels directly onto ships for market — steps that would make oil and gas extraction expensive, especially with current oil prices so low.
“Even if you’re drilling offshore, you’ve got to get the oil or the gas onto the shore somehow, and that would require construction through state waters,” Murphy said, calling the infrastructure ban “equally powerful” as parts of the bill that more explicitly ban offshore drilling.
Still, Murphy acknowledged that New Jersey’s offshore drilling ban can only do so much to prevent a potential oil spill from impacting the state’s coastline — which is why he is working with other states to pass similar bans. So far, Murphy says the work has been mostly on an “ad-hoc” basis, but he isn’t ruling out the idea that New Jersey might team up with other states along the Atlantic Coast to form some kind of official coalition against offshore drilling.
In that sphere, Murphy would likely have ready allies in almost every governor along the Atlantic coastline. Only Maine Governor Paul LePage (R) supports the rich asshole administration’s offshore drilling proposal, while governors in New York, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina have all publicly come out against the proposal.
“If you have a coastline, I think it’s a natural, visceral reaction that this is just wrong,” Murphy said. “It’s wrong from an economic impact, it’s wrong from an environmental impact.”
Beyond signing into law the nation’s strongest offshore drilling ban, Murphy has big plans for the Garden State’s environmental future. While his predecessor, Chris Christie (R), pursued an environmental agenda marked by support for fossil fuel infrastructure and criticism of renewable energy programs like the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), Murphy is working to make New Jersey an example of progressive environmental action.
So far, Murphy has begun the process for the state to re-enter RGGI, has signed a bill requiring the state to adhere to the Paris climate agreement, and has begun work to open the state’s shorelines to offshore wind production. Murphy also wants to make sure that environmental justice is at the core of his administration’s environmental agenda, and is working with the New Jersey Port Authority to address issues of air pollution and asthma in Newark.
“I think politics too often gum up the environmental agenda, which I think is frankly outrageous,” Murphy said. “We did have a governor who tried to fit his policies into a personal, national, narrative. Those days are over here.”
Rudy Giuliani is a ‘has-been’ who was ‘never that great in the first place’: Ex-DOJ public corruption prosecutor
Former NYC Mayor Rudy Giuliani. Photo by Marc Nozell from Merrimack, New Hampshire, USA (Rudy Giuliani) [CC BY 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
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Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who joined President some rich asshole’s legal defense team, has no realistic chance of fulfilling his public predictions of wrapping up special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation within the next two-weeks, Friday’s panel on MSNBC’s Hardball explained.
The segment began with anchor Chris Matthew playing a clip of the two men together in 2000. Giuliani was mayor at the time, and was dressed in drag. the rich asshole was showcasing the persona he projects from the oval office.
The segment ended with the rich asshole putting his face in then-Mayor Giuliani’s artificial bosom.
“Oh, you dirty boy you, oh,” Giuliani said in a high pitched voice. “Donald, I thought you were a gentleman.”
“That was some rich asshole and his new lawyer, Rudy Guiliani, during happier times back in 2000,” Matthews noted.
To analyze the relationship, Matthews brought on Georgetown Law Professor Paul Butler. Butler specialized in prosecuting public corruption during his time at the Department of Justice.
“How can Giuliani come in and say, ‘I’m blowing the whistle on you guys, we’re going to stop this thing?’ That doesn’t make sense,” the host concluded.
“Because he is not a good criminal defense lawyer,” answered Prof. Butler. “There are a hundred white collar criminal defense attorneys in D.C. who are experienced in high profile complex criminal investigations. Rudy Giuliani is not one of those people.
“He’s a has-been who was never all that great in the first place,” he concluded.
“Which is why he could make this outrageous statement that he can bring the investigation to an end,” Butler continued. “Trust me, he cannot do that.”
Watch:
Michael Cohen’s lawyer says he could soon be indicted
April 20, 2018
Jessica Kwong
Posted with permission from Newsweek
Michael Cohen’s attorney argued in a Los Angeles court Friday that a lawsuit against the president’s personal lawyer filed by Stormy Daniels should be delayed because Cohen could soon be indicted.
Cohen and Trump were seeking a 90-day delay to a lawsuit filed by Daniels arguing that a non-disclosure agreement she signed prior to the 2016 election was invalid because Trump never signed it. U.S. District Court Judge S. James Otero postponed ruling on the matter Friday, giving Cohen until Wednesday to file a declaration that he will refuse to answer questions due to his right to invoke the Fifth Amendment to protect against self-incrimination.
Cohen had his office, home and hotel room raided by the FBI last week, with officials seizing documents related to his $130,000 payment made to Daniels. As part of his push for a delay, Cohen lawyer Brent Blakely claimed that “the potential indictment of client" puts Cohen "in a very difficult situation," according to CNBC.
Blakely said that Cohen could be indicted within 90 days, pointing to a previous statement from Daniels’s lawyer Michael Avenatti to that effect, CNN reported.
Always a bad sign when the judge tells you that your motion has “gaping holes in it,” as the judge told the attys for MC and DJT this AM. I don’t know why they continue to hide what they know about the FBI raids. Time to come clean and let the chips fall where they may. #basta
Five days earlier, Avenatti told CNN: “I strongly believe that within the next 90 days we’re going to see the unsealing of an indictment against Mr. Cohen for a host of very serious offenses."
Avenatti, who has repeatedly taken the opportunity to slam Cohen and Trump, believes Cohen will decide to flip on the president by this summer or earlier, and become a witness.
“There is zero question in my mind that Michael Cohen is going to be indicted for some very serious, pervasive conduct,” Avenatti told Vanity Fair in a report published Thursday.
Avenatti claims to have evidence that Cohen engaged in bank fraud and that it will prove that Trump was aware that Cohen paid Daniels and other women hush money to cover up alleged affairs.
“There’s a significant level of cooperation between us and the Southern District of New York U.S. attorney’s office,” he added.
Trump is reportedly worried about the charges that Cohen could potentially be hit with, and whether his lawyer will flip.
In stunning CNN interview, the rich asshole’s divorce lawyer suggests Cohen will flip
"He's of a type that I have recognized in the past as one not suited to stand up to the rigors of jail life."
Jay Goldberg, President the rich asshole’s divorce lawyer, said during a CNN appearance on Thursday evening that he thinks Michael Cohen will end up cooperating with prosecutors because he’s afraid of being sexually assaulted in prison.
“He’s of a type that I have recognized in the past as one not suited to stand up to the rigors of jail life,” Goldberg said of Cohen, the rich asshole’s longtime personal attorney and the current target of a federal criminal investigation. “I think, in many ways — and it’s difficult to say this — prison has a racial overtone, and a person like Michael doesn’t see himself walking down Broadway while people are clamoring, ‘you’re going to be my wife.’ And so he’s under pressure from his family to try to figure out what it would take to bring the government aboard as his sponsor.”
Goldberg, who claims to know Cohen personally, told CNN’s Erin Burnett he shared his concerns directly with President the rich asshole during a phone conversation a few days after the FBI raided Cohen’s home, office, and hotel room on April 9.
“He called me on April 13,” Goldberg said of his chat with the rich asshole, adding that the president shared his concerns “about a person who is facing a lengthy prison term [being] likely to say those things which in the witness’s mind would best position himself for a 5K1 letter, which would enable the government to recommend that he be shown leniency.”
“That doesn’t necessarily mean that he tells the truth,” Goldberg added. “History has shown that people under the threat of heavy litigation glean what the prosecutor is interested in hearing, and they can form their conduct so that they can get what’s known as a 5K1 letter.”
Goldberg said the rich asshole told him that he “understood” his concerns.
Part of the FBI’s investigation into Cohen is regarding a hush payment made just before the 2016 presidential election to Stormy Daniels, an adult film actress who says she had an affair with the rich asshole. The lawyer representing Daniels, Michael Avenatti, recently told Vanity Fair he believes “there is zero question” that Cohen “is going to be indicted for some very serious, pervasive conduct.”
Goldberg isn’t the only lawyer in the rich asshole’s orbit who appears to be worried about Cohen potentially cooperating with prosecutors.
Alan Dershowitz, a retired Harvard law professor who regularly appears on Hannityand who recently dined at the White House with the rich asshole, also said during a Thursday CNN appearance that the president’s “working assumption” should be that Cohen will ultimately cooperate with prosecutors.
“I have told every client I have represented over the last 53 years: assume your assume your best friend will flip,” Dershowitz said. “The president has to assume that his closest friends, his greatest associates, the people he trusts the most, if exposed to the pressure, the risk of life imprisonment, will flip. That has to be his working assumption.”
.@AlanDersh on possibility Michael Cohen will "flip": "I have always said, assume your best friend will flip... the president has to assume that his closest friends, the people he trusts the most, if exposed to the pressure, will flip. That has to be his working assumption."
Dershowitz characterized the rich asshole’s decision to call Cohen after the raid as “not a wise move,” and advised the rich asshole to not issue any pardons.
Last week, the rich asshole abruptly pardoned Scooter Libby, a former Bush administration aide who was convicted of lying to investigators and obstruction of justice. Some observers interpreted the move as a signal to potential witnesses like Cohen and former the rich asshole campaign chairman Paul Manafort, who faces serious prison time, that they will be rewarded for not cooperating with prosecutors.
CNN’s Phil Mudd: Putin sees the rich asshole’s obsession with Russian hookers and thinks ‘I can work this guy’
Philip Mudd (Photo: Screen capture)
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CNN counter-terrorism analyst Phil Mudd said on Friday that President some rich asshole’s seeming obsession with talking about Russian hookers shows how easily he can be distracted from doing his job as president.
During a panel discussion on former FBI director James Comey’s recently released memos about his interactions with the rich asshole White House, Mudd marveled that the rich asshole allegedly told Comey that Russian President Vladimir Putin had boasted to him about the quality of Russian prostitutes.
“Vladimir Putin, who’s been a strong man around since his days in the KGB, has got to be looking at the President of the United States and saying, ‘I can work this guy,'” said Mudd. “If the substance of our conversations is about prostitutes and not Crimea, that tells me about this guy’s attention to long-term strategic interests of the United States.”
Panelist Caroline Polisi, a former white-collar criminal defense attorney, said that the most shocking aspects about Comey’s memos were the rich asshole’s total lack of curiosity about what really happened in the 2016 presidential election.
“Comey has been stating this, the president never pushed harder, he never followed up with James Comey asking, ‘Well, what were the allegations?’ or ‘What did happen in the 2016 election?'” she said. “Which is shocking, by all accounts, that the President of the United States wouldn’t want to get more information about what, by all accounts, the entirety of the intelligence community agreed was meddling in the election.”
Watch the video below.
Mike Flynn back in limelight after FBI plea deal
April 20, 2018
Greg Price
Posted with permission from Newsweek
Disgraced former national security adviser Michael Flynn has re-entered the political limelight but not as a witness or target of the special counsel’s investigation. Instead, Flynn has reportedly become a star among President Donald Trump’s supporters and those rallying against Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s probe.
Indeed, the former general delivered a foreign policy speech in New York Thursday night and endorsed a Republican candidate for Congress last month, according to Politico.
After delivering his speech about “directions in foreign policy” for the London Center for Policy Research, he stated he was “doing great” while refusing to answer questions.
Flynn reportedly was not paid for the speech, but those who attended had to shell out $10,000 in order to hear the short-lived national security adviser, as well as former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and others.
The speech followed Flynn’s endorsement of Republican candidate Omar Navarro, who is challenging Democratic Representative Maxine Waters for her seat in California.
The efforts are intended for Flynn to put his controversial recent past behind him.
“General Flynn is moving on with his life and this speech is part of that endeavor,” his brother Joseph Flynn told Politico. “There are lots of people who want to hear his voice again.”
Still, Flynn is only about five months removed from his guilty plea in Mueller’s probe. In December, he admitted to lying to FBI officials about his contacts with foreign officials and agreed to cooperate with the investigation into Russia’s meddling in the 2016 election.
Flynn’s speech occurred mere hours before former FBI director James Comey’s infamous memos were leaked to the media. Comey quoted Trump as saying Flynn had “serious judgment issues” after learning a foreign leader had called to speak to the president but that a call back had not been scheduled until six days later. The country and its leader were redacted, as were other lines in the memos that Comey kept after what he perceived to be odd or improper behavior by Trump in their interactions.
Trump has said he had to fire Flynn in February of last year because he had lied to the FBI, but has also wondered on Twitter why Flynn’s life had to be “destroyed” while others like Comey and Hillary Clinton have faced no investigations. The president reiterated his stance Friday morning while again blasting Comey.
“So General Michael Flynn’s life can be totally destroyed while Shadey James Comey can Leak and Lie and make lots of money from a third rate book (that should never have been written). Is that really the way life in America is supposed to work? I don’t think so!” Trump tweeted.
So General Michael Flynn’s life can be totally destroyed while Shadey James Comey can Leak and Lie and make lots of money from a third rate book (that should never have been written). Is that really the way life in America is supposed to work? I don’t think so!
the rich asshole and Trudeau have one big thing in common when it comes to climate change
"It's not a Canadian problem. It's a North American problem."
After facing prolonged resistance from indigenous communities and environmental groups, the Texas-based energy company Kinder Morgan announced in early April that it would temporarily be suspending construction of its proposed Trans Mountain pipeline expansion, which would have transported tar sands oil from Alberta to the southwestern coast of British Columbia.
The victory, however, was short-lived, as Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced on April 15 that he was willing to offer Kinder Morgan government aidto make sure that the project gets built. Describing the pipeline as being “of vital strategic interest to Canada,” Trudeau added that he was “actively pursuing legislative options that will assert and reinforce the government of Canada’s jurisdiction in this matter.”
Since some rich asshole won the U.S. presidency in 2016, United States-based climate activists have looked to Canada and Trudeau’s government in the hope that a more liberal North American country might continue to march ahead with climate action in the face of the rich asshole’s all-out resistance. Trudeau himself has chastised the rich asshole for his climate stance, vocally disapproving of the rich asshole’s choice to withdraw from the Paris climate agreement.
But when it comes to dealing with grassroots resistance to fossil fuel infrastructure, climate activists have come to the sobering realization that perhaps the rich asshole and Trudeau are more similar than disparate, using executive power to push forward projects of crucial importance to corporations at the expense of public health and the environment.
“It’s not a Canadian problem. It’s a North American problem,” Eric de Place, programs director with the Seattle-based Sightline Institute, told ThinkProgress.
Geographically, the similarities between the United States and Canada when it comes to fossil fuel resistance — and extraction — are startling. Both countries produce the bulk of their fossil fuel in the interior of the country, whether in the tar sands fields of Alberta or the Powder River Basin coal mines and Bakken oil fields of North Dakota and Wyoming.
In both countries, energy companies looking for a way to export their fuels have looked to cities along the coasts — and particularly, along the Pacific Coast, which offers a quick and easy route to Asian markets. And in both cases, companies have encountered a wall of local resistance to those export projects — mostly lead by indigenous communities — that have seriously hampered their ability to move fuel from landlocked regions to coastal areas.
“I think it’s fair to say that the environmental community is as lock step opposed to the Trans Mountain pipeline as to the coal export projects of yesteryear,” de Place said, referencing a slew of proposed coal export terminals that ultimately met their demise due in large part to local resistance in Oregon and Washington.
In the Pacific Northwest, such continued resistance has helped local communities defeat a slew of proposed fossil fuel infrastructure projects, from coal export terminals to natural gas and oil pipelines. The same thing happened in British Columbia, where environmental groups and indigenous groups successfully defeated Enbridge’s plans for a pipeline from Alberta to the Pacific.
Taken together, this years-long campaign of opposition to export terminals and pipelines along the Pacific Coast has left landlocked energy companies — and energy-rich regions whose economies largely depend on the success of these companies — with few options for export.
In the Powder River Basin, for instance, coal companies have struggled to find a viable export route for their coal, given the massive wall of resistance in the Pacific Northwest. In 2011, there were six proposals for coal export terminals that cumulatively would have shipped more than 100 million tons of coal from the Powder River Basin to Asian markets; today, just one of those projects remains under consideration.
Communities in the Northwest have also rallied in opposition to crude oil export terminals that would transport fuel from the Bakken region to Asia, citing the dangers associated with increased oil-by-rail traffic. In Vancouver, Washington, state officials recently rejected a proposal for what would have been the largest oil-by-rail export facility in the country.
In Canada, opposition to pipelines has put a squeeze on the country’s tar sands industry. Tar sands — or oil sands — are an incredibly energy intensive kind of fuel to extract, largely because it is located deeper beneath the earth than fuel like natural gas. Tar sands oil is also much heavier than typical crude oil or natural gas; its original state is closer to tar than a liquid, so companies have to use natural gas and chemicals to heat and pressurize the substance into what is known as diluted bitumen, or “dilbit.”
Because the process is so time-intensive — and requires so much energy — it’s difficult for tar sands oil to be competitive with crude or natural gas, especially with current oil prices hovering around $66 a barrel.
Pretty much every major energy company — with the exception of Exxon — that used to have a significant financial stake in Canada’s tar sands oil has been getting out of the game, and projections for future production from the industry has fallen by more than 1 billion barrels.
“There has been, from climate advocates, for decades, a tremendous amount of justified frustration that we can’t seem to, at the national level, take a serious approach to climate change,” de Place said. “I think one of the reasons [the local movement to resist fossil fuels] has been so successful is that those localized fights give people power. It enables people to tackle these kinds of Darth Vader industries that have done so much to foul up our politicians and corrupt our national discourse.”
But powerful industries like coal, oil, and tar sands aren’t the kinds of players that take losses sitting down. In both Canada and the United States, energy companies — and energy-dependent regions — have been flexing their political muscle in response to coastal opposition, trying everything from federal bailouts to lawsuits against progressive cities and counties.
In Wyoming, for instance, state lawmakers considered a bill earlier this year that would have earmarked $250,000 in state funds to retain private counsel and launch a lawsuit against Washington state’s denial of permits related to coal export terminals. In Utah, lawmakers are considering a similar bill that would set aside $2 million in state funds for coal and climate-related lawsuits against California, whose progressive climate goals make it more expensive for Utah to export coal.
In Canada, Alberta responded to British Columbia’s resistance to the Kinder Morgan pipeline expansion by boycotting the province’s wine industry — though that boycott ended after British Columbia challenged the constitutionality of the ban in court. Alberta Premier Rachel Notley has also said that the government is looking into legal strategies to challenge British Columbia’s resistance to tar sands pipelines, and she recently introduced legislation that would allow Alberta to restrict the flow of energy fuels going to British Columbia.
At the federal level, both countries have seen leaders step in with executive action to revive flailing energy projects.
In the United States, the rich asshole signed an executive order in January of 2017 that directed federal agencies to conclude — and approve — all necessary studies and permits for the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines. Both had been sidelined after years of community and environmental resistance.
And Trudeau appears to be taking a cue from the rich asshole’s playbook with respect to the Kinder Morgan pipeline, telling reporters on April 15 that he intends to introduce legislation to Canadian lawmakers to “reaffirm federal jurisdiction over the interprovincial pipeline,” according to the National Observer.
“Unfortunately in both cases, the federal governments are not just ignoring the wishes and wellbeing of their citizens, but also overreaching in their regulatory power,” Yianni Varonis, a spokesperson for Greenpeace, told ThinkProgress via email.
While the rich asshole’s support for fossil fuel projects should come as no surprise — he campaigned on a platform of unfettered fossil fuel extraction and a rollback of environmental regulations — Trudeau’s stance clashes with his international image of a progressive, climate-minded environmentalist. The reality, however, is that even liberal politicians tend to support pipeline projects and fossil fuel infrastructure.
President Barack Obama, for instance, took years to take a public stand against Keystone XL and the Dakota Access pipeline, only doing so in the final years of his administration. And despite his eventual opposition to these two pipelines, the Obama administration approved a handful of cross-border pipeline projects during his presidency. This includes two pipelines owned by Energy Transfer Partners — the same company that owns the Dakota Access pipeline — and a cross-border pipeline that brings tar sands oil from Alberta to Wisconsin.
“These industries come from Alberta or Texas, from Wyoming or Montana and they bring with them a certain amount of muscle, both political and financial,” de Place said, adding that the Obama administration was “not a great friend” to the anti-fossil fuel infrastructure movement in the Northwest. “It has gotten worse under the rich asshole, but honestly, not that worse. When I see Trudeau saying that he is going to build that pipeline, that dynamic is really familiar.”
’I worry about his fitness: Intel Dem concluded Comey memos ‘call into question the fitness of the president to serve’
some rich asshole on Instagram (Screenshot)
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A top Democrat on the House Intel Committee told MSNBC’s Ari Melber that the leaked James Comey memos call into question the ability of President some rich asshole to discharge the powers and duties of his office.
Congressman Jackie Speier (D-CA) revealed her fears on The Beat with Ari Melber on Friday.
“Congresswoman, much has come out and much has been discussed about these Comey Memos,” Melber noted. “Walk us through what you think is significant about this and was congress right to leak them?”
“Well, this is an example where the majority, the Republicans, wanted desperately for those memos to come under their possession, so that they could use them as a weapon,” Rep. Speier replied. “They then, I think, leaked them immediately and it sort of blew up in their faces.”
“I think that it underscores Comey’s reputation, generally, as, you know, being straight-shooter accurate,” she continued later in the segment.
“I also think it calls into question — once again — the fitness of the president to serve,” the congresswoman argued. “Because, as Comey said in those contemporaneous notes, it was like a puzzle — he was throwing one puzzle piece down and then putting it back up, jumping from one topic to another, in a monologue.”
“He does not track well,” she concluded. “And, in terms of his ability to lie, we have seen that over and over and over again.”
“Congresswoman, when you say, these memos make you question some rich asshole’s fitness, what do you mean?” Melber asked.
“I have, for a long time, been very concerned about the president’s fitness to serve,” Rep. Speier replied. “In this case, with Director Comey, and how he jumps from topic to topic, there isn’t the kind of discipline associated with what we would expect the president to have.”
“But do these memos in your view raise questions about his actual ability to do the job and his legitimacy?” Melber asked again.
“Well, I would suggest to you that what it shows is that he does not have the discipline to be able to have a conversation — to engage with someone in a manner that has a give and take — that he is constantly jumping from one topic to another,” she replied. “He does that in his press conferences all the time, he continues to repeat sentences over and over again.”
“I worry about his fitness,” she concluded.
Watch:
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April 20, 2018
Democrats are taking the rich asshole campaign's collusion with Russia to court.
While the rich asshole continues to Tweet-rage that the investigation into his campaign’s collusion with Russia is a “witch hunt” and a “hoax,” the Democratic Party is fighting back in a big, multimillion dollar way.
On Friday, the Democratic National Committee filed a lawsuit against the rich asshole’s campaign, Russia, and WikiLeaks for conspiring to fix the 2016 election “to hurt Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton and help the rich asshole by hacking the computer networks of the Democratic Party and disseminating stolen material found there,” the Washington Post reports.
The suit doesn’t name some rich asshole personally, but it does target several top officials from his campaign, including Paul Manafort, his deputy Rick Gates, and foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos, all of whom have been indicted as part of special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation.
Papadopoulos and Gates have both pleaded guilty and are now cooperating with Mueller’s investigation.
The suit also names the rich asshole’s longtime confidante Roger Stone, who was confirmed in March to have communicated with Russia’s military intelligence during the election.
DNC chairman Tom Perez issued a blistering statement, condemning Russia, the rich asshole campaign, and the rich asshole himself.
“During the 2016 presidential campaign, Russia launched an all-out assault on our democracy, and it found a willing and active partner in some rich asshole’s campaign,” Perez said. He called the collusion “an act of unprecedented treachery.”
The Washington Post notes that the lawsuit is not entirely unprecedented: “In 1972, the DNC filed suit against former president Richard Nixon’s reelection committee seeking $1 million in damages for the break-in at Democratic headquarters in the Watergate building.”
the rich asshole’s team — including his latest hire, Rudy Giuliani — continue to insist that Mueller’s investigation should be wrapping up soon. But with this lawsuit, the team has a whole new set of problems that aren’t going away any time soon.
The 111 hypocrites that backed the rich asshole’s refugee ban and strikes on Syria
Almost all of them said they supported the bombing for humanitarian reasons.
111 members of Congress expressed support for President some rich asshole’s decision to launch airstrikes in Syria last week — and also expressed support for the president’s ban on Syrian refugees and immigrants.
Dozens of other lawmakers made no clear statement on the president’s decision to ban Syrian refugees last year, but said they supported last week’s airstrikes.
the rich asshole said he was motivated to authorize Friday’s military action — which was carried out in coordination with France and the United Kingdom — by the “evil and despicable” chemical attack launched by the government in the town of Douma a week earlier. The U.S. president spoke of “mothers and fathers, infants and children thrashing in pain and gasping for air” and called Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad a “monster.”
Like the rich asshole, nearly all the members of Congress who said they support the airstrikes also expressed humanitarian concerns for the plight of the Syrian people. But 152 lawmakers tallied by Think Progress either expressed support for, or failed to condemn last year’s Muslim ban, which halted refugee resettlement for 120 days and suspended all Syrian immigrant and non-immigrant visas for 90 days.
ThinkProgress looked through public statements of every member of Congress to determine whether they supported, condemned, or made no clear statement on the rich asshole’s ban last year. ThinkProgress then combed through the public statements of all members who did not explicitly condemn the ban to see whether they expressed support for the airstrikes last week. Neither the ban nor the airstrikes were voted on by Congress.
Lawmakers’ supposed concern for the Syrian people has simply not translated into immigration policy.
Just one week after taking office, the rich asshole imposed a measure indefinitely suspending all Syrian refugee resettlement in the United States. Since then, he has issued two watered down versions of the same ban. All three versions barred Syrian immigrants and non-immigrants, including students, from entering the United States.
The most recent version of this ban is still in place, and unlike earlier versions, is indefinite. The Supreme Court will be hearing oral arguments next week on a legal challenge to the measure.
While there is no longer a specific ban on Syrian refugees, the rich asshole administration’s immigration policies have led to historically low numbers of refugees being allowed to enter the United States. The United States — which has yet to draw up a coherent strategy on Syria — has accepted only 11 Syrian refugees this year.
In 2017, 139 members of Congress expressed support for the rich asshole’s refugee ban and also supported the U.S. airstrikes on the al-Shayrat airbase, after a chemical weapons attack by Assad a week prior.
You can see ThinkProgress’ full data set and links to the lawmakers’ statements this year here.
Below is the full list of lawmakers who supported both the Muslim ban and the Syrian airstrikes. All of them are Republican.
Alabama
Rep. Bradly Byrne
Rep. Robert Aderholt
Rep. Mo Brooks
Alaska
Rep. Don Young
Sen. Dan Sullivan
Arizona
Rep. Martha McSally
Sen. John McCain
Arkansas
Rep. Rick Crawford
Rep. French Hill
Rep. Steve Womack
Sen. John Boozman
Sen. Tom Cotton
California
Rep. Devin Nunes
Rep. Kevin McCarthy
Rep. Steve Knight
Rep. Ed Royce
Rep. Ken Calvert
Rep. Darrell Issa
Colorado
Rep. Scott Tipton
Sen. Cory Gardner
Florida
Rep. Matt Gaetz
Rep. Gus Bilirakis
Rep. Vern Buchanan
Rep. Neal Dunn
Rep. Mario Díaz-Balart
Rep. Carlos Curbelo
Rep. Ted Yoho
Rep. Ron DeSantis
Georgia
Rep. Jody Hice
Sen. David Perdue
Sen. Johnny Isakson
Illinois
Rep. Mike Bost
Rep. Darin LaHood
Rep. Peter Roskam
Indiana
Rep. Jackie Walorski
Rep. Todd Rokita
Rep. Trey Hollingsworth
Louisiana
Rep. Steve Scalise
Rep. Clay Higgins
Rep. Ralph Abraham
Sen. John N. Kennedy
Maine
Rep. Bruce Poliquin
Sen. Susan Collins
Maryland
Rep. Andy Harris
Michigan
Rep. David Trott
Rep. Bill Huizenga
Rep. Mike Bishop
Mississippi
Rep. Steven Palazzo
Missouri
Rep. Ann Wagner
Rep. Blaine Luetkemeyer
Rep. Sam Graves
Sen. Roy Blunt
Nebraska
Rep. Jeff Fortenberry
Rep. Don Bacon
New Jersey
Rep. Tom MacArthur
Rep. Leonard Lance
New York
Rep. Lee Zeldin
Rep. Daniel Donovan
Rep. John Faso
Rep. Peter King
Rep. Claudia Tenney
Rep. Tom Reed
Rep. Chris Collins
North Carolina
Rep. Ted Budd
Rep. Mark Walker
Rep. David Rouzer
Rep. Richard Hudson
Rep. Robert Pittenger
Sen. Thom Tillis
North Dakota
Rep. Kevin Cramer
Ohio
Rep. Brad Wenstrup
Rep. Bill Johnson
Rep. Warren Davidson
Oklahoma
Rep. Tom Cole
Rep. Steve Russell
Sen. Jim Inhofe
Pennsylvania
Rep. Lou Barletta
Rep. Lloyd Smucker
Rep. Mike Kelly
Rep. Scott Perry
Sen. Pat Toomey
South Carolina
Rep. Joe Wilson
Rep. Jeff Duncan
Sen. Lindsey Graham
South Dakota
Rep. Kristi Noem
Sen. Mike Rounds
Tennessee
Rep. Phil Roe
Rep. Chuck Fleischmann
Rep. Scott DesJarlais
Rep. Diane Black
Rep. Marsha Blackburn
Rep. David Kustoff
Sen. Bob Corker
Sen. Lamar Alexander
Texas
Rep. Jodey Arrington
Rep. Ted Poe
Rep. Pete Olson
Rep. Roger Williams
Rep. Michael Burgess
Rep. Pete Sessions
Rep. Brian Babin
Sen. Ted Cruz
Utah
Rep. Chris Stewart
Rep. Jason Chaffetz
Rep. Mia Love
Virginia
Rep. Rob Wittman
Rep. Scott Taylor
Washington
Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers
Wisconsin
Rep. Paul Ryan
Sen. Ron Johnson
Wyoming
Rep. Liz Cheney
With additional reporting from Elham Khatami.
This dataset has been updated with additional context about Rep. Curbelo’s views that Syrian refugees should not be summarily rejected, but should be allowed in the country as long as the U.S. government demands “intense vetting.”
the rich asshole brags on Twitter about ‘big progress’ as North Korea pauses nuclear test program
President some rich asshole and Kim Jong-un (driver Photographer/Flickr)
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It was announced Friday that North Korea will cease testing of nuclear missiles as part of it’s threats and programs. This year, intelligence members revealed Kim Jong-Un could put a nuclear warhead on a missile that would reach the United States. Since November, however, there has been no missile testing.
President some rich asshole began his own attack on the dictator last year, referring to him as “little rocket man.” When the leader seemed to indicate he would cease his activities if the rich asshole would meet with him, the U.S. president took the bait. CIA director Mike Pompeo met with North Korea over the Easter weekend and the rich asshole is scheduled to meet with the dictator, marking the first time any leader has done so.
As the news was breaking, the rich asshole tweeted out an attack at former Democratic Party chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz, though he incorrectly named her Wendy. Ultimately, he seemed to learn of the story and turned to take credit.
“North Korea has agreed to suspend all Nuclear Tests and close up a major test site. This is very good news for North Korea and the World – big progress! Look forward to our Summit,” he tweeted.
the rich asshole intends to meet with Kim Jong-Un in May or June.
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April 20, 2018
Mega-banks on Wall Street have already received more than $3.5 billion in giveaways from the GOP tax scam, and are en route to take home over $19 billion.
Thanks to the Republican tax law, the six mega-banks that dominate Wall Street received at least $3.59 billion in tax breaks according to a new analysis.
And that’s just for the first quarter of 2018.
A related analysis from Wells Fargo Securities predicts that, for the entire year, the banks will make out like bandits, ducking $19 billion in taxes.
The Associated Press looked at earnings reports from JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and Bank of America. What they found were the true beneficiaries of the Republican plan, and a stark contrast to the $1.50-a-week pay bump for a secretary that was so highly touted by Paul Ryan.
Concocted in secret by lobbyists who worked in concert with Republican leadership and multimillionaire Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin, the tax plan was designed as a giveaway to corporate America and the super wealthy. The legislation — which received no Democratic votes — delivered for the wealthiest 1 percent.
AP noted the big banks paid between 28 and 31 percent in corporate income taxes before the plan. Now, they pay considerably less: JP Morgan Chase pays just 18.3 percent, Goldman Sachs’ bill dropped to 17.2 percent, and CitiGroup will only pay 23.7 percent.
The tax legislation is not the populist cut for the middle class the rich asshole and his underlings claim to the public. It is a giveaway to the most elite institutions around.
Republicans believed that the legislation would work as a sort of silver bullet for them, rescuing Republicans up for re-election who are being weighed down by the corrupt the rich asshole administration.
But in real America, the tax law has been a bust. The GOP thought running ads touting the tax law in Pennsylvania, in the heart of the rich asshole country, would help them win. But instead they lostthe race to the Democratic nominee — after pulling the poorly performing tax ads last minute.
The tax proposal was always unpopular with Americans, and things never improved. It remains one of the most unpopular pieces of legislation to make it through Congress.
Now the effects are being felt across the country, as individual taxpayers are being thrown crumbs (at best) while mega-banks are getting billions because the GOP catered to their whims. Again, the middle class is being left behind by the party led by the rich asshole, who can’t be bothered to deal with their concerns.
Voters have already sent a sign to Republicans in the form of Democratic wins in deep red the rich asshole country. They are likely relishing the opportunity to let their feelings be known on an even grander scale.
Russian attempts to woo American white supremacists have backfired
A quarter-century after American neo-fascists began looking to Russia for support, the relationship is on its heels.
The National Rifle Association (NRA) doesn’t want to talk about its relationship with Russia. For months, the gun lobby has avoided questions from lawmakers on its ties to Russian officials specifically sanctioned by Washington — all the more after the NRA’s primary contact in Russia, Alexander Torshin, was named in the latest round of U.S. sanctions.
But the NRA is only one facet of a nexus of strange links between the American far-right and those close to the Kremlin. From Christian fundamentalists swooning for Russian President Vladimir Putin, to American secessionists repeatedly traveling to Moscow, to far-right media mouthpieces finding a home on Russian propaganda outlets, these ties have only grown — and grown more notorious — over the past few years.
Indeed, no foreign entity has provided as much support for these far-right causes recently as those in Moscow, where those with conspicuous ties to the Kremlin worked to cultivate and coalesce these American movements that, in the age of the rich asshole, have gained new credence.
However, the recent scrutiny on the relationship between Russian officials and the NRA demonstrates how this attempt to make inroads with far-right groups in the U.S. can backfire. And that backlash is even starker when it comes to the cooperation Kremlin-linked figures have pursued with American white supremacists. After an embarrassing series of setbacks in 2018, America’s young white supremacists — the new generation of white nationalists who burst forth during the rich asshole campaign — are on their heels, battered by bad press, and, in certain cases, facing significant jail time.
The ties between American white nationalists and Russians extend beyond the past few years. And those ties haven’t produced anywhere near the success many expected. In fact, over the past few months, they have effectively imploded.
Great White North
Despite reports that Putin’s intimates routinely referred to former President Barack Obama as the n-word or “monkey,” American white supremacists had connected with Russians long before his presidency. The first significant ties between white supremacists and neo-fascists in Russia and the U.S. can be traced to the immediate aftermath of World War II, when a number of American far-right figures — including noted fascist Harold Keith Thompson — built up contacts with Soviet agents.
KGB operatives also recruited Americans in the 1970s to deface synagogues in Washington and New York, while further paying them to “desecrate Jewish cemeteries,” as one KGB general wrote in his memoirs.
Given that the Soviet Union was the great boogeyman for much of the American far-right, these initial connections were only explored to a limited extent. But after the collapse of the Soviet Union, as Russian fascists surged amidst the Soviet rubble, American white supremacists took a fresh look at Moscow.
The first, most prominent neo-fascist to travel to a newly independent Russia appears to be Lyndon LaRouche. A font of anti-Semitic conspiracy, LaRouche found fertile ground in Russia.
In October 1992, LaRouche’s Schiller Institute joined with the Russian State Humanitarian University to organize a conference on “Alternative Approaches to Economic Reform.” As LaRouche’s magazine would later relate, his ideas had “reach[ed] Moscow in time of troubles,” with his teachings, according to one conference participant, “open[ing] for us a new world.” The American fascist even managed at one point to speak in front of the entire Russian parliament.
LaRouche also partnered with Sergei Glazyev, a one-time Minister of External Economic Relations of the Russian Federation who later joined the opposition against President Boris Yeltsin. Glazyev’s patronage, as researcher Anton Shekhovtsov would write, allowed LaRouche to become “an opinion maker and commentator on political and economic issues in Russia — a status that LaRouche could not enjoy in his home country where he has remained a fringe political figure.”
Russia presents “an unmatched opportunity to help protect the longevity of the white race,” said David Duke.
LaRouche was soon superseded in Russia by another American white supremacist, however — one who gained newfound prominence decades later during some rich asshole’s presidential campaign. It’s unclear how David Duke, former Ku Klux Klan leader and anti-Semitic white supremacist extraordinaire, first ended up in Russia. Regardless of how he landed there, Duke says that his five years in Russia were some of the most productive in his life.
Duke sold his books in the Russian parliament and attended numerous white supremacist conferences in the country, often as the lone American representative. Toward the turn of the century, Duke began saying that Russia presented “an unmatched opportunity to help protect the longevity of the white race.” He clarified that Moscow — a city he said had “the largest number of [w]hite people of any city in the entire world” — was the “key to white survival.”
Along the way, Duke brought other American neo-fascists to Moscow, including Preston Wiginton, a Texas white supremacist who courted Russian skinheads in his own right.
Duke never managed to build the official ties LaRouche amassed. However, one photo hints at the types of audiences Duke attained while in Russia. In a black suit and maroon tie, Duke stands next to a man with a scraggly beard, a dark blazer, and drooping eyes — a man who would, in years to come, be referred to as “Putin’s Brain,” and who would become one of the primary nodes between Russian circles and American white nationalists.
The rise of Eurasianism
Before detailing the features and fascism coursing Alexander Dugin’s history and writings, a necessary caveat: It’s easy to overstate the importance of Dugin, the man in the undated photo with Duke. Despite the catchy descriptors, Dugin’s direct ties to Putin appear, at best, scant. We know of only one official meeting between the two, in 2000, shortly after Putin rose to the presidency.
Still, that one meeting paid dividends. “Dugin refuses to discuss the meeting,” wrote Charles Clover, a journalist who has covered Dugin in depth. “[B]ut it would change his career. Soon there were sponsors, contacts, and open doors.”
While Putin may have kept Dugin at an arm’s length, security officials had no problem catering to him, and allowing him to teach a new generation of Russian military officers. As his profile rose, Dugin began lecturing at Russia’s General Staff Academy and his material was eventually assigned to every member of the academy.
Much of that comity from Russian officials stemmed from Dugin’s theories, which center primarily on “Eurasianism,” itself a geopolitical theory that was little more than soft cover for Russian imperialism.
Dugin’s theories are buried in fabricated history. As Yale historian Timothy Snyder notes, Dugin is a “[c]ontemporary Russian fascist,” one whose “references are German Nazis and postwar West European fascists.” Dugin’s primary theory, positing Russia as a country eternally at war with the U.S., builds upon the work of Lev Gumilev, himself a resounding fraud.
To be sure, Dugin’s theories were easy to mock. As Clover wrote, Eurasianists’ theories “are barely credible and are best understood as a sort of metaphor.” But as one researcher on the Russian right said about Dugin’s 1997 Foundations of Geopolitics, “There has probably not been another book published in Russia during the post-communist period which has exerted a comparable influence on Russian military, police, and statist foreign policy elites.”
For many in Moscow, particularly within the Russian security services, Dugin’s theories offered a way back for the Kremlin and Russian imperialism writ large. Ignoring Dugin’s own fascism — he named his alter ego after a Nazi official in charge of paranormal research, after all — officials during the Putin years lapped up Dugin’s teachings. During Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Putin appeared to be doing little more than following Dugin’s own ideas for Ukrainian fracture.
As Marlene Laruelle, a professor at George Washington University, wrote, “The influence of [Dugin’s] personality and his works must not be underestimated.”
A new world
In 2014, Russia appeared ascendant, boasting a successful Olympic Games, a stronger post-2008 economic recovery than many Western states, and the perceived ability to out-dance the U.S. at every step, from Edward Snowden to events in Syria.
After the annexation of Crimea, nationalists — white nationalists, especially — across the U.S. looked to Putin for guidance. He was, said one, now the head of the “last great White empire.” All the while, Dugin acted as the lynch pin binding Russia’s growing ties with the Western far-right.
These new ties between Moscow, Russian nationalists, and America’s neo-fascists over the past few years centered on the two most prominent young American white supremacists the 21st century has produced.
Richard Spencer’s wife called Dugin a “well-educated scholar” with a “rare intellectual caliber.”
The first is Richard Spencer, the infamously dubbed “dapper white nationalist.” In 2014, Spencer managed to organize a conference in Budapest, Hungary, for like-minded fascists. “The Future of Europe,” he called it. The keynote speaker was slated to be none other than Dugin.
Unfortunately for them both, Hungary barred Dugin’s entry, citing sanctions, while Spencer was detained and eventually expelled from the country. But shortly thereafter, Spencer would be writing for Dugin’s site, sharing Dugin’s thoughts with his own followers, and pushing pro-Russian policies.
The purpose and meaning of the alt-right movement katehon.com/article/purpos…
Spencer
While Buzzfeed in 2014 reported that Spencer said he knew Dugin “personally,” it’s still unclear how Dugin first came across Spencer’s radar: Spencer doesn’t speak Russian, and Dugin’s English remains broken.
However, in the final days of the American presidential campaign, a series of clues emerged tying the two together. It turned out that Spencer had married a woman named Nina Kouprianova, who had, over the few years prior, pushed a steady stream of pro-Russia, and pro-Dugin, material to her own followers.
@PaulSonne However American neocons and other Western imperialists ie @zbig are thrilled w regime change and annexation of Ukraine
@MarkSleboda1 Most Western journos fail at the onset - when it comes to classifying someone of Dugin's rare intellectual caliber. @PaulSonne
Byzantina
Originally from the Soviet Union, Kouprianova — writing under the name “Nina Byzantina” — had whitewashed Putin’s regime at every turn, appearing on Russian propaganda networks as an “independent scholar” and claiming that Russia had “chosen the path… of healthy debate.” (Spencer, as it is, also appeared on RT multiple times, described by the channel as the editor of an “online culture journal.”)
Kouprianova also acted as one of Dugin’s translators. With her fluency in both Russian and English, she helped introduce Dugin’s writings and theories into English — some of which would later be published via Spencer’s own publishing house. Rather than point to his fascism, chauvinism, or sheer fraudulence, Kouprianova claimed Dugin was a “well-educated scholar” with a “rare intellectual caliber.” He was, she said, “one of the greatest minds of our time.”
All of this, as Spencer began referring to Russia as the “sole white power in the world.”
@miloslazaNBG22 @NinaByzantina @verafilatova At a rally where the main speaker was Denis Pushilin, supported by Dugin and Zhirinovsky
Dugin is one of the greatest minds of our time, and Pushilin strikes me, a Russian, as brave. :) @BBCDanielS @miloslazaNBG22 @verafilatova
Traditional voices
But the Spencer-Kouprianova tandem wasn’t the only pair tying directly back to Dugin, or recruiting American white supremacists toward the Kremlin’s perceived court philosopher. Matthew Heimbach acted as Russian nationalists’ other twin American pole, around whom people like Dugin could expand their following.
As the presidential campaign started, Heimbach was already one of the leading figures among the young white supremacists backing the rich asshole; in 2016, he was arrested for shoving an anti-the rich asshole protester at a the rich asshole rally.
But where Spencer relied on his supposed intellect, Heimbach preferred grassroots organizing — acting, in a sense, as the brawn to Spencer’s brain. By 2015, Heimbach had decided he would form his own organization, which he would call the Traditionalist Worker Party.
The Traditionalist Worker Party didn’t hide its bigotry. In time, it would grow into a “major energizing and motivating factor for young racists,” as the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Ryan Lenz told ThinkProgress. And at its launch party, there was only one logical voice to christen them: Dugin.
“I see Russia as kind of the axis for nationalists,” Heimbach said.
In a speech — this time by video, as Dugin was barred from entering the U.S. — Dugin issued a “common message” to his “American friends,” exhorting Heimbach and his followers to success. “I’m very glad that I can address you,” Dugin said. “The actual modern world is losing its identity — the cultur[e], the civilization, is in great danger, and I think, maybe, it’s the greatest danger in all our human history.”
According to Heimbach, Dugin’s speech was “amazingly well-received, and exciting for the American white nationalist movement.” (Dugin would later present a similar speech at Texas A&M University, this time at the behest of none other than neo-Nazi Wiginton.)
Heimbach didn’t stop with Dugin. Soon thereafter, he announced plans to travel to Russia for the second annual conference — organized by the Russian Imperial Movement, itself an outgrowth of efforts from Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin — focused on gathering leaders of the West’s white nationalists under one roof in St. Petersburg. (The 2015 conference had featured, among dozens of others, a former KKK lawyer and white supremacist Jared Taylor, one of Spencer’s ideological mentors.)
“I see Russia as kind of the axis for nationalists,” Heimbach said. During the Soviet period, he added, “there was the Comintern, the Communist International. And in the modern era, it’s almost like a nationalist version — or the Traditionalist International.”
The conference was postponed, but in 2017, Heimbach welcomed a representative from the Russian Imperial Movement to the U.S. — the first summit on American soil between an American white supremacist and an official representative of a notorious Russian nationalist movement. The Russian Imperial Movement, apparently impressed with Heimbach’s hospitality, said that, moving forward, “the task is to share the experience of political [and] information warfare,” as well as “joint squad tactics training.”
“When we went to the White House, we took a photo with a Russian imperial flag,” Heimbach told ThinkProgress. “Hopefully before too long, when we’re able to meet in D.C., it will be on the terms of the Russian Imperial Movement [and] the new imperialist tsarist Russia meeting with the delegates from a free and independent white homeland.”
Implosion
In late 2016, everything seemed right: for Russia, for America’s white supremacists, for the marriage between the two. the rich asshole had been elected, promising good times and glad tidings to Moscow and the young white nationalists buoying his campaign. The future appeared bright.
As Dugin reveled to extreme right conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, “Anti-Americanism is over! Now the people of free America, free Russia, all anti-globalists of the world, should build a new world — a new architecture!”
A year later, however, that bright future has dimmed.
the rich asshole still refrains from criticizing Putin, and has undercut American efforts at propping up human and civil rights globally. But his election hasn’t proven to be nearly the panacea Russia expected, as Ukraine, Syria, and the ongoing sanctions regime illustrate.
For the young white supremacists riding the rich asshole’s coattails, matters appear even worse.
After last summer’s violent rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, membership among the young white supremacist cohort became more toxic than ever before, with any number of websites and platforms kicking off Spencer, Heimbach, and their ilk. Suddenly, no one showed up at Spencer’s events — at his nationwide tours, at his college appearances. He was, as the rich asshole’s first year closed, now a bully without a pulpit. In March, he announced he would be rethinking his entire strategy, slinking back into the shadows.
Heimbach’s fall, meanwhile, has been even more spectacular. He was recently arrested in his trailer after — in a twist as ludicrous as any over the past few years — having an affair with his mother-in-law, and battering his father-in-law when the latter found out. It was a bizarre ending for a man ThinkProgress had dubbed the “most important white supremacist” of 2016. Given a prior arrest, Heimbach is facing the prospect of significant jail time. And his Traditionalist Worker Party, by all appearances, is no more.
And then there’s Dugin: The man who once had the Kremlin’s ear — or so he, and many, would claim — is out of a job, following his pro-genocidal comments aimed at Ukrainians. It’s unclear how, exactly, Dugin makes a living. But any interest in his teachings has effectively dried up.
As has Russia’s interests in American white supremacists — for the time being, at least. Dating from at least 2014, the ties seem to have peaked toward the end of 2016. But the rich asshole’s victory, for both, appears increasingly hollow. And the dreams of a Traditionalist International, like the Comintern before it, appears all but dead.
This article has been updated.
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April 20, 2018
Another Republican maneuver to protect the rich asshole is faltering.
If you thought Republicans’ decision earlier this year to release the so-called Nunes memo in an attempt to discredit investigations into the rich asshole backfired badly, the release of the Comey memos may be turn out even worse for them.
Republicans are arguably actively trying to interfere and damage ongoing investigations into the rich asshole, and apparently thought that “leaking” the memos former FBI Director James Comey wrote about his meetings with the rich asshole last year would trip Comey up.
Instead, it’s doing just the opposite.
The memos not only confirm many of the claims Comey has made publicly as he promotes his book “Higher Loyalty: A Higher Loyalty: Truth, Lies, and Leadership.” They also paint a highly damning portrait of the rich asshole.
Thanks to the Comey memos, the rich asshole now seems to be caught in an obvious lie regarding his infamous trip to Moscow in 2013 in connection with the Miss Universe pageant, which he owned.
It was there, according to the rich asshole dossier, written by a former British intelligence operative, that the rich asshole spent a night at the Ritz-Carlton hotel with Russian prostitutes and paid them to “perform a ‘golden showers’ (urination) show in front of him.”
That lurid episode was part of the dossier’s larger conclusion that the rich asshole has made himself susceptible to Russian blackmail.
While key parts of the dossier have checked out, the rich asshole has denied the “golden showers” claim. According to the memos, the rich asshole stressed to Comey that he hadn’t even stayed overnight at a Moscow hotel during his Miss Universe trip in 2013.
It makes very little sense for the rich asshole to travel halfway around the world to Russian, then leave Moscow immediate, without even spending the night, to fly back to New York.
And that may be why the rich asshole’s longtime head of security, Kurt Schiller, reportedly told investigators a different story about the Moscow trip.
Testifying behind closed doors before the House Intelligence Committee, Schiller denied the rich asshole spent the night with Russian prostitutes. But Schiller did confirm the rich asshole spent the night at the Ritz-Carlton:
Schiller testified that he stood outside the rich asshole’s hotel room for a time and then went to bed. One source noted that Schiller testified he eventually left the rich asshole’s hotel room door and could not say for sure what happened during the remainder of the night.
Someone’s lying about the crucial Moscow trip, either the rich asshole or his longtime confidant, Schiller.
Meanwhile, journalists remain puzzled why Republicans demanded access to Comey’s memos, and then promptly leaked them to the press.
As CNN reported, “The documents written by the then-FBI director, detailing his interactions with the rich asshole, present a contemporaneous and deeply unflattering view of a President throwing his weight around in his first days in the White House — that at the very least seems highly inappropriate.”
This is a gang that can’t shoot straight.
North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Un says he’s finished nuclear tests and will cease missile launches ahead of the rich asshole talks
A news screen in Tokyo flashes a report of President some rich asshole's agreement to meet with North Korean leader Kim Jong. (AFP/File / Toshifumi KITAMURA)
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North Korean leader took a major U-turn and said that he will stop conducting missile testing. Kim Jong-Un told his country that he has finished his testing and the nuclear tests will stop ahead of the meeting with President some rich asshole.
“From April 21, North Korea will stop nuclear tests and launches of intercontinental ballistic missiles,” KCNA said, according to South Korean news agency Yonhap News.
“The North will shut down a nuclear test site in the country’s northern side to prove the vow to suspend nuclear test,” Yonhap continued.
Critics warn against celebrating too soon and expecting a peace agreement around the corner.
“They have reached a point in their development cycle/testing sequence that this is probably technologically true,” according to MIT associate professor Vipin Narang. “In fact they told us in November already that they had reached completion of their nuclear deterrent.”
They have reached a point in their development cycle/testing sequence that this is probably technologically true. In fact they told us in November already that they had reached completion of their nuclear deterrent. twitter.com/jljzen/status/…
The story is developing.
McCabe to sue the rich asshole admin for defamation, wrongful termination
BY JACQUELINE THOMSEN - 04/20/18 12:24 PM EDT
Former Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe is planning to sue the rich asshole administration for defamation and wrongful termination, according to multiple media reports Friday.
McCabe’s lawyer Michael Bromwich told reporters that McCabe is also considering filing other civil claims.
He said the legal team hasn’t yet figured out when they’re going to file the lawsuits and is working on making them "solid."
“We’ll file when we’re ready,” Bromwich said, according to Axios.
The attorney also announced the launch of a legal defense fund for McCabe, and hopes to transfer the money raised for McCabe's legal costs through a crowdfunding campaign started after his March firing to the official fund.
Bromwich also accused opponents of McCabe, including President the rich asshole, of "continuing slander."
Attorney General Jeff Sessions fired McCabe last month after an inspector general report found he made an unauthorized disclosure to the media and was not forthcoming with federal investigators.
McCabe denied the allegations and said he was being targeted in an effort to undermine special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe into Russia's election interference.
Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz released the report last week of McCabe's conduct at the FBI, alleging that he authorized a leak to the press to "advance his personal interests" and he misled investigators about the matter. the rich asshole called the report a "disaster" for McCabe.
Horowitz issued a criminal referral to the U.S. attorney’s office in D.C. on Thursday related to McCabe’s conduct that his attorney called "unjustified."
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April 20, 2018
Another once-safe Republican seat is suddenly competitive. And Republicans should be terrified.
This week, the political world was startled by a poll showing Democratic emergency physician Hiral Tipirneni had a margin-of-error 46 to 45 lead over former Republican state Sen. Debbie Lesko, in the special election for Arizona’s 8th Congressional District.
But lest anyone dismiss it as an outlier, a second poll released Thursday evening also showed the deep red suburban Phoenix district is indeed neck and neck. And there are some serious red flags for Republicans in the results.
According to the Lake Research Partners poll, commissioned by the Tipirneni campaign, the candidates are tied 44 to 44 among likely voters — and 46 to 46 among people who have already voted early.
The poll finds voters view Tipirneni favorably by 18 points and Lesko unfavorably by 2 points. It also finds Democrats are much more motivated to vote.
Most astonishingly, the poll shows 13 percent of Republican early voters so far have defected for Tipirneni. For context, only 8 percent of Republicans in Alabama crossed over to vote for Democrat Doug Jones in the Senate race last year, and that was enough for him to win.
Two months ago, these numbers would have been unthinkable. Election forecasters initially rated this district Solid Republican, and for good reason. the rich asshole carried it by 21 points, and the Republican who previously held the seat, Trent Franks, consistently won his last 7 elections by enormous margins until he resigned last year over a sexual harassment scandal.
But as Tipirneni has amassed support and fundraising on a platform of universal health care and progressive reform, and as Lesko has stumbled in debates and bogged herself down in campaign finance scandals, Republicans fear this race could go the same way as Pennsylvania’s 18th District. And they are spending like crazy to stave it off.
Lately, Arizona is one big headache for Republicans. Another new poll shows Democratic Rep. Kyrsten Sinema walloping all three Republican candidates for Senate. Meanwhile, Republicans in the legislature are frantically trying to rewrite state law to avoid another special election if Sen. John McCain’s seat becomes vacant.
With the special election for Arizona’s 8th scheduled for next Tuesday, Republicans will scramble to save the race that should never have been a race. The question now is whether Democratic enthusiasm can pull off yet another upset.
Morning Joe panel mocks GOP over Comey memos: ‘It takes a special kind of genius’ to get ‘checkmated by the facts’
Nicolle Wallace (MSNBC)
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MSNBC’s Nicolle Wallace mocked House Republicans after their attempt to discredit FBI director James Comey quickly backfired and confirmed his salacious claims about President some rich asshole.
The president’s congressional allies pressured the Department of Justice to release contemporaneous memos written by Comey, which match up with accounts in his new book describing events from the early months of the rich asshole administration.
“Every conversation that Jim Comey testified to is proven out by the memos that the Republicans trying to prosecute Jim Comey wanted released,” said Wallace, who was filling in as guest host of “Morning Joe.” “This is really a case where the Republicans were checkmated by the facts.”
House Republicans threatened to hold deputy attorney general Rod Rosenstein in contempt if he did not authorize release of the memos, which were promptly leaked to reporters.
“It takes a certain special kind of genius on the part of the Republicans to think that having these memos and then leaking them would somehow be — would work out well for the president,” said MSNBC’s John Heilemann, “that this would somehow exonerate him, knowing what the substance of the memos were. There may be a few new details, but these memos were never going to be good for President the rich asshole, and none of them are devastating. There’s no huge material fact here that’s going to move the investigation.”
the rich asshole appeals decision blocking transfer of combatant John Doe
BY KATIE BO WILLIAMS - 04/20/18 12:11 PM EDT
The rich asshole administration on Friday appealed an order from a federal judge blocking it from transferring a U.S. citizen held in military custody to Saudi Arabia, protracting the legal fight over the fate of a man known only as John Doe.
Doe was captured by Syrian forces in mid-September as a suspected Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) fighter and transferred to U.S. military custody in Iraq, where he has remained since.
There is no exact legal precedent for his case and the rich asshole administration has struggled with how to handle him. It reportedly lacks sufficient evidence to charge him in federal court, as it has done with other U.S. citizens captured working for ISIS — but for security reasons, it is loath to simply release him.
The government recently struck a deal with a third country — confirmed to The Hill by a U.S. official to be Saudi Arabia, where Doe also holds citizenship — to take Doe off of the U.S.’s hands.
But the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), which is representing Doe, argues that forcibly transferring him to foreign custody would trample on his rights as an American citizen.
On Thursday night, a federal judge agreed to block the transfer.
The government is also appealing a previous order from the same judge, U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan, requiring the government to provide the detainee with 72 hours notice if it intended to transfer him.
The appeals court has heard oral arguments in that case but has not issued a ruling. Because the two appeals address largely the same legal questions, analysts expect that they will now be consolidated.
The administration provided noticed of Doe's transfer on Monday night, with Chutkan issuing her ruling blocking the move Thursday night, just minutes before the 72-hour clock was set to run out.
Chutkan’s brief, one-page order did not provide a rationale, but states that the court will provide a redacted version of her opinion after consultation with the two parties.
Doe is challenging his status as an enemy combatant, arguing that the government must either charge him with a crime or release him. He has claimed to have traveled to Syria in order to report on the conflict there and said that he was kidnapped by ISIS. The U.S. government says that he joined the terror group.
Both issues — whether the government can transfer Doe and whether Doe is being lawfully held as an enemy combatant — hinge on his right to habeas corpus, which requires the government to provide a legal basis for detention.
The government argued Thursday that transferring Doe to another country constitutes relief under habeas, because he will be released from U.S. custody. It claims that it has the authority to transfer Doe, as a battlefield capture, to the custody of another country with a “legitimate sovereign interest” in him — in other words, to a regional partner in the fight against ISIS.
Saudi Arabia, which was not named in court, “would initially take him into custody and then it would be completely up to them” what to do with him, Justice Department lawyer James Burnham said in court Thursday. “Custody could be one day or 10 years and that’s completely up to them.”
The ACLU has argued that the government must show a positive legal authority — like a treaty or statute — to transfer Doe. An agreement with a partner with a “legitimate interest” in Doe is not sufficient, the lead attorney on the case said in court Thursday.
“When it comes to a citizen, it’s not, ‘let’s make a deal,’” Jonathan Hafetz, a senior staff attorney at ACLU, said.
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