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Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM
he also just admitted that Trump fired Comey because he wouldn't tell him if he was a target in the FBI's investigation.
This is a good article.
Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.This is worth a read:
Mueller’s Queries Point to What Trouble Trump Is In
Last night, we learned that the specific questions were actually created by a Trump lawyer, Jay Sekulow, his interpretation of 16 specific subjects presented by Mr. Mueller’s team. Mr. Sekulow broke down the subjects and subtopics into the separate questions. This explains why Mr. Trump’s team had these questions — it would be highly unusual for a prosecutor to give a witness questions in advance, but it is fairly common for a prosecutor to preview potential topics for a defense attorney before an interview. For that reason, I think it’s fair to assume that Mr. Sekulow’s questions track what Mr. Mueller’s team wants to cover in an interview.
Mr. Trump’s team plans to use the questions to attack the special counsel as “overreaching” and going “beyond his mandate,” but the questions themselves suggest that Mr. Mueller has carefully stayed within his bounds. They contain nothing about obscure business deals or real estate transactions; the questions focus on coordination with Russia, obstruction of justice and topics that have been covered at length in the news media. None of the topics should have come as a surprise to Mr. Trump’s team, aside from an explosive question about efforts by the former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort to seek aid from the Kremlin, which is squarely about coordination with Russia.
What should concern Mr. Trump’s team is how the questions zero in on Mr. Trump’s criminal liability. They leave little doubt that Mr. Trump is in serious jeopardy, particularly regarding obstruction of justice. I concluded months ago that Mr. Mueller would likely determine that the president obstructed justice, but the questions show that Mr. Mueller has already thought about how he would prove his case. The queries ask about Mr. Trump’s state of mind when he fired James Comey, when he erupted in anger at Attorney General Jeff Sessions for recusing himself and when he considered firing the special counsel. The questions are intended to prove the case against Mr. Trump through his own words.
But it would be a mistake to count the number of questions focused on obstruction and conclude that Mr. Mueller’s investigation of the president focuses primarily on that topic. The inquiries on topics other than obstruction are broad. For example, the question “What discussions did you have during the campaign regarding any meeting with Mr. Putin?” encompasses a lot of ground. You could ask a similar broad question regarding the Comey firing — ”What discussions did you have about or with James Comey?” — and cover much of the ground covered in the 18 questions related to him.
The fact that the questions on topics other than obstruction are so broad does not necessarily suggest that Mr. Mueller has less evidence regarding those topics. A more likely possibility is that Mr. Mueller is not willing to tip his hand on those topics because the evidence he has regarding them hasn’t been extensively covered in the press.
The president’s team could have gathered evidence of obstruction themselves, as I did, because Mr. Trump’s tweets and private conversations about Mr. Comey are well known. But it would be much harder for his team to know exactly what evidence Mr. Mueller has regarding the Trump Tower meeting, and Mr. Mueller wouldn’t want to disclose what he knows before the interview.
Again, it’s worth remembering that Mr. Trump’s team, not Mr. Mueller, reportedly devised these questions. Mr. Mueller may have merely responded to specific inquiries from the Trump team, and they might have asked about fewer specific events related to other topics.
If Mr. Trump does not agree to an interview, Mr. Mueller is reportedly considering subpoenaing him to testify before a grand jury. The president’s lawyers are considering whether to challenge Mr. Mueller’s authority to subpoena Mr. Trump for an investigation of potential crimes he committed while in office. No president has ever challenged a prosecutor’s right to subpoena him to testify in court. Although Bill Clinton received a grand jury subpoena for his testimony, it was withdrawn after he agreed to an interview.
Mr. Trump’s claim would be novel, but the Supreme Court denied Richard Nixon’s challenge to a subpoena for documents and tapes as well as Mr. Clinton’s request to postpone a civil lawsuit during his presidency. The Supreme Court would likely rule against Mr. Trump, but he could use the challenge to delay Mr. Mueller’s investigation and his own testimony, which explains why Mr. Mueller is trying to negotiate a voluntary interview.
What is hardest to know is why Mr. Mueller is seeking an interview of Mr. Trump at what appears to be an early stage of the investigation. Typically prosecutors wait until the end of an investigation to interview their most important witness, because they uncover additional evidence as the investigation progresses. So does this mean that Mr. Mueller’s investigation is wrapping up soon? Or does it mean that he is considering splitting his investigation into “phases,” with a report at the end of each phase? I’m skeptical that he’ll do that: What if he uncovers new evidence in Phase 2 that changes his view of something he investigated in Phase 1?
The simplest explanation for the early interview is that Mr. Mueller thinks his chances of getting the president to agree to an interview will decrease over time. Mr. Trump could at some point decide to take the Fifth to avoid testimony, despite any political downside.
The potential questions we saw this week explain why Mr. Trump is so concerned about his criminal liability. He faces difficult questions — not just about obstruction but also about a host of topics related to coordination with Russia — and his lawyers appear convinced that he cannot answer them without putting himself in further jeopardy.
edited 2nd May '18 10:42:41 PM by megaeliz
Personal experiance from dealing with military people, is to them they only care about the military budget itself, they think the democrats are anti-military because they are the only ones that try to reduce military spending.
It doesn't mater that the GOP is slashing VA budgets, and not giving two shits about veterans, there not at that stage of there life yet, so what they see is that the equipment they are using is old enough to be there grandparents, that the planes are literally falling out of the sky with age, and there suposed to trust there life to this stuff, then the democrats want to cut the funding MORE.
Nevermind that most of that is due to extreme mismanagement of funds, it doesn't mater, people don't normally think that far.
edited 2nd May '18 11:58:15 PM by Imca
Amongst the enlisted, yes.
Officers lean liberal.
Also the various branches lean various ways, in descending order from most liberal to most conservative. Airforce > Navy > Army >>> Marines, with the Airforce actualy being slightly liberal, but the Marines being pretty hardline conservative, even bucking the trend of liberal officers.
For actual numbers its something like 60/40 on the Airforce side, and then 20/80 for the Marines.
Its honestly an interesting demographic, in how varied it is along such specific lines.
edited 3rd May '18 12:25:21 AM by Imca
Service jobs lean conservative, because they appeal to traditional conservative values.
Honor, Loyalty, Duty, they serve the group that employs them, and keep order, which is things that are valued highly.....
At least amongst traditional conservatism, what has been popping up lately is more Regressionisim, and has been referred too as Regressive instead for a reason.
This is all paired with the fact that the military draws most of its enlisted from rural areas where there does not exist better or more stable career paths, and rural areas themselfs tend to be conservative.
The officer/enlisted devide I am fairly sure comes from the fact that Officers are required to be educated and have a collage degree.... but I can't make that claim with 100% confidence.
edited 3rd May '18 12:34:18 AM by Imca
Maybe that Asian supremacist should go to Asia, I'd be pretty scared of Asian supremacists there. Then again, they might not take her seriously depending on what nationality of Asian she is, and they definitely won't take her seriously as a woman (but that just goes without saying with racial supremacy groups).
As mentioned before by someone else, the big reason why the enlisted tend to skew conservative (or Republican as the original study went) is because they're simply not old enough to feel personally invested in a lot of the non-budget things that the Republicans are more than happy to cut. When its time for them to get discharged or retired, the result is the opposite of the civilian phenomenon in which many young Democrats become Republicans as they age due to a combination of cynicism and discovering how good it feels to be the privileged class they railed against in their younger days.
Although this is from the Obama era, here's a good Quora post
detailing the mentality justifying military support for Republicans:
1. The Democrats underfund the military and are seen as naïve and soft-headed when it comes to world politics. The present military has 33% fewer infantry units, 53% fewer Navy ships and over 60% fewer combat ready planes than when Obama first took office; and we are approaching a very dangerous period in history with Radical Islam committed to engaging in terrorism and destroying the West, a China flexing its military muscles, a nationalist Russia flexing its military muscles. It is during the current Democrat Administration that the Russians taunt the American military by close fly-by operations near Navy vessels.
2. The perception of many, perhaps most military people is that Democrats do not like and do not care about the military and thus, among other things, do not give the military the due respect deserved. Occasional words are not enough. The feeling is that Democrats will give anti-Vietnam and anti-Iraq and Afghan War speeches at a drop of a hat without really understanding or caring to understand what is involved and the sacrifices in blood that the military has given. GW Bush, for all the calumnies he suffered, is respected because he went to military hospitals and has hosted wounded warrior events, went to the guys on the front line to serve Thanksgiving dinner and did a lot of little things that showed respect and affection. In contrast, the Democrats have been intent on pushing through social experimentation having nothing to do with fighting capability at a time that the military can least deal with it. And did you ever see Obama visit a military hospital? Nooo.
3. Many in the military do have religious belief, although they don’t wear it on their sleeve. The current Democrat Administration is hostile to religion. Mikey Weinstein’s anti-Christian rants in the military are music to many Democrats’ ears, but it grates upon those in the military.
4. For historical reasons, Democrats are not trusted to make good judgments affecting the military and will desert the military after sacrifices in blood are made. In Vietnam, the Tet Offensive was in the end actually a military victory for the U.S. and South Vietnam, particularly in I Corps where the Marines beat up the NVA in Hue. But Democrats attacked our Vietnam involvement for which Democrat JFK (“pay any price, bear any burden for the cause of liberty”) and Democrat LBJ were responsible, and Democrats insisted upon ending even any support of South Vietnam, which while not perfect was a democratic nation in contrast to Stalinist North Vietnam. In Iraq, after the surge, the U.S. military and its Iraqi ally again won; but again, the Democrats, after having voted for the Iraq War, turned against it; and the end result was the complete mishandling of the situation by the Obama Administration so that ISIS, the successors to al Qaeda in Iraq, have taken territory that American blood was shed for.
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Obama puts Marines on umbrella duty, irking conservatives
Yeah...
We're just going back to the "good ol' days" of stuff like Watergate and Iran-Contra. I guess this is what Trump meant when he said MAGA.
edited 3rd May '18 1:10:58 AM by M84
Disgusted, but not surprisedSo what did Rudy Giuliani admit on Hannity yesterday.
- Campaign Finance violations by Trump of $130,000.
- Criminal violations of felony money laundering and structuring.
- Obstruction of Justice, reconfirming Trump’s intent was to fire @Comey to influence the 2016 Election Fraud.
- Told @jaredkushner that he is “disposable”, appearing to indicate crimes could be pinned on him to avoid @Ivanka Trump being criminally prosecuted.
- Compared the @FBI Agents of the SDNY to Nazi Stormtroopers.
- Called Rod Rosenstein, “disgraceful” for stating the Department of Justice would not be extorted by threats.
It is hard to imagine an attorney doing more damage to his client than Giuliani did tonight, in what was supposed to be a softball interview with Hannity.
edited 3rd May '18 5:37:39 AM by megaeliz
Trump to Giuliani: Stop Helping Me!
Or at least that's what a sane person would say. It would seem bizarre to me that people offering their assistance with Trump's legal matters would be so completely clueless about how actual legal proceedings work, but it's hardly more bizarre than anything else that's happened recently.
The only thing I can think of that revealing Trump's reimbursement of Cohen would help with is killing the potential charge of campaign finance violations against him, but it adds so many more possible charges...
edited 3rd May '18 5:41:54 AM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
