Does this affect the FBI investigation? Presumably they don't just give up on things when someone leaves.
Does this affect the FBI investigation? Presumably they don't just give up on things when someone leaves.
Presumably he's going to appoint one of his best pals, who won't that bothered about investigating things, as head investigator.
The FBI is fucking useless as it is, can't be any worse with Clint Eastwood or Greg Norman heading it up.
Giuliani, for sure.
That would be amazing. That or Chris Christie.
Why do we need a federal police anyway? Privatise it and let Trump security run the national security.
It does start to make my theory that the Republicans are absolutely going to Mugabe the fuck out of the next election more solid. It's already happened in North Carolina and I only see it getting worse.
Trump's first scheduled event today is a meeting with the Sergey Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister.
You almost have to admire how openly corrupt the cunt is.
BUT NOW THEY PLAY SO SAD
Hard to argue. Easy D.
The worst thing about Donald J. Trump's tweets are the sadact soapbox wankers with blue ticks who do a THREAD of self-aggrandising tosh as the first replies under each one.
Yes. That is the worst thing.
American media was banned from that meeting with Lavrov, only Russian state media was allowed in the room. It's a circus.
I'm nyet a crook.
It's truly insane that they thought this would do anything other than ridiculously fan the flames. Who's advice is he listening to?
Everyone at the White House is apparently furious with the photographs from the Lavrov meeting. One of Trump's staff is quoted as saying 'They tricked us. They lie.'
Trump also claimed yesterday that insurance for a healthy 20 year old is $15 a month, if it's anything like any health insurance I have it's closer to $250...
You're not healthy, twenty, or American, Phonics.
I've been paying health insurance since I was 21.
edit: Oh look a basic google shows I got it bang on.
https://www.valuepenguin.com/average...alth-insurance
His seemingly use of quotation marks makes me seethe harder than any of the blue ticks replying to him.
Taping conversations in the White House, that always ends well.
Not at all a Presidential sounding thing. But what exactly does it mean?
Is he implying that he may have access to tapes which could damage Comey, and threatening him with this?
It reads like a threat to release private conversations (recorded or otherwise) but who fucking knows with this clown.
I thought that since Watergate - everything in the Whitehouse is recorded (including the Oval Office)?
Phone calls have all been recorded since long before Watergate, there's a corking one with Lyndon Johnson complaining to his tailor that his knife keeps falling out his pocket when he sits down and asking for more room 'from my nuts all the way around to my bunghole'. I don't know about all audio in the building though.
I'm enjoying this so much.
Now Trump is crowing over a trade agreement with China which was actually negotiated by Obama, while his lawyer has announced that his tax returns from the last ten years show no income of any kind from any Russian sources in Russia, no sir, 'with a few exceptions'.
His Presidency seems to be running much like the campaign, in that he's just up to so much shit that none of it can be fully explored or reported on because by the time the articles on him pissing in a birdbath are half written he's off to punch a child to the ground.
This, like almost the entirety of the US healthcare debate both domestically and internationally, is just wrong. The US healthcare care setup is entirely based on a few historical quirks. Everything else is a myth.
During the world war period the US healthcare system developed differently from the rest of the world for two simple reasons. One, the War Powers Acts added wage controls and the extra labor supply of the post slave labor force created a unique set of circumstances. We had both wage controls and a more robust labor market. Medium to large sized companies got around this and kept talent by offering benefits. This was exacerbated in the post war periods when wage controls were not lifted.
So while everyone else built new systems, we did not because companies did not want to anger their labor forces. This is the backbone of why our system is so dysfunctional. The vast majority of Americans are subsidized either by the government through Medicare / Medicaid or by their employers. Also, the largest payers in the system are extremely price resistant (employer Benefits departments) are judged on employee satisfaction and not prices.
It is not the least bit sexy, but just dumb circumstances explain 90% of everything.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world...=.f62c87f4c103
President Trump revealed highly classified information to the Russian foreign minister and ambassador in a White House meeting last week, according to current and former U.S. officials, who said that Trump’s disclosures jeopardized a critical source of intelligence on the Islamic State.
The information Trump relayed had been provided by a U.S. partner through an intelligence-sharing arrangement considered so sensitive that details have been withheld from allies and tightly restricted even within the U.S. government, officials said.
The partner had not given the United States permission to share the material with Russia, and officials said that Trump’s decision to do so risks cooperation from an ally that has access to the inner workings of the Islamic State. After Trump’s meeting, senior White House officials took steps to contain the damage, placing calls to the CIA and National Security Agency.
“This is code-word information,” said a U.S. official familiar with the matter, using terminology that refers to one of the highest classification levels used by American spy agencies. Trump “revealed more information to the Russian ambassador than we have shared with our own allies.”
UK or the jews?
Just enjoy it while it lasts, because it will forever discredit the doctrine of American exceptionalism.
If it was that critical and sensitive how do all of these 'current and former officials' know about it, and why have they blabbed to the papers instead of keeping it in-house?
It would be interesting to listen to Trump telling all this classified information. I bet the Russians are even more confused now.
Something that secretive would more than likely have either a very short distance between the initial reports (from where/whoever they come from) and the top, top people, or it would be set up in such a way that nobody really knows what happens to their reports. The top, top people aren't going to go lolling about Mr. President to the newspapers (if only because they would be easily identified), and how would the people lower down the chain have any idea what was said in these meetings?
Twitter is packed these days with nobodies who worked as a contractor with the lowest possible clearance at Langley for ten minutes tweeting about their 'sources' confirming every possible Trump is an idiot/Russian agent allegation made by similarly motivated nobodies. It all just happens to fit certain NARRATIVES, so nobody really bothers to think about it. Plus there is also the fact that you can't prove it never happened, and that if anyone asks Sean Spicer about it he will shit himself, so no smoke without fire mate.
I wonder if it has anything to do with the aliens.
It is likely not very critical information and it is certainly not illegal for the President but everyone in the Trump admin leaks. Jared is known to leak to Sinclair, Preibus to Costa, Bannon to Lake, Cernovich, and Breitbart. McMaster and Mattis leak to contradict bad policy. Treating Trumpworld like a typical admin is wrong because they are unprofessional and sloppy. Trump does not use briefing books and wings meetings with foreign leaders. WaPo and the Times have been engaged in a ridiculous game of source counting; WaPo cited thirty sources in one article over the weekend.
Did he give away anything vital? Almost certainly not, but McMaster's statement does not deny classified information was given. He specifically says sources and methods were not revealed.
I get that people on here like to be contrarian, but it's surely pretty clear to everyone by now that Trump's just incompetent, and miles out of his depth, right?
Like, you can complain about the liberals on twitter or whatever all you want, but at this point you'd have to have a blindfold on not to see that they're basically right about his ability, temperament, and competence.
I like to think the is elaborate performance art by Republicans to illustrate the danger of allocating power to the executive branch.
Nothing that he has said or done is remotely out of keeping with what people knew they were voting for. He's empowered to sack the director of the FBI in a fit of childishness if he so wishes, for example. He can disclose classified information if he so wishes.
I think it's more of a commentary on the state of the American presidential system than anything else. If you don't really care about the politics of it, and aren't determinedly ideological, you can pretty much do what you want in the position.
Another win for the Westminster system.
If your President can set off a 'constitutional crisis' by doing things he's empowered to do, you've probably given too much power to the executive branch.
I don't disagree - that's your issue isn't it.
It's still real bad shit even if 'it's legal' (always the worst defense you can make) tbh. The reason the FBI Director has a 10 year turnaround is exactly so they can avoid the politics of the job.
Obstruction of justice is not legal, and that may well have been the case where Comey was concerned.
There's nothing there to obstruct though. He's not done it because he feels bad for Manafort and Roger Stone. He does it because he's an incredibly insecure (and even dumber) human being to the point that anyone who doesn't pledge loyalty to The Donald has to die.
The reason he's leaked this 'secret info' isn't because he's desperate for the Russians to take over the U.S.. He's just so insecure he feels the need to impress a second rate diplomat.
"I've got great intel, the best intel Yuri. You gotta believe me, this intel is just wonderful."
That or it's an elaborate ploy where he never wanted to win in the first place and he hates it so much he's actively trying to be impeached.
It appears that he may have done it to obstruct an investigation into his supposed Russian links.
Which again, I think amounts to fuck all, but it still counts.
He openly admitted that when he was thinking of binning Comey he considered the Russia investigation, calling it 'fake news'.
John Oliver laughingly raised a possibility that fits quite nicely with the idea that he's just an insecure child. Comey is six foot eight, and made Trump look and feel tiny by comparison so he had to go.