US Politics. Trump Crossing the Dnieper. Alea Iacta Est.

[Impmk2]

15 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

The interesting thing about the Australian angle is: 1- Aussie went to the USA, so Obama and co did not go to Aussie looking for dirt.; and 2. Aussie was (and still is) under a right-wing govt, and the PM at the time, Malcolm Turnbull is very unlikely to have been favourable to a Hillary Clinton presidency. He probably would have preferred any Republican over Trump, but he'd take Trump over Clinton any day. 

Not sure about that. Turnbull was initially rolled when he was in opposition for supporting Labor's carbon pricing back in 2008ish, then when he was PM for trying to get a carbon framework around power generation. He's always been pretty left wing socially, supported gay marriage, just to the right on economic issues. And he was willing to sell his soul to the right to try to stay in power.

Also the Australian right wing has been until quite recently mostly to the left of the establishment Dems (aside from the issue of immigration). Many on the right would prefer a stable US government under the Dems as a moderating force in the Asia pacific, as well as the existing trade framework (plus the TPP) in place.

ETA: Not that this discounts your first point. I find it quite unlikely that Alexander Downer, who (despite what I think of his politics) was an extremely long serving and experienced foreign minister under the previous conservative (Howard) government, would have gone on a fishing expedition for dirt on Trump on the behalf of Obama. Potential for blowback is too high. Far more likely the story we have is right, the information more or less fell into his lap and he passed it on.

[Jace, Extat]

43 minutes ago, DanteGabriel said:

I wonder if he sees any link at all between his efforts to make Sarah Palin the Republican VP nominee in 2008, and the rise of another corrupt know-nothing dingbat.

I would actually wager "yes" having seen too much of him on the idiot box, but he'll never admit it out loud. So effectively "no".

[The Anti-Targ]

5 minutes ago, Impmk2 said:

Not sure about that. Turnbull was initially rolled when he was in opposition for supporting Labor's carbon pricing back in 2008ish, then when he was PM for trying to get a carbon framework around power generation. He's always been pretty left wing socially, supported gay marriage, just to the right on economic issues. And he was willing to sell his soul to the right to try to stay in power.

Also the Australian right wing has been until quite recently mostly to the left of the establishment Dems (aside from the issue of immigration). Many on the right would prefer a stable US government under the Dems as a moderating force in the Asia pacific, as well as the existing trade framework (plus the TPP) in place.

I know it's common received wisdom that MPs in NZ and AUS mainstream right-wing parties would all be Democrats if they were Americans. But I don't really think it's true; might have been a few decades back before the neo-lib / neo-con takeover. They'd mostly (but not all) be moderate republicans IMO, some would be heading towards the looney fringe though (eg. there be climate change deniers among them). They are all "for" the social programmes like public health, because it's already in place and it would be electoral suicide to support full privatisation. But if it didn't exist few of them would be looking to bring it in. They all speak the language of the right: low taxes, business friendly, small government, "individual responsibility", beating up on the welfare queens, punishing the poor for failing to bootstrap themselves into the middle classes, the left is just tax and spend socialism, etc etc. They use the same rhetorical devices too: "virtue signalling", "nanny state". And in the case of New Zealand (which is commonly, but also mistakenly, seen as leftish to Australia) the maintream right-wing party established a spokesman against political correctness while in opposition.

Indeed the US has some social(ist) programmes of which I am quite jealous. The school lunch programme being one. We used to have a half-arsed version of it with most elementary school kids getting a glass of milk (and an apple during WWII) every day, but that was shit-canned by, guess who, the right-wing mainstream party. 

[ThinkerX]

Falls into the 'water is wet' category, but what the heck....

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/president-trump-may-have-lied-to-mueller-house-democrats-say/ar-AAI4YaL?ocid=ob-fb-enus-580&fbclid=IwAR0fT598LH000XUGCNrrANwDA4fBoaBieUrZsBbd6kEn8qmQO-FlP79xkXg

 

Lawyers for the House of Representatives revealed on Monday that they have reason to believe that the grand-jury redactions in special counsel Robert Mueller’s report show that President Donald Trump lied about his knowledge of his campaign’s contacts with WikiLeaks.

[Jeor]

45 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

They are all "for" the social programmes like public health, because it's already in place and it would be electoral suicide to support full privatisation. But if it didn't exist few of them would be looking to bring it in. They all speak the language of the right: low taxes, business friendly, small government, "individual responsibility", beating up on the welfare queens, punishing the poor for failing to bootstrap themselves into the middle classes, the left is just tax and spend socialism, etc etc.

I agree to an extent; I think the establishment of universal healthcare in other countries like Australia and NZ really obscures the comparison between their right-wing parties and US Republicans. If you took healthcare out of the equation, the policies and politics would look fairly similar - lower taxes, big business friendly, socially conservative, family values etc. Healthcare is such a big issue it tends to distort the picture.

Another aspect of it is gun control. John Howard (conservative PM) is famous for raising a temporary tax to pay for the buyback and even threatened the states with a nationwide referendum and constitutional amendment if they didn't voluntarily comply with the new framework. No way that would happen in the US, but then again Australia's gun culture was much more niche than the widespread ownership in the US. Twenty-five years later, the conservatives are slightly weakening the gun laws again but it's still not nearly as bad a situation as the US.

Politicians are all creatures of their environment, and I think the US and Australian environments have very different baselines. But I have no doubt if you parachuted Scott Morrison (current Australian PM) into American politics, he would be a pretty staunch Republican. Tony Abbott would have absolutely been a Republican. Gillard and Rudd would have definitely been Democrats. The only confusing one is Malcolm Turnbull (socially liberal, economic conservative), who might legitimately have been one or the other. And vice versa, if you put current US Republicans into the Australian environment (with healthcare entrenched, and compulsory voting as well, let's not forget), I'm sure that most of them would moderate their views.

[The Anti-Targ]

The gun thing at the extreme end is uniquely US among conservatives / the right. Sure, the political right in all western countries generally tend toward permissiveness in terms of guns, but that's based on their broader notion of individualism, and opposition to the nanny state notion, not from a peculiar religious devotion to guns.

[mormont]

6 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

As to Aussie-Russia-gate. Haven't people plead guilty and gone to prison for the Russia thing already? How can you discredit an investigation that actually lead to some people going to prison, for shit they actually did? Surely, with successful convictions under its belt, investigating the Muellar investigation is a misuse of federal funds and DoJ resources.

IIRC Trump's line is that the things they went to prison for are not crimes.

[DireWolfSpirit]

Just chiming in after the conversation, but yeah Kristol was on MSNBC all through the Mueller investigation and consistent in his disapproval over Trump. I doubt George Will would ever be caught praising the Orange dirtbag either.

[Mexal]

Dems messaging feels like it’s getting drowned out by false whistleblower process shit (flat out lies). They need to be on every form of media connecting the “transcript” with the actual crimes.

[Larry of the Lawn]

4 minutes ago, Mexal said:

Dems messaging feels like it’s getting drowned out by false whistleblower process shit (flat out lies). They need to be on every form of media connecting the “transcript” with the actual crimes.

Totally agree.  They are the absolute worst at this.

[Gaston de Foix]

1 hour ago, larrytheimp said:

Totally agree.  They are the absolute worst at this.

It's not just messaging.  Why on earth would they invite the Whistleblower to testify when he has already told them what he knows?

Why not first obtain documents from WH, including the rest of Trump's conversations with Zelensky, his explanation of his directions to Mulvaney.  A successful investigation requires contemporaneous documents and Democrats should be seeking those documents with ferocity. 

[Centrist Simon Steele]

I was reading on Vox (yeah, yeah I was bored) that Trump called for Schiff to be arrested for treason (and he used Twitter for this?). Vox defined treason (waging war against your own country or aiding an enemy of the country) and said Schiff is fine. Duh?

The bigger issue here that our media can't seem to see is that Trump is not only calling for civil war, but outright the arrest of his critics.

Either way, based on the definition of treason, would anyone who supported Trump be guilty of treason?

 

 

[Gaston de Foix]

Trump hasn't ordered Schiff's arrest for treason.  Nor, as a practical matter, could he, since the US is a sophisticated democracy and there are internal and external safeguards against such an abuse of power.  His words are performative/hortatory.  Hot air. 

This is why the focus on Trump's words is just a giant red herring.  It's his deeds, using the power of the presidency, that truly constitute impeachable conduct. 

[Martell Spy]

Barr personally asked foreign officials to aid inquiry into CIA, FBI activities in 2016

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/attorney-general-barr-personally-asked-foreign-officials-to-aid-inquiry-into-cia-fbi-activities-in-2016/2019/09/30/d50cd5c4-e3a5-11e9-b403-f738899982d2_story.html

Quote

 

Attorney General William P. Barr has held private meetings overseas with foreign intelligence officials seeking their help in a Justice Department inquiry that President Trump hopes will discredit U.S. intelligence agencies’ examination of possible connections between Russia and members of the Trump campaign during the 2016 election, according to people familiar with the matter.

Barr’s personal involvement is likely to stoke further criticism from Democrats pursuing impeachment that he is helping the Trump administration use executive branch powers to augment investigations aimed primarily at the president’s adversaries.

But the high-level Justice Department focus on intelligence operatives’ conduct is likely to cheer Trump and other conservatives for whom “investigate the investigators” has become a rallying cry. Barr has voiced his own concerns, telling lawmakers in April that he believed “spying did occur” when it came to the U.S. investigation of the Trump campaign.

The direct involvement of the nation’s top law enforcement official shows the priority Barr places on the investigation being conducted by John Durham, the U.S. attorney in Connecticut, who has been assigned the sensitive task of reviewing U.S. intelligence work surrounding the 2016 election and its aftermath.

The attorney general’s active role also underscores the degree to which a nearly three-year-old election still consumes significant resources and attention inside the federal government. Current and former intelligence and law enforcement officials expressed frustration and alarm Monday that the head of the Justice Department was taking such a direct role in reexamining what they view as conspiracy theories and baseless allegations of misconduct.

 

 

I guess the question now is, is there any U.S. foreign policy being currently conducted that is not focused on getting Trump reelected in 2020?

[Mexal]

11 minutes ago, Martell Spy said:

Barr personally asked foreign officials to aid inquiry into CIA, FBI activities in 2016

I guess the question now is, is there any U.S. foreign policy being currently conducted that is not focused on getting Trump reelected in 2020?

No. There isn't.

[Centrist Simon Steele]

12 minutes ago, Gaston de Foix said:

Trump hasn't ordered Schiff's arrest for treason.  Nor, as a practical matter, could he, since the US is a sophisticated democracy and there are internal and external safeguards against such an abuse of power.  His words are performative/hortatory.  Hot air. 

This is why the focus on Trump's words is just a giant red herring.  It's his deeds, using the power of the presidency, that truly constitute impeachable conduct. 

He has not ordered it, but he has tweeted it and demanded Schiff be questioned. Your willingness to analyze this as a rhetorical act is a problem I don't care to uncover, unpack.

[DMC]

I think y'all worry way too much - another favorite Democratic pastime.  Had CNN or MSNBC on in the background the past hour or so and the only thing on the whistleblower process shit I've seen is CNN clarifying the Intel IG himself debunked that bullshit yesterday.  As for online I haven't really seen it much - hell it's not even on Drudge!  And regardless, no one's changing their mind based on whether the info was first, second, or twenty-forth hand knowledge.

Honestly at this juncture I'm much more worried about the barrage of news - e.g. Australia, revisiting Mueller, Pompeo, Giuliani, etc. - drowning out the focus and simplicity of the message, resulting in people tuning the whole thing out like the Mueller investigation.

34 minutes ago, Simon Steele said:

I was reading on Vox (yeah, yeah I was bored) that Trump called for Schiff to be arrested for treason (and he used Twitter for this?). Vox defined treason (waging war against your own country or aiding an enemy of the country) and said Schiff is fine. Duh?

Yeah that article merely reflects Vox's constant urge to "explain" things like the reader is a five year old and they're experts on everything.  All it was emphasizing was how hard it is to be convicted of treason in the US.

[sologdin]

based on the definition of treason, would anyone who supported Trump be guilty of treason?

doubtful.  we don't have a lot of cases that interpret the constitutional provision.  most of the affirmed convictions involve people who worked for the third reich--like, went to germany and followed orders during the war.

john brown's conviction for treason against virginia is instructive, too--dude actually waged a war, of sorts.  all this talk of treason--whether by the president or his opponents--is off the rails.

[Zorral]

9 hours ago, DireWolfSpirit said:

Just chiming in after the conversation, but yeah Kristol was on MSNBC all through the Mueller investigation and consistent in his disapproval over Trump. I doubt George Will would ever be caught praising the Orange dirtbag either.

I guess I'm the only one here who doesn't watch tv.  (Gotta say though, this saves me a whole lot of stress and sour stomach!)

I do watch a lot of streaming -- but not tv per se.

[Kalbear]

19 hours ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

I've been wrong before.  If I'm wrong on this one I don't think it will be at all funny.  :lolsob: would be more appropriate. 

One, I hope Trump isn't so foolish to arrest a member of Congress.  Two, if he is that foolish I hope I'm right about Congress.  

I used to think that some republicans might have a conscience and do the right thing even when politically damaging, but I no longer believe that. If they did, they would no longer be part of the republican party.