US Politics

[Tracker]

15 minutes ago, bustamente said:

How someone like this thrives in the States is why it has become the toilet **** stained country.

 

The planned insurrection revelations just keep getting wider and deeper and now stand revealed as what the worst fears were. Trump and his lackeys planned and attempted to overthrow the results of the Biden election even though, or maybe because, they absolutely knew that Trump had lost. These miscreants were prepared to use violence, illegal mobilization of US military and para-military and as many of government departments as they could suborne to do their bidding.

And yet, despite this growing mountain  of evidence, most Americans are blissfully ignorant of how close they came to living in a dictatorship. Nothing short of a vigorous prosecution of all involved parties and an excising of all supporters within the civil service will prevent this from happening again.

[Tracker]

'That does not happen': Witnesses refute House Republican's 'outrageous' claims of 'infanticide'
   
During a House of Representatives hearing on "abortion access and the law" on Wednesday, United States Congressman Ralph Norman (R-South Carolina) attempted to coax witnesses to validate the false right-wing claim that infants are often killed after they are delivered.

It was a total disaster for the Republican lawmaker and the second time in as many days that the GOP has had its dubious arguments solidly refuted.
 
"Do you agree with infanticide?" Norman asked Georgia State Representative Renitta Shannon (D-84th District).

"Well, I think you're using inflammatory language to basically describe a situation that does not happen. We don't have infanticide happening. Doctors would not do that, and neither would folks who have carried pregnancies," Shannon shot back.

"Okay, would a healthy child – do you agree that if a healthy child is born that it's that woman's right to decide if it lives or dies?" Norman posited.

"What I think is based on your question you have a very low opinion of pregnant people," Shannon replied.

Norman then tried to interrupt Shannon but she tore right through it.

"Excuse me, do you want an answer or do you want to keep talking over witnesses? What I am telling you is that nobody would carry a pregnancy and then decide on a Monday because they are bored that they want to have an abortion," she said. "That's ridiculous. And it's inflammatory. What you're saying – you're talking about families who are in tough situations where folks have been excited about carrying a pregnancy. Most of the abortions that happen later in pregnancy are really tragedies where it's really a disappointment for everyone involved."

Norman was completely unmoved and then redirected his initial question at National Women's Law Center President Fatima Goss Graves, who was seated next to Shannon at the witness table.

"Would you agree – I take it with all those words – that you agree with, basically, murdering a child after they're born. Yes or no?" he asked Graves.

She was not having it.

"I have to say, Congressman, how you just characterized the representative's statement is extremely inflammatory and the type of thing that is dangerous," Graves said.

Norman tried to cut Graves off, but she nevertheless persisted.

"You guys have been talking today about the threats against crisis pregnancy centers, which I assume are serious and are terrible," she continued, "the threats on people who work on abortion access every single day, and part of it is because of this sort of inflammatory, outrageous language and it is not okay."

https://www.alternet.org/2022/07/witnesses-dismember-house-republican-infanticide/

[Tracker]

More than one coup: Jan. 6 committee draws a direct line to Donald Trump

Earlier this week, the New York Times published an op-ed by former Justice Department (DOJ) prosecutor and primary member of Robert Mueller's Russia investigation team Andrew Weissman in which he shared his concern about what the DOJ is doing about Donald Trump's attempted coup. Weissman suggested that they may have approached the case as one might approach an organized crime investigation starting with the January 6th insurrectionist prosecutions and working their way up. Looking at the case as it's been presented by the January 6th Committee so far, he came to believe it would have been better organized as a "hub and spoke" conspiracy "in which the Ellipse speech by President Trump and the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol were just one 'spoke' of a grander scheme." In other words, as a conspiracy with Donald Trump at the center of a number of different plots aimed at accomplishing the same goal.

After hearing all the testimony and evidence so far, it seems clear that's exactly what happened.  As crazy as the committee's presentation of the White House event was, it was actually much, much crazier.

Donald Trump concocted the Big Lie even before the election as a scheme to stay in office if Joe Biden won. He was told over and over again by almost everyone around him that his lies had no basis in fact or law. Yet he and a few accomplices cooked up various maneuvers anyway, from filing specious lawsuits to pressuring state officials to trying to corrupt the Justice Department in an effort to somehow overturn the results. One obscure lawyer came up with a spurious strategy to get partisan players to file fake electoral votes in order to have the vice president claim there was a dispute and refuse to count the votes. All of these plans overlapped in some ways but stood as distinct "spokes" in the president's relentless drive to stay in office no matter what it took.

The public hearing on Tuesday highlighted a couple of other spokes, one which was thankfully never acted upon while the other tragically was. The committee discussed a notorious meeting that took place on December 18th, 2020, four days after the states had all filed their electoral votes. I wrote about it in some detail a while back, based upon the vivid report by Jonathan Swan of Axios, and I have to say that as crazy as the committee's presentation of the event was, it was actually much, much crazier.

On the evening of the 18th, Trump lawyer Sidney Powell, former national security adviser Michael Flynn and the former CEO of Overstock.com Patrick Byrne were waved into the oval office by a member of Trump loyalist Peter Navarro's staff without anyone knowing about it. A major confrontation ensued between the three of them and lawyers from the White House counsel's office as the outsiders tried to persuade the president to declare a national security emergency under an executive order from 2018 (regarding cyber threats) enabling the president to order the military to seize the voting machines to do an audit. The group wanted the president to name Powell as special counsel to "investigate" voter fraud. They had even already drafted the order giving Powell the assignment and ordering the seizure.

Trump listened carefully to the presentation and repeatedly pointed out to the White House lawyers and others who were vociferously arguing against this inane plot that at least Powell and the others were "out there fighting." Trump patched in Rudy Giuliani on the phone and even he was against Powell's plot believing they had a better chance of overturning the election through the state legislatures and he ended up coming over to the White House and joining in person. Powell thought Trump had agreed with the plan to name her special counsel and no one is quite sure if he actually did. In any case, no national security emergency was declared so that "spoke" was abandoned that night. 

Donald Trump was at the center of a number of different plots aimed at accomplishing the same goal.

The committee didn't mention it in the hearing but it's worth noting how Powell and Flynn came up with this looney idea. Sarah D. Wire of the Los Angeles Times did a deep dive on the Patrick Byrne connection and apparently, right around the election, Byrne financed and organized a "crowdsourcing" operation to find the alleged voter fraud. He hired cyber security experts and analysts and first put them up at the Trump Hotel in Washington and then moved the whole group down to a plantation in Georgia owned by another kooky Trump attorney named Lin Wood, supposedly for security purposes. Michael Flynn was intimately involved in all this as was Powell.

This group was the source of most of the allegations that Giuliani and Powell used in their many unsuccessful lawsuits and it was also where Powell and Flynn, as well as a number of fringe players, came up with the stories that the election had been stolen by foreign countries hacking the voting machines, giving them the supposed authority to declare a national security emergency and call out the military. (Flynn had already been agitating for Trump to declare martial law and have the military re-run the election in the swing states.) This is why Byrne was with them at the White House meeting on December 18th where nobody knew who he was. He had financed the whole operation.

https://www.salon.com/2022/07/13/more-than-one-coup-jan-6-committee-draws-a-direct-line-to-donald/

[Tracker]

House Republican asks if women give birth to turtles or tacos
   
Republican members of the United States House of Representatives are seldom reluctant to fire off bizarre claims about reproductive health. On Wednesday, Georgia Congressman Jody Hice took the GOP's rhetoric to a new level.

During a hearing on "abortion access and the law," Hice, one of several outspoken characters in the Peach State's right-wing caucus, asked if pregnant people ever deliver "something" that is not a homosapien.
 
"Is there any instance of a woman giving birth to something that is not a human being, a baby, like, a turtle, or as our First Lady suggested, a breakfast taco," Hice asked. "I mean, is there any instance where other than a human being has been born?"

https://www.alternet.org/2022/07/house-republican-women-birth-turtles/

[Tracker]

Trump Team Formalizes Strategy To Blame Everything On Mark Meadows

 
Trump and his attorneys realize by now that he has very little room to maneuver, and he needs a defense, fast. A lot of witnesses are coming forward, corroborating each other’s stories, and the story they’re telling is a seamless, internally consistent, compelling, terrifying, and extremely felonious one. According to Rolling Stone, Team Trump is desperate enough to have chosen a risky strategy, putting it all on Mark Meadows.

Rolling Stone writes:

Trump’s inner circle increasingly views Meadows as a likely fall guy for the former president’s attempts to overturn the 2020 election. Members of Trump’s legal team are actively planning certain strategies around Meadows’ downfall — including possible criminal charges. Trump has himself begun the process of distancing himself from some of his onetime senior aide’s alleged actions around Jan. 6.

That is almost laughably desperate. The central tenet of any such plan is that the average person would believe that Meadows concocted this elaborate scheme which required the entirety of Trump’s inner circle. Meanwhile, Trump just mindlessly went along, unable to stop the diabolical Meadows. Meadows forced Trump to yell at the crowd to go to the Capitol and fight like hell. The theory is not only “unbelievable,” it is unbelievably risky.

 

[bustamente]

Trump maybe be the dumbest human being on the planet but he is smart enough not to leave a paper trail, nothing to tie him with anybody he gets to do his dirty work

[Tracker]

10 minutes ago, bustamente said:

Trump maybe be the dumbest human being on the planet but he is smart enough not to leave a paper trail, nothing to tie him with anybody he gets to do his dirty work

The sharks are circling Trump. He was stupid enough to make a personal phone call to a former staffer who was set to corroborate  the previous staffer's accounts of Trump's behaviours. Trump hoped to dissuade the second staffer to shut up but instead the call was reported to a lawyer and the 1/6 committee. Can't get more stoopid than that.

[Wanna-B-Fanboy]

 

 

[JCon]

It's always misogyny with the right.  They just want to control everyone. 

[Tracker]

Criminal Smoking Gun: Trump Campaign Operative Gave Fake Elector List To House Republican

The Trump campaign member who gave the fake elector list to a House Republican has been identified as the Trump reelection effort is tied to the criminal plot.

Politico reported:

Mike Roman, then Trump’s 2020 director of Election Day operations, delivered those false elector certificates — signed by pro-Trump activists in Michigan and Wisconsin — to Rep. Mike Kelly’s (R-Pa.) chief of staff at the time, both people told POLITICO. Kelly was a Trump ally in the effort to overturn the 2020 election, and his then-top aide received the documents from Roman before deputizing a colleague to disseminate copies on Capitol Hill, according to both people.

Roman’s role in the effort to deliver those slates of electors directly to Pence has not previously been reported. 

The fake elector list ran through the Trump campaign. It has long been suspected that the criminal plot originated with the Trump campaign. Trump’s campaign lawyers are under Justice Department investigation for the plot, but the attachment of the name of someone from the Trump campaign who disseminated the list on Capitol Hill provides a direct public link from the Trump campaign to the crime.

House Republicans were involved in the fake elector plot. The names of the fake electors were providers to the GOP members of Congress so that they could vote for the fake slate and throw the election to Donald Trump.

[Tracker]

Three men linked to Russian spies were in 'unhinged' Oval Office meeting with Donald Trump: report
  

One of America's top counterintelligence experts revealed his thoughts on Saturday on the three men linked to sanctioned Russian spies who were present for a key White House meeting plotting Donald Trump's coup attempt.

"Four days after the electors met across the country and made Joe Biden the president-elect, Donald Trump was still trying to find a way to hang on to the presidency," Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) said in Tuesday's public hearing of the Jan. 6 Attack on the U.S. Capitol.

"On Friday, December 18th, his team of outside advisers paid him a surprise visit in the White House that would quickly become the stuff of legend," Raskin explained. "The meeting has been called unhinged, not normal and the craziest meeting of the Trump presidency. The outside lawyers who'd been involved in dozens of failed lawsuits had lots of theories supporting the big lie, but no evidence to support it."

At the meeting, the idea of using the U.S. military to seize voting machines was proposed.

"In the wee hours of December 19th, dissatisfied with his options, Donald Trump decided to call for a large and wild crowd on Wednesday, January 6th, the day when Congress would meet to certify the electoral votes," Raskin explained. "Never before in American history had a president called for a crowd to come contest the counting of electoral votes by Congress or engaged in any effort designed to influence, delay, or obstruct the joint session of Congress in doing its work required by our Constitution and the Electoral Count Act. As we'll see, Donald Trump's 1:42 AM tweet electrified and galvanized his supporters, especially the dangerous extremists in the Oath Keepers, the Proud Boys, and other racist and white nationalist groups spoiling for a fight against the government."

In a thread posted to Twitter, former FBI Deputy Assistant Director for Counterintelligence Peter Strzok noticed a pattern among some of the participants. Strzok had also headed the FBI's counterespionage section.

Strzok said the meeting had 'staggering counterintelligence issues' presented the three of those in attendance.

"Mike Flynn, who was paid by an organ of Russian state media to travel to Moscow to attend a dinner where he was seated next to Putin. Flynn later plead guilty to lying to the FBI about conversations he had with the Russian Ambassador about election interference," he noted.

"Patrick Byrne, one of several men once in an intimate relationship with convicted Russian agent Marina Butina. Byrne gave money to Butina after her return to Russia, where she ran for the Duma, hounded Navalny, and supported the invasion of Ukraine," Strzok continued. "Rudy Giuliani, who repeatedly met with and took info from sanctioned Russian agents like Andrii Derkach, despite USIC warnings to the White House in 2019 that Trump’s personal lawyer 'was the target of an influence operation by Russian intelligence.'"

"So in this tiny meeting in the Oval Office where options to upend US democracy were advanced to the President of the United States, there were not one, not two, but three people directly linked to sanctioned and convicted agents of the Russian government," Strzok noted. "While I doubt Russia planned it, their efforts to gain access to Trump’s inner sanctum succeeded beyond their wildest dreams. And it demonstrates just how successful seemingly amateurish intelligence activity can be."

He included a Russian Foreign Ministry photo from inside the Oval Office of Trump meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Ambassador Sergey Kislyak

https://www.alternet.org/2022/07/three-men-linked-russian-spies/

Edited July 17, 2022 by Tracker

[Tracker]

Children Died In Uvalde Because Police Didn’t Try To Open An Unlocked Classroom Door

There are many stunning revelations about the disastrous Uvalde police response to the Robb Elementary mass shooting, but, shockingly, they try to open an unlocked classroom door.

The San Antonio Express-News reported on a Texas House committee report on the law enforcement response:

A shield that would have protected officers against the gunman’s assault-style rifle arrived at 12:20 p.m. BORTAC, an elite tactical unit of the U.S. Border Patrol, likely assumed command shortly before 12:30 p.m.

Yet officers, including Paul Guerrero, acting commander of BORTAC, waited until 12:50 p.m. to enter Room 111 and kill Ramos — 73 minutes after police first arrived at the school.
A door to the classrooms likely was unlocked the entire time. While trying to find a master key, officers didn’t try to open the door before finally storming the room, the report said.

Nearly 400 law enforcement officers were on the scene, and not a single one of them tried to open the unlocked classroom door. It is as if they were making up excuses not to enter the room and stop the shooter.

The report described the law enforcement response as lackadaisical and described how police abandoned their school shooter training where they were taught to put themselves on the line to attempt to save children.

The report blamed poor information, spotty communications, and law enforcement officers who did not follow their training.

The lock on the classroom door was broken for weeks, and it was not repaired. The school spotted the shooter outside the building, but no one used the intercom to declare a lockdown, so the teacher in the classroom had no idea what was happening when a shooter walked in and began shooting.

Law enforcement probably got kids killed through their response, and people should be held accountable.

[bustamente]

Trump will announce that he is running for President because that is the only thing that will keep him out of prison until the Republicans can win the House and maybe Senate and impeach Garland.

[Tracker]

1 hour ago, bustamente said:

Trump will announce that he is running for President because that is the only thing that will keep him out of prison until the Republicans can win the House and maybe Senate and impeach Garland.

That has been his plan since he realized he was in danger of being not only arrested but convicted despite his money and bravado. However, recent polls have put Florida DeSantis ahead of him in the nomination race and gaining a greater lead. So, he is boned unless he flees the country, which is a definite possibility. Orange jumpsuits clash with his orange skin.

[blue_gold_84]

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/representatives-congress-arrested-today-supreme-court-abortion-alexandria-ocasio-cortez-carolyn-maloney-2022-07-19/

Quote

Seventeen members of Congress were among those arrested Tuesday during an abortion rights demonstration outside the Supreme Court, according to the U.S. Capitol Police. 

U.S. Capitol Police said they made a total of 35 arrests for crowding, obstructing or incommoding, which included 17 members of Congress. Protesters had perched themselves on First Street NE near the Capitol building, blocking the street. Capitol Police said they issued their standard three warnings before beginning the arrests. 

A spokesperson for Democratic Rep. Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts also confirmed multiple arrests of members of Congress, and said Pressley was among those arrested. Pressley's communications director Ricardo Sánchez said her arrest was an act of "non-violent civil disobedience." Rep. Katherine Clark, the Democratic assistant speaker of the House, was also arrested. 

Rep. Carolyn Maloney's office also announced she was among the Democratic Women's Caucus members arrested near the Supreme Court.

 

"There is no democracy if women do not have control over their own bodies and decisions about their own health, including reproductive care," Maloney said in a statement after arrest, according to her office. "I have the privilege of representing a state where reproductive rights are respected and protected — the least I can do is put my body on the line for the 33 million women at risk of losing their rights. The Republican Party and the right-wing extremists behind this decision are not pro-life, but pro-controlling the bodies of women, girls, and any person who can become pregnant. Their ultimate goal is to institute a national ban on abortion. We will not let them win. We will be back."

A spokesperson for Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez confirmed she was among those arrested.

Abortion rights supporters — and those opposed to abortion rights — have been demonstrating near the Supreme Court since the court's decision to strike down abortion protections under Roe nearly a month ago. The court ruled that abortion is not a constitutional right.

Democrats are hoping to enshrine abortion access protections into law, but such a measure lacks support in the Senate under current rules.

[bustamente]

11 minutes ago, Tracker said:

That has been his plan since he realized he was in danger of being not only arrested but convicted despite his money and bravado. However, recent polls have put Florida DeSantis ahead of him in the nomination race and gaining a greater lead. So, he is boned unless he flees the country, which is a definite possibility. Orange jumpsuits clash with his orange skin.

Agreed he wont be the nominee, he has way to much baggage and even with Biden's low approval rate he beats Trump. Announcing he will run is a tactic as he thinks it will save him from being indicted especially  with the mountain of evidence that the 1/6 commission is digging up on him and his enablers. They all need to be held accountable but the clock is ticking and I fear the will is not there by the DOJ to drag America through the mud for all the world to see.

[Tracker]

                                    

[Mark F]

John Fetterman democratic party senate candidate article.

 

https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2022-07-18/fetterman-democrats-midterms?utm_source=reddit.com

[bustamente]

Seriously this is the guy who messed up the United States, he bootlickers still idolize him

 

[Tracker]

1 hour ago, bustamente said:

Seriously this is the guy who messed up the United States, he bootlickers still idolize him

 

I don't know which is more remarkable- Trump's mangling of the English language or Meadows having the bald-faced temerity to defend and praise it.

[bustamente]

Trump's secret service are actual bootlickers, well tell me more, the corruption runs deep with anything involving Trump and it's incredible to what lengths people will go to protect him

[Mark F]

astonishing with the mountains of evidence, the fact that he continues to commit related crimes,

 

authorities are still afraid of him.

 

something stinks. the rancid stink of pervasive corruption.

Edited July 20, 2022 by Mark F

[Tracker]

2 hours ago, bustamente said:

Trump's secret service are actual bootlickers, well tell me more, the corruption runs deep with anything involving Trump and it's incredible to what lengths people will go to protect him

Agreed. The American Department of Justice is investigating the mysterious disappearance of Secret Service text messages from 1/6.

[bustamente]

6 minutes ago, Tracker said:

Agreed. The American Department of Justice is investigating the mysterious disappearance of Secret Service text messages from 1/6.

The Secret service member on Trumps detail erased their text messages to save Trump so their bosses decided to have everyone involved delete all their messages from those days to make it look like it was a mistake and or glitch. Subpoena the lot of then and get then on the record recalling the events in question

[Tracker]

 

 
Trump thought that he could avoid prosecution by declaring himself a candidate for president, but Attorney General Merrick Garland put an end to that.

Garland was asked about investigating a former president, and he answered, “No person is above the law in this country, nothing stops us. I don’t know how to — I’ll say that again. No person is above the law in this country. I can’t say it any more clearly than that. There is nothing in the Constitution, in any other factors which prevent us from investigating anyone, anyone who’s criminally responsible for an attempt to undo a democratic election.”