US Politics: Opening Pandora's Box

[SerHaHa]

Quote

Problem number one there is that hacking of information by a third party isn't whistleblowing. Whistleblowing is when you, or I, in the normal course of our duties, become aware of information indicating wrongdoing in an organisation of which we are part (usually by being an employee): and, having no other means or having exhausted other means of trying to get the organisation to do something about it, we then make a public disclosure of the facts.

Using illegal methods to proactively look for compromising information about an organisation of which we are not a part, for the express purpose of damaging that organisation, doesn't meet any element of that definition. Not one. So these are not the same thing.

Far from being 'perfect' this is as imperfect a comparison as can be imagined.

Has Wikileaks not long maintained that it received the vast majority of its information from sources inside the DNC?  Is that not "whistle-blowing" by your own definition?  How is that ANY different than "leaks" within the intelligence community from those who dislike Trump there?

[Kalbear]

Just now, SerHaHa said:

Has Wikileaks not long maintained that it received the vast majority of its information from sources inside the DNC?  Is that not "whistle-blowing" by your own definition?  How is that ANY different than "leaks" within the intelligence community from those who dislike Trump there?

Wikileaks lied. They didn't receive the vast majority of their information from the inside. 

It would be the same if they had, but they didn't. 

[Fragile Bird]

Kal, yes I think that's the one they've been quoting.  

Sean Spicer has just said that the first thing Trump did when they heard about Flynn's call was have it reviewed by WH counsel and it was determined there was no legal issue with the conversation. The issue with Flynn was one of trust.

So, screw the Logan Act and the concept of there's only one president at a time.

[Manhole Eunuchsbane]

 

/Everybody Dance Now!

[Mexal]

10 minutes ago, Fragile Bird said:

Kal, yes I think that's the one they've been quoting.  

Sean Spicer has just said that the first thing Trump did when they heard about Flynn's call was have it reviewed by WH counsel and it was determined there was no legal issue with the conversation. The issue with Flynn was one of trust.

So, screw the Logan Act and the concept of there's only one president at a time.

They basically threw Flynn under the bus. He did nothing wrong talking to Russian Ambassador, shouldn't have lied to Pence, President has been monitoring the situation daily (even though he claimed not to know anything about it on Friday) but there were "other instances" that deteriorated the trust for Trump so he asked for resignation, even though Conway has been going around saying he volunteered to resign. It's damage control spin.

The worst part of all this is that Trump knew for a month that Flynn was potentially compromised by the Russians and lying about it and still allowed him access to intelligence. That's just pure incompetence even if it wasn't malicious.

[Mlle. Zabzie]

31 minutes ago, Fragile Bird said:

When people introduce Hitler into a conversation, we call that an example of Godwin's Law.

What do we call it when observers call a political situation a Game of Thrones situation? Martin's Law?

CNN says that the reason Kellyanne Conway could come out and say Flynn had the full confidence of Trump only have Spicer come out an hour later and say something different is because staff are not speaking to each other, that they are all busy  stabbing each other in the back, a GoT situation among the staff.

Flynn tweeted last night he was a scapegoat. For who? Did Trump tell him to discuss sanctions with the Russians? Did Bannon?

Oh, breaking news: the Russians have just launched a kind of cruise missile made illegal under their arms treaty with the US.

That's ok, Trump told Putin that the treaty was a "bad deal."

[Zorral]

House Oversight Committee won't investigate what Flynn did and said, citing exec privilege. Feh.

Where's lock him up lock him up lock him up for criminal acts?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/jason-chaffetz-michael-flynn_us_58a31aa2e4b03df370da45b9?

 

[Fragile Bird]

Now Spicer says when the Sally Yates came in to warn the WH about Flynn, all she said was "here's a heads up, there may be something about Flynn that might be a problem".

[Mexal]

Just now, Fragile Bird said:

Now Spicer says when the Sally Yates came in to warn the WH about Flynn, all she said was "here's a heads up, there may be something about Flynn that might be a problem".

They're spinning. You don't think the first question would be "why do you think Flynn might be a problem?"

Spicer also said that they've known for 17 days and were investigating the legalities daily while at the same time saying the WH Counsel determined it was legal "immediately." He's all over the map and it doesn't make sense.

[mormont]

28 minutes ago, SerHaHa said:

Has Wikileaks not long maintained that it received the vast majority of its information from sources inside the DNC?  Is that not "whistle-blowing" by your own definition?  How is that ANY different than "leaks" within the intelligence community from those who dislike Trump there?

Son, you tried a little troll-by, you showed you don't understand what whistleblowing even is, now drop it and move on.

[Tywin et al.]

@Trebla,

That article was amazing. They're not even trying to hide the back stabbing. 

Open question: Has any high ranking White House official been canned faster than Flynn? 25 days seems pretty fast.

[Manhole Eunuchsbane]

1 minute ago, Tywin et al. said:

@Trebla,

That article was amazing. They're not even trying to hide the back stabbing. 

Open question: Has any high ranking White House official been canned faster than Flynn? 25 days seems pretty fast.

Pretty sure it's a record. I think I read the next fastest was a Defense Secretary under Reagan who lasted just under a year. Like 325 days or something.

[Fragile Bird]

Trump had to get even for that handshake.

https://www.thestar.com/news/world/2017/02/14/trumps-press-secretary-just-called-justin-trudeau-prime-minister-joe-trudeau-of-canada.html

[JGP]

@Relic I've read a few different articles on it. One or two cited a launch (and one of those just in the title, not the text) the others just talked about deployment. Still, being a developing story it might be a bit before the actual facts bear out.

Either way though...

[Kalbear]

So this is weird. I was seeing if I could do some basic sleuthing on who RoguePOTUSStaff is, and they didn't do anything stupid like what Spicer did - their WHOIS is registered to a different domain, for instance.

But on their verification page the source has this weird little comment:

<!--

Juan Valdez, 19th & F NW, 1045

-->

Doing a quick search on this, it looks like this points to a cafe in DC on the corner of 19th and F street. I'm guessing the 1045 would be a meeting time. 

So, for anyone in the DC area, you should check out the time and see if you can stop by whatever they list next time. 

ETA: also note that their source template came from this github repository, which is registered to someone in San Francisco. Doesn't really mean much, but perhaps the history and pull requests could shine some light on it.

[Mexal]

Looks like Chaffetz is looking to Mar-a-Lago security. Dem's requested this a few weeks ago but never heard back so now it's Chaffetz's turn. Still nothing from them about Flynn and Russia but at least he's poking into some other issues that matter.

 

[White Walker Texas Ranger]

I'd be fascinated to read biography of Mike Flynn.

How do you become a Lieutenant General if you're deranged? Well, he probably got crazy relatively late in his career, and it didn't become a problem until he was fired? Or maybe he was always a bit crazy, but smart and competent enough that it didn't matter until he was a general? Was the craziness a slow onset thing, or a sudden thing, and if the latter when? Maybe he became crazy after making general, but had enough career momentum to carry him to three stars?

[Fragile Bird]

30 minutes ago, White Walker Texas Ranger said:

I'd be fascinated to read biography of Mike Flynn.

How do you become a Lieutenant General if you're deranged? Well, he probably got crazy relatively late in his career, and it didn't become a problem until he was fired? Or maybe he was always a bit crazy, but smart and competent enough that it didn't matter until he was a general? Was the craziness a slow onset thing, or a sudden thing, and if the latter when? Maybe he became crazy after making general, but had enough career momentum to carry him to three stars?

I read that he was always an aggressive s.o.b., but very smart, but Iraq apparently sent him over the edge. 

 

ETA:  Sean Spicer: "trump has been very tough on Russia, in contrast to the previous administration that allowed Russia to seize Crimea".

[Mexal]

This interview with Conway this morning is worth watching for multiple reasons. 

1. She looks miserable. First time I've really seen her look like she hates life.

2. She confirms that Flynn was in daily intel briefings up until yesterday which goes to show that Trump wasn't going to do shit until it became public. If you were really concerned, you wouldn't have a potentially compromised adviser in meetings about the highest levels of national security.

3. She says it was Flynn's idea to resign while Spicer said it was Trump's.

 

[Tywin et al.]

1 hour ago, Mexal said:

2. She confirms that Flynn was in daily intel briefings up until yesterday which goes to show that Trump wasn't going to do shit until it became public. If you were really concerned, you wouldn't have a potentially compromised adviser in meetings about the highest levels of national security.

I just don't understand, aside from hyper-partisanship, how the GoP could be in full freak-out mode over Clinton's emails while not seeming to care too much that Trump was knowingly providing classified information to an individual that was widely viewed as compromised by the intelligence community.