Trump Part 16

[vuk]

There is no shortage of things to campaign on against Trump and in the meantime just let all the Special Counsel stuff play out in congress committees.

funny how that has basically been my position for the past 2 years.

I also suspect the Dem candidates will start impeachment talk in reverse order of their chances of winning the nomination as it's sort of the last role of the dice to excite the base (even if it means losing in OH, PA, etc.). And that one of the biggest dangers is the Dems destroy themselves with another awful nomination process.

i don't think the nomination process can possibly be worse than the last time out. it's also great to see such a big field, at the very least from a the perspective of political entertainment, but more importantly the massive influence of progressives, which is forcing just about all of them to adopt (at least in public) very populist positions, which play very well with all of america. just look at what bernie did at fox news town hall.

My other concern would be how much damage Trump might do in his remaining time. Most specifically, given that the wider issues involve not just Russia but Saudi Arabia and Israel who collectively would like little more than conflict with Iran.

just to be clear, given the ambiguous wording, the war-with-iran "collective" you're talking about is USA + israel + saudi arabia here, not russia.

 

[matthewr]

that is a terrible misrepresentation. i am not comparing the media hype to trump's behaviour. those are 2 distinct things (not divorced from one another, obviously, but easy to distinguish for purposes of discourse). i never said that one was the real problem. they are 2 real problems. the criticisms being leveled by me and greenwald and hedges are about the media reporting and it was horrible. there isn't any controversy about trump being horrible.

Then it appears we agree -- there is lots of evidence that Trump colluded with Russia to influence the US election and in doing so committed a number of crimes and is self-evidently compromised and vulnerable to blackmail by foreign governments.

Although this never seems to me to be what Greenwald is arguing and I am still not remotely convinced that given this context I should be that bothered about problems with Chuck Todd's reporting.

 

[Marky-Mark]

My knowledge of Russia is superficial at best. But I do know that they're a petro-state. And with the arctic ice melt they're going gangbusters with exploration and likely expect significant production to come of it. Not to piggyback onto the climate protest thread, but between their goals and our sanctions, I'd follow that money before I would a pee-pee tape.

 

[matthewr]

funny how that has basically been my position for the past 2 years.

But has it changed given how much more we know now most of the stuff we thought was true has been confirmed by Mueller? The moral, criminal and political case for impeachment grows all the time and will likely quickly prove irresistible.

just to be clear, given the ambiguous wording, the war-with-iran "collective" you're talking about is USA + israel + saudi arabia here, not russia.

Sort of. The suggestion is that Saudi, UAE, Israel want Iran out of Syria and generally Iran's power restrained but they can only do this with help from Putin. So the idea is that Trump delivers sanctions relief in return for Putin's help with Iran and Syria.

I am not so far completely convinced by this not least as Trump seems to have mostly failed at sanctions relief and Putin has leverage over him anyway. But my point is that, from a US and NATO point of view at least, Trump is a problem and almost anybody else would be better.

 

[matthewr]

Your quoted paragraph concerns me greatly when combined with the observation, often made, that Trump should be or will be doomed when he leaves office and looses the Presidential powers and immunities. The obvious imperative for him becomes 'President for Life.' So if we lose a chance to force him out we may not get another.

I think even Mitch McConnell will abandon ship if it gets to that point.

 

[vuk]

Then it appears we agree -- there is lots of evidence that Trump colluded with Russia to influence the US election and in doing so committed a number of crimes and is self-evidently compromised and vulnerable to blackmail by foreign governments.

i wouldn't phrase it exactly that way or be as emphatic about certain aspects. trump is clearly always open to any kind of collaboration/collusion with anyone who is going to let him achieve something, be it financial or political -- here i mean political in the narrowest, most selfish and superficial sense. he was very open to collusion with russians. the degree to which they are connected to the government or the amount of blackmail they hold over him are not clear at all -- which leads to...

Although this never seems to me to be what Greenwald is arguing and I am still not remotely convinced that given this context I should be that bothered about problems with Chuck Todd's reporting.

come on -- we're obviously not singling out chuck todd. as bad as tump is, the effects and precise nature of his relationship with russia was unequivocally characterized in a way that convinced just about everyone that there would be collusion indictments in the mueller report. rachel maddow, as the most prominent example (and you used to link to her), presented the extreme view that "our president" was being controlled by the kremlin and many variations on that. so, even though we have lots of evidence of stuff, we have no evidence of anything that dramatic. i suppose you could say that the exaggerations of a news personality are not a serious issue by comparison, but is that true?

clearly, someone like you wouldn't buy into it, but what about regular people? is it really OK to have this sort of tabloid reporting standard wall-to-wall? it's not just about people being misinformed on the trump issue itself, but as chris hedges points out, all the military and intelligence powers have clearly seized on this to justify their own ends, which are massively served by having an enemy. there are indeed parallels with the iraq WMD fiasco.

 

[vuk]

But has it changed given how much more we know now most of the stuff we thought was true has been confirmed by Mueller? The moral, criminal and political case for impeachment grows all the time and will likely quickly prove irresistible.

just to be clear, all democratic party political calculations aside, i firmly believe there is way more than enough to warrant impeachment and that this should not be a political thing but very basic congressional duty. watergate was a jay-walking offense by comparison. IMO, it all changed when ronald reagan and his pack of criminals got away with iran-contra -- one of those criminals now serving trump and attempting similar things in venezuela.

 

[vuk]

on a lighter note, a star is born:

 

[DonQuixote99]

I think even Mitch McConnell will abandon ship if it gets to that point.

I am not content to count on that. He strikes me as the very model of a feckless Weimar parliamentarian.

 

[Marky-Mark]

I always think of him as part turtle, part mortician.

 

[DonQuixote99]

Loves change and progress like a turtle. The mortician out to get some big paydays out of the death of the Republic.

 

[Yank]

...one of those criminals now serving trump and attempting similar things in venezuela.

It amazes me that Elliot Abrams was allowed back into government, rather than being tarred and feathered and rode out of town on a rail.

 

[matthewr]

the degree to which they are connected to the government or the amount of blackmail they hold over him are not clear at all

This level of credulity on the left is what baffles me. The people involved are all long term, well known associates of Putin and/or his criminal associates and the very idea that any of this stuff happens without his knowledge and approval is surely absurd? If we were talking about known CIA operative doing stuff in Latin America nobody on the left would think twice about connecting similar dots. I don't understand why this story is not treated like, say, Iran-Contra.

come on -- we're obviously not singling out chuck todd. as bad as tump is, the effects and precise nature of his relationship with russia was unequivocally characterized in a way that convinced just about everyone that there would be collusion indictments in the mueller report. rachel maddow, as the most prominent example (and you used to link to her), presented the extreme view that "our president" was being controlled by the kremlin and many variations on that. so, even though we have lots of evidence of stuff, we have no evidence of anything that dramatic. i suppose you could say that the exaggerations of a news personality are not a serious issue by comparison, but is that true?

clearly, someone like you wouldn't buy into it, but what about regular people? is it really OK to have this sort of tabloid reporting standard wall-to-wall? it's not just about people being misinformed on the trump issue itself, but as chris hedges points out, all the military and intelligence powers have clearly seized on this to justify their own ends, which are massively served by having an enemy. there are indeed parallels with the iraq WMD fiasco.

I don't recognise this characterisation at all, other than it sounding very much like how someone from the Whitehouse would describe it. And much of Maddow's reporting, like Seth's and the Steele dossier has been in significant part, confirmed by the Mueller report. My two objections to her are 1) she has virtually zero original reporting and is mostly just telling you what someone at the NYT or WP has found and 2) the fact it takes her 20 minutes to laboriously explain something that could be stated in under 5 mins. So in the end her show is not really worth watching.

The ultimate irony here is that the only reason the apparent contradiction in your views of these events and mine doesn't drive me insane is because through knowing you all these years I now know all about cognitive biases. And FWIW I do agree that the more excitable members on here are equally harming the cause of understanding this and bringing Trump and his associates to justice. But that doesn't stop me from thinking that on this issue you are mostly getting it wrong and that there is, confirmation effects aside, just a shitload of evidence here and in any other criminal case Trump, Prince, Kushner, etc. etc. would all have been indicted and arrested on various charges.

 

[Ciunas Audio]

I think she is right to let it play out and not go off half-cocked as it could easily go wrong and give Trump a way to win in 2020. There is no shortage of things to campaign on against Trump and in the meantime just let all the Special Counsel stuff play out in congress committees. I suspect the point at which it becomes a good idea in campaign terms to start talking about impeachment is the same point at which it becomes impossible for all but the mental wing of senate republicans to carry on protecting him.

I also suspect the Dem candidates will start impeachment talk in reverse order of their chances of winning the nomination as it's sort of the last role of the dice to excite the base (even if it means losing in OH, PA, etc.). And that one of the biggest dangers is the Dems destroy themselves with another awful nomination process.

My other concern would be how much damage Trump might do in his remaining time. Most specifically, given that the wider issues involve not just Russia but Saudi Arabia and Israel who collectively would like little more than conflict with Iran.

Indeed, I agree - there's a lot more damage to come from Trump & the GOP - they know a war in the ME will be a major distraction & I expect to see this play out as part of the grand bargain struck between Trump & the coalition of foreign powers that got him elected - it has still to evolve fully.

 

[Ciunas Audio]

matthew.

that is a terrible misrepresentation. i am not comparing the media hype to trump's behaviour. those are 2 distinct things (not divorced from one another, obviously, but easy to distinguish for purposes of discourse). i never said that one was the real problem. they are 2 real problems. the criticisms being leveled by me and greenwald and hedges are about the media reporting and it was horrible. there isn't any controversy about trump being horrible.

Hold on, I've heard Max & Greenwald saying that the whole Russian collusion thing was just a conspiracy theory & a hoax/scam - it wasn't & isn't but it's more complex & involves more than Russia than either Mueller was allowed to investigate or indeed was appreciated at the time. Calling it a scam/hoax & blaming the media for over-hyping it is ignoring the crux of the matter - Trump is compromised in so many ways by pre-election arrangements with foreign powers that it seems the correct thing to admit is "we prematurely focused on a very narrow investigation into collusion with Russia government in election manipulation when, in fact, it is far deeper & more complex than this." Just because that particular investigation didn't nail him doesn't mean that his full treasonous behaviour won't be revealed in time. It seems to me that people who say the whole thing was a hoax/scam (Greenwald) are Trump apologists

I see Maté also saying that the Trump tower deal in Moscow wasn't a secret, eh, sorry?
he also says that it was nowhere close to a deal - it was just a letter of intent - he overlooks that the financing for this deal was through a Russian bank was restricted by US sanctions & so access to this money was locked up until these sanctions on Russia were lifted. Hmm, is this a motivation for Trump lifting Russian sanctions - no, couldn't be - he wouldn't be so transactional, would he - he was just trying to be friendly with Russia (Greenwald). FFS, let's get real & look into Trumps motivations!!

my argument was not about mueller, it was about people like chuck todd saying stupid, anti-empirical nonsense. again, we are not discussing the same thing. maybe that's what i should be pointing out as the main issue.

So, are you saying that the Mueller investigation was too restricted (unduly so but understandable, given what was known generally at the time the investigation was started) & should have been far more expansive & explored more deeply into the matters at hand
Or are you saying it was all a waste of time & should be forgotten now?

 

[Ciunas Audio]

I like Hedges, don't know Maté but that interview is like a re-run of Greenwald's piece - they trot out the same misinformation (WH FULLY co-operated with Mueller's investigation, etc - really? - did they read the Mueller report or see Trumps tweets ?) about the Mueller report as if they were spokepersons for WH
And far from the whole Mueller report conclusions handing Trump a victory, they themselves are acting like the PR agents for the WH, ignoring the limited scope & basically are being instrumental in trying to do the very thing they accuse the media of - handing Trump a victory

 

[DonQuixote99]

I like Hedges, don't know Maté but that interview is like a re-run of Greenwald's piece - they trot out the same misinformation (WH FULLY co-operated with Mueller's investigation, etc - really? - did they read the Mueller report or see Trumps tweets ?) about the Mueller report as if they were spokepersons for WH
And far from the whole Mueller report conclusions handing Trump a victory, they themselves are acting like the PR agents for the WH, ignoring the limited scope & basically are being instrumental in trying to do the very thing they accuse the media of - handing Trump a victory

I smell corruption. Can't explain this stuff otherwise.

 

[Ciunas Audio]

I smell corruption. Can't explain this stuff otherwise.

I don't but when Greenwald & Maté both trot out the same disingenuous statement that the WH fully co-operated with Mueller, it does smack of a very deep rooted bias only really worthy of pro-Trump propagandists - this is the sort of stuff Guliani trots out

 

[Ciunas Audio]

I would like to hear from Mueller when & how the scope & terms of his investigation was set & by whom
I believe this will reveal some important aspects of this whole investigation

 

[DonQuixote99]

I don't but when Greenwald & Maté both trot out the same disingenuous statement that the WH fully co-operated with Mueller, it does smack of a very deep rooted bias only really worthy of pro-Trump propagandists - this is the sort of stuff Guliani trots out

The corruption may be implicit. You gain benefits from participating in a particular reality discourse, and at some level you know you'd lose them if you stopped. The benefits start with membership in the group, at the very least, but can easily be more tangible.

People are often very guided by a shared culture of what 'people like us' think. Sometimes other actors even 'read people out' of this group or that based on violations. So your motivation (always an emotion generated subconsciously) can be very influential on the conscious arguments you construct and accept.