Thanks to the hard work of Democratic pundit Scott Dworkin, it’s
beginning to look like every Republican politician has some kind of link
to Russia.
Over the last few months, Dworkin has revealed that several
Republican senators — including John McCain, Ted Cruz, and Marco Rubio —
have accepted money from Russian donors. He also produced evidence of
even more connections a couple of weeks ago that were shared by Palmer
Report.
In May, Dworkin found documents that link Senate Majority Leader
Mitch McConnell to a super PAC that accepted $2.5 million from a
“pro-Putin Ukrainian businessman.” He shared photos of the documents on
Twitter, along with the following message:
‘#TrumpLeaks Docs: Mitch McConnell linked super PAC took $2.5
million from a pro-Putin Ukrainian businessman last election cycle
#trumprussia’
#TrumpLeaks Docs: Mitch McConnell linked super PAC took $2.5 million
from a pro-Putin Ukrainian businessman last election cycle #trumprussia
pic.twitter.com/V7HTq16fCR
— Scott Dworkin (@funder) May 21, 2017
*Scott Walker*
Dworkin also found that McConnell is not the only person who has
benefited from a pro-Putin businessman. He tweeted a couple of days
later photos of documents that show Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker also
received money from this “pro-Putin” individual during the last
election cycle.
MORE..Interesting read.!
Why they refuse to have Trump investigated.
We all knew that bunch was invested in Putin's scam, now we have the story.
When will the people of West Virginia and Pennsylvania, those
stalwart Trump voters who believe he’ll be bringing back coal jobs,
finally figure out they’ve been had?
History suggests it's
unrealistic to expect people to change their minds quickly. This is a
pattern that has held for centuries. In the 1600's the Salem witch trials
dragged on for eight long months before townsfolk finally began to
realize that they had been caught up in an irrational frenzy. More
recently, Americans proved during Watergate that they are reluctant to
turn on a president they have just elected despite mounds of evidence
incriminating him in scandalous practices. The Watergate burglary took
place on June 17, 1972. But it wasn't until April 30, 1973 – eleven
months later – that his popularity finally fell below 50 percent. This
was long after the Watergate burglars had been tried and convicted and
the FBI had confirmed news reports that the Republicans had played dirty
tricks on the Democrats during the campaign. Leaked testimony had even
showed that former Attorney General John Mitchell knew about the
break-in in advance. But not until Nixon fired White House Counsel John
Dean and White House aides H.R. Haldeman and John Ehrlichman resigned
did a majority turn against the president. And even at that point
Nixon's poll numbers stood higher than Trump's. Nixon: 48 percent;
Trump: 42 percent.
It's not just conservative voters who are
reluctant to change their minds. So are liberals. After news reports
surfaced in the 1970s proving that John Kennedy was a serial philanderer
millions of his supporters refused to acknowledge it. A poll in 2013
show a majority of Americans still think of him as a good family man.
Thus
far not even many leading Democrats have been willing to come out in
favor of Trump's impeachment. Cory Booker, the liberal senator from New
Jersey, said this past week it's simply too soon. And if a guy like
Booker is not yet prepared to come straight out for impeachment, why
should we think Trump voters would be willing to? It is only just in the
last few weeks that polls show that a plurality of voters now favor
Trump's impeachment. (Twelve percent of self-identified Trump voters
share this view, which is remarkable.)
It's no mystery why people
are reluctant to change their minds. Social scientists have produced
hundreds of studies that explain the phenomenon. Rank partisanship is
only part of the answer. Mainly it’s that people don't like to admit
they were wrong, which is what they would be doing if they concede that
Trump is not up to the job. When Trump voters hear news that puts their
leader in an unfavorable light they experience cognitive dissonance. The
natural reaction to this is to deny the legitimacy of the source of the
news that they find upsetting. This is what explains the harsh attacks
on the liberal media. Those stories are literally making Trump voters
feel bad. As the Emory University social scientist Drew Westen
has demonstrated, people hearing information contrary to their beliefs
will cease giving it credence. This is not a decision we make at the
conscious level. Our brain makes it for us automatically.
So what
leads people to finally change their minds? One of the most convincing
explanations is provided by the Theory of Affective Intelligence. This
mouthful of a name refers to the tendency of people experiencing
cognitive dissonance to feel anxiety when they do so. As social
scientist George Marcus has explained, when the burden of hanging onto
an existing opinion becomes greater than the cost of changing it, we
begin to reconsider our commitments. What's the trigger? Anxiety. When
there's a mismatch between our views of the way the world works and
reality we grow anxious. This provokes us to make a fresh evaluation.
What
this research suggests is that we probably have a ways to go before
Trump voters are going to switch their opinions. While some are
evidently feeling buyers' remorse, a majority aren't. They're just not
anxious enough yet. Liberals need not worry. The very same headlines
that are giving them an upset stomach are making it more and more likely
Trump voters are also experiencing discomfort. What might push them
over the edge? One possibility would be a decision to follow through on
his threat to end subsidies to insurance companies under Obamacare,
leading to the collapse of the system, and the loss of coverage for
millions of Trump voters. That’s become more and more likely since the
Senate is apparently unable to pass the repeal and replace measure Trump
has been counting on. So liberals just have to wait and watch. Will
the story unfold like Watergate? Every day the answer increasingly
seems yes.
An optimist would argue that social media will
help push people to change their minds faster now than in the past. But
social media could also have the opposite effect. People living in a
bubble who get their media from biased sources online may be less likely
to encounter the contrary views that stimulate reflection than was
common, say, in the Nixon years when virtually all Americans watched the
mainstream network news shows. Eventually, one supposes, people will
catch on no matter how they consume news. Of late even Fox News viewers
have heard enough disturbing stories about Trump to begin to reconsider
their commitment to him. That is undoubtedly one reason why Nate
Silver found that so many Trump voters are reluctant to count themselves
among the strongest supporters.
Photo Illustration by Kelly Caminero/The Daily Beast
Inside
Russia Today’s American headquarters in Washington, across from the
receptionist’s desk stamped by a lime green “RT” banner, an ad starring
Ed Schultz and Larry King plays on a large screen TV.
Schultz and
King, whom he dwarfs, stand opposite one another, marveling at the
success of the Republican presidential nominee, Donald Trump, which they
both agree is astounding. “Follow the 2016 campaign right here on RT
America!” Schultz says. King points at the camera and delivers the
network’s slogan, “And question more.”
Founded 11 years ago
Thursday in September of 2005, Russia Today is a Moscow-based,
English-language news outlet which is funded by the Kremlin and serves
to promote Russian state propaganda, like stories about the West
collapsing and the CIA being to blame for the downing of Malaysia
Airlines Flight 17 over Ukraine, which according to RT, Russia did not
invade.
In 2010, RT branched out to the United States, launching RT America. In a 2014 BuzzFeed investigation,
Rosie Gray reported former RT America employees describing “an
atmosphere of censorship and pressure” at the network—like orders to
report on Germany as a “failed state” despite any evidence that the
country fits the criteria.
One RT anchor, Liz Wahl, protested by
quitting live on air. She later described
herself as “Putin’s pawn.” Casual viewing of the network shows a focus
on negative stories about the U.S., from claims that American Olympians
received special treatment which allowed them to take drugs to outward
mocking of the Democrats’ presidential nominee, Hillary Clinton, despite
claiming non-partisanship.
Nevertheless, the network today
broadcasts shows hosted by Schultz, a former sportscaster turned
right-wing radio host turned liberal bullhorn; King, the longtime host
of Larry King Live; and Jesse Ventura, the former wrestler and governor of Minnesota who promotes 9/11 truther conspiracies, among a handful of other less notable names.
Ventura makes sense in a way—RT is a network, after all, with an Illuminati correspondent. Schultz and King, however, are head scratchers.
Both
men left their major American networks—Schultz, when his MSNBC show was
canceled in July 2015; King, when he retired from CNN in 2010—amid
sinking ratings and dwindling popularity.
But that hardly makes them
unique in television, where hosts can come and go with the seasons.
Neither
was persona non grata in the U.S. media when they decided to work for
what amounts to an arm of the Russian government, legitimizing the
network with their presence—King, due to his long history as a reliable
and trustworthy interviewer, and Schultz, for his reputation as an
emotional, liberal populist who says what’s on his mind.
“Endorsements
from prominent people can bring legitimacy to unknown brands,” Nicco
Mele, the director of the Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and
Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School, said. “That’s true of
tennis shoes and that’s true of media properties.” Hiring King and
Schultz, Mele said, grants RT America a “patina of respectability”
although, unlike Al Jazeera English, which was initially feared to be an
extension of the Qatari government, RT America has not made it a point
to build a robust newsroom or pursue shoe-leather reporting. As for
concerns about RT, Mele said, “I don’t feel like it’s been overstated.”
Amid
Trump’s decision to appear on King’s program last week—which was
criticized by, among others, President Obama—the hosts’ strange
association with the Russian government has come into focus just as
concerns about Russia’s meddling in the 2016 election have reached a
fever pitch.
RT America, with its corn fed media personalities serving to soften the blow of blatantly
anti-American Russian propaganda, now looks like proof of those
concerns, available for viewing 24 hours a day on a cable channel near
you.
And the question remains, why would any American work there if they could avoid it?
“Desperation,”
Jeff Jarvis, a professor at the City University of New York’s Graduate
School of Journalism, said. “To go on RT is—to me—primarily just a
desperate move to have a camera in front of you with willful disregard
for who’s putting that camera there.”
Schultz had initially been eager to do an interview about his role at RT and provide his own answer to that question.
He
scheduled the conversation to take place immediately at his office near
the White House after receiving the request on Tuesday afternoon.
“Your
story just got better,” he wrote in an email. “Obama just called out
Trump for doing an interview on RT. The Russian propaganda channel. We
are not propaganda. Yes, I will speak with you.”
But then something changed abruptly.
“I guess I cant do the interview, [sic]” he wrote, just 12 minutes later.
The
receptionist said he was at his usual post on the 7th floor, but he
refused to come down. “I’m sorry for this… I’m just aware of how unfair
the DB has been to RT,” he said, perhaps referring to the sometimes-stormy history between the two organizations. “I’m not willing to take that chance.
Thanks Ed.”
When
Schultz was on MSNBC, he was an enthusiastic critic of Trump, whom he
lanced as a “racist,” and Russian President Vladimir Putin, whom he
derisively labeled “Putie.” But since joining RT in January, The News With Ed Schultz host has been neutered.
He’s an anchor now, he stresses, not a pundit. But, as Michael Crowley noted for Politico Magazine,
his shows often focus on U.S. missteps at home and abroad, from
oversized budgets to failing policies in the Middle East. Trump, rather
than being called out, is instead given an exceedingly fair shake,
characterized as someone who’s “tapped into anger among working people.”
It’s Putin-approved programming, in other words.
Obama,
speaking in Philadelphia on Tuesday, said Trump, “just last week went
on Russian state television to talk down our military and to curry favor
with Vladimir Putin. He loves this guy!”
Trump
has repeatedly praised Putin and even parroted the Kremlin talking
point that Russia did not seize Crimea, and the Russian conspiracy
theory that Obama founded ISIS. Thousands of Twitter accounts, known for
pushing demonstrably-fake Russian news stories, are also reliably on
the #TrumpTrain.
When his campaign was run by Paul Manafort, a lobbyist who worked for
Russian oligarchs (among other unsavory characters), they took the
unprecedented step of softening the Republican Party platform’s language regarding how farthe United States would go in defending Ukraine against Russian incursion.
And
Russia has appeared to exert influence over the democratic process in
other ways. The hack of the Democratic National Committee is widely considered, within the U.S. intelligence community, to have been the work of the Russian government. Further, Wikileaks, which is suspected
of having ties to Russia, has been working overtime on behalf of Trump,
taunting the release of materials that would be damaging to Clinton’s
campaign and even, on Twitter (before deleting it), taking a poll of
which illness people thought Clinton was suffering from.
A
spokesperson for Trump attempted to quell concerns about his RT
appearance—during which he criticized the American media and said claims
that the Russians were meddling in the election were probably just
Democratic talking points—by making the dubious claim that Trump simply
didn’t know the show was for Russian state television, but thought it
was for King’s podcast. Then Trump’s campaign manager, Kellyanne Conway,
said the appearance was just a “favor” to his longtime friend, whose
CNN show he frequented.
King could not be reached for an interview
as of press time, but in response to questions about his association
with RT, he’s often claimed that he is not employed by the network and
they simply license his material. That doesn’t explain why King stars in
at least two ads for the network, where he says the network’s slogan.
King’s publicist was unaware of the ads when asked about them.
One
former RT America anchor, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said
King’s claim of independence from RT is suspicious, given his chummy
relationship with the Russian news director.
When the former
anchor was at RT, King taped his show “a few doors down” from the news
director’s office. “They meet and they talk,” the former anchor said. In
King’s interview with Trump, King asked questions that were, in the
former anchor’s telling, “questions that I would’ve been asked to ask if
I was interviewing a congressman or something like that.”
Before
King came onboard, the former anchor remembered, “It was kind of like a
rumor he was coming on and we were all like, ‘What? Why would Larry King
come here?’ It makes no sense.”
The former anchor said, “The Russian news director, I remember he was really, really excited to get him on board.”
For RT, King’s decision to associate with the network was “like Christmas.”
“A
big part of the strategy is to use American voices to spread these
pro-Kremlin messages or point out U.S. hypocrisy,” the former anchor
said. “So, if you have someone like Larry King do that, it really adds
legitimacy… The whole thing with RT is kind of, like, using U.S.
officials and U.S. media figures.”
Still, Trump’s greatest
defender was not a member of his campaign staff or an outside surrogate.
It was his onetime enemy, Schultz.
“It should be pointed out that
the Clinton campaign has refused interviews on RT America,” Schultz
said in a homemade video he posted online. “This is manufactured news by
the Clinton campaign to vilify Donald Trump and connect him to Vladimir
Putin, and that’s their strategy to win the election.”
He added,
“It is so sad and so small and so elementary and I think it’s hurting
Hillary Clinton, which I think is even more than sad.”
Meanwhile,
Schultz was deciding whether or not to change his mind about canceling
our interview.
“Let me think on it,” he said. “I don’t need the story. I
do this job because I love it, not to be the focus of some story.”
He then told me he could be found at the White House, where liberal activists were protesting the Dakota Access Pipeline.
He
stood on the grass outside the protest in a pinstripe suit and royal
blue shirt, talking on the phone.
He is a tall and broad figure, with
rust-colored hair and small blue eyes that fight against his fleshy
eyelids to make contact with the world.
“I’m sorry that it kinda
worked out that way,” he said about the inconvenience. He claimed it was
his decision to cancel the interview, not RT’s. “I have to respect the
people I’m working for,” he said.
He stared off at the protest, a troubled look on his face. “Our world is fucked up, isn’t it?” he asked.
He said he’d recently taken a “chance” by talking to TheWashington Post,
but was unhappy with the attention in the end—though he wouldn’t
divulge why, or if it had led to trouble at RT. “I’m just at a point in
time in my career where I just, I don’t need any publicity,” he said. “I
do this job ’cause I love it. I’ve never really figured out why the
media covers the media, you know? I’m a reporter just like you are.”
Just
then a protester approached with a stack of signs and asked if Schultz
would like one. “No, thank you, sir,” Schultz said. The protester looked
at him skeptically. “Your days of signs are over?” he asked. Schultz
laughed through a frown. “No, it’s not over,” he said.
Asked if it
bothered him when he was criticized for working for what almost
everyone outside of the Russian government believes is a propaganda
network, Schultz said, “Well, it doesn’t bother me because I know it’s
not the truth, you know? There’s so much in the media that’s not the
truth. You know, so I go with what I know and I go with my instincts and
I go with the facts.”
Schultz emphasized that he’s now “in a
totally different role than what I was doing at MSNBC. I was doing an
opinion show. I’m a nightly news anchor now, I don’t—if you watch my
show, at 8 o’clock—I don’t give opinions.” Although, he was eager to
give his critical opinion of Clinton after Trump’s RT interview proved
controversial.
Still, Schultz called the alleged change “rather
refreshing,” and said the reason he didn’t seek out a job on another
American network was because he wanted to do something different and he
didn’t want to rival MSNBC, where he said he still has a lot of friends.
“I feel very comfortable about being fair to Trump,” he said, “I think I’ve been very fair to him.”
Reminded
how much he used to hate Trump, Schultz said, “Um, well, then I guess
that kind of shows my opinions aren’t getting in the way, right?”
Suddenly, a look of concern spread across Schultz’s face.
He
never wanted to be interviewed, he said, and despite giving a reporter
his location and answering questions for several minutes, he didn’t want
to be quoted. He grew incensed and accusatory, but then seemed to try
to calm himself by saying he was comfortable with everything he had said
on the record.
He said he didn’t want to answer any more questions, but then he ran after me, in a state of total panic.
“I’m asking you professionally to not write anything about me,” he said.
Informed
that I couldn’t promise that, since I was there talking to him to
report a story partially about him—something he knew—his face turned
red.
He moved closer and stared into my eyes, and then he screamed
at me, divulging something personal and wholly unrelated to both RT and
the conflict at hand.
“This is a hit job, I know it is!” he screamed again.
Later,
in an email, he said, “I’m on record asking you not to do s story on
me. I did not know I was being recorded. I don’t want any coverage . I’m
professionally asking you to not write about me.
Thank you Ed [sic].”
A few hours later, he called my phone and hung up.
The most important thing we have learned this year is that when
the Republican Party was hijacked by a dangerous fascist who
threatens to destroy the institutions that make America great and
free, most Republicans up and down the organizational chart stood
behind him and insisted he ought to be president.
Some did this because they are fools who do not understand why
Trump is dangerous.
Some did it because they were naïve enough to believe he could be
controlled and manipulated into implementing a normal Republican
agenda.
Of course, there were the minority of Republicans who did what
was right and withheld their support from Trump: people like Gov. John Kasich of Ohio, Sen. Ben Sasse
of Nebraska, and Hewlett-Packard CEO and megadonor Meg Whitman,
with her calling Trump "a threat to the survival of the
republic."
I want to focus on a fourth group: Republican politicians who
understand exactly how dangerous Donald Trump is but who have
chosen to support him anyway for reasons of strategy, careerism,
or cowardice.
Cowards and scoundrels
I am talking, for example, about Sen. Marco Rubio, who in the
primary called Trump an "erratic individual" who must not be
trusted with nuclear weapons — and then endorsed him for
president.
I am talking about Sen. Ted Cruz, who called Trump a
"pathological liar" and "utterly amoral" — and then endorsed him for president, even though
Trump never apologized for threatening to "spill the beans" on
Cruz's wife and suggesting Cruz's father was involved in the
assassination of President John F. Kennedy.
Most of all, I'm talking about House Speaker Paul Ryan, a man whose
pained, blue eyes suggest he desperately wants to cry for help.
He's a man who runs around the country pathetically trying to
pretend that Trump does not exist and that the key issue is his
congressional caucus' "Better Way" agenda. And he's a man who, of
his own free will, seeks to help Donald Trump become president.
These men are not fools like Ben Carson.
US Sen. Marco Rubio of
Florida.Thomson
Reuters
To borrow a phrase from Rubio, they know exactly what they are
doing: They are taking an action that risks the destruction of
the American republic to advance their personal interests.
They know what Whitman knows about the risks Trump poses to
America. Rubio himself warned specifically of the risk of Trump
starting a nuclear war! But they do not care.
I can conclude from the available evidence only that they love
their careers more than they love America. And they are why I
quit the Republican Party this week.
Why I was a Republican
I'm not a conservative. I know a lot of you already thought my
Republican affiliation was a trolling exercise, and honestly, my
registration change
was probably overdue.
I became a Republican as a teenager because of my upbringing in
Massachusetts, a state where the GOP has produced five good
governors in my lifetime, from Bill Weld (now the Libertarian
Party's vice-presidential nominee) to Charlie Baker. I worked for
Mitt Romney when he ran for governor, and while I did not like
his presidential campaigns, I think he has a record in
Massachusetts he can be proud of.
All four living current and former Republican governors of
Massachusetts oppose Trump.
I stayed a Republican because of my background working in state
and local government finance, a policy area where a
well-functioning Republican Party can bring important restraint.
I have voted Republican, for example, in each of the past three
New York City mayoral races.
I don't think it was ridiculous to be in a party that I disagreed
with on a lot of national issues. Change is made through party
coalitions, and I thought the Republican Party was where I was
more likely to be able to improve ideas at the margin in the long
run. Being a member of a party does not obligate you to vote for
its bad candidates in the meantime.
But what this election has made clear is that policy is not the
most important problem with the Republican Party.
Sen. Ben Sasse of Nebraska
at the CPAC conference for conservatives in
March.REUTERS/Gary
Cameron
The GOP was vulnerable to hacking
The Republican Party had a fundamental vulnerability: Because of
the
fact-free environment so many of its voters live in, and
because of the
anti-Democrat hysteria that had been willfully whipped up by
so many of its politicians, it was possible for the party to be
taken over by a fascist promising revenge.
And because there are only two major parties in the United
States, and either of the parties' nominees can become president,
such vulnerability in the Republican Party constitutes
vulnerability in our democracy.
I can't be a part of an organization that creates that kind of
risk.
What parties are for
My editor asked why I became a Democrat instead of an
independent. I did that because I believe political parties are
key vehicles for policy making, and choosing not to join one is
choosing to give up influence.
I agree with Sasse, the senator from Nebraska, that parties exist
in service of policy ends and that loyalty to the party
should be contingent on whether loyalty serves those ends.
Because of this, it is worth joining a party even if you do not
intend to be a partisan, and even if you will often oppose what
the party does.
Sasse was one of the earliest and loudest voices of resistance to
Trump in the Republican Party, and after the intra-GOP civil war
that is sure to ensue from Trump's loss, I wonder whether he will
decide remaining in the GOP does a service to the ends he cares
about.
Sasse is a lot more conservative than I am, so I don't expect him
to become a Democrat. It makes sense for people like him and
Kasich to try, after the election, to wrest control of the party
away from the conspiracy nuts and proto-fascists.
But I believe they will fail. And I'm not going to stick around
to watch.
CORRECTION: An earlier version of this article said Ted Cruz
had called Donald Trump a "con artist." It was Marco Rubio who
called him that. It's become difficult to keep track of which
Trump endorsers said which things about Trump's manifest
unfitness to be president.
This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Business Insider.
News broke Monday that
President Donald Trump appears to have plagiarized his family coat of
arms that appears outside of the Trump National Golf Club outside of
Washington. This weekend the Senior PGA Championship was hosted at the
golf club and the “Trump family coat of arms” was featured on signs all
over.
The actual emblem features three lions and two chevrons on a shield with a gloved hand gripping an arrow or spear, The New York Timesreported.
The coat of arms was originally granted by British authorities in 1939
to Joseph Edward Davies. He was the third husband of Marjorie
Merriweather Post, the man who built the Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida.
Ironically, he once served as the ambassador to the former Soviet Union.
The Trump Organization staged a hostile takeover of the coat of arms and replaced the Latin word for “integrity” with “Trump.”
Davies grandson Joseph D. Tydings, a former U.S. state senator from
Maryland, admitted there are members of his family who are ready to sue
Trump, but he cautioned against it. Tydings once worked for a large firm
that managed Trump. He told his family that the suit would end up
costing generations after them money.
“This is the first I’ve ever heard about it being used anywhere
else,” Tydings said of the coat of arms placement at the northern
resort.
When Trump tried to bring the American version to Scotland for his new development the authorities refused to allow the usage.
The Internet was not necessarily surprised by Trump stealing the coat
of arms. Instead of encouraging the lawsuit, the Internet sought
mockery instead:
@BraddJaffy Shall we talk about his fake ancestry in light of his "Pocahontas" jabs now?
@BraddJaffy
"Trump Org created Civil War memorial…commemorating a battle &
“river of blood” that never occurred, a plaque marking the fictitious
event…"
— Jesus McAmerican (@Jesus_McAmerica) May 29, 2017
I can't think of a better metaphor for Trump
admin. He stole his coat of arms from someone else but replaced
INTEGRITY w/ TRUMP on it–> https://t.co/Oi1CQ8Q8z5
A herald at the College of Arms, near St. Paul's,
helped me find the original coat of arms used by Trump, registered to
Joseph Davies. pic.twitter.com/zMTUkGXeA0
Walter Shapiro:
“Even under the benign theory that Kushner thought that a secret back
channel was like a small boy’s tin-can telephone, his life in the coming
months and maybe years will be a study in misery. He will probably
spend more time with his personal lawyer, Clinton Justice Department
veteran Jamie Gorelick, than with Ivanka or his children. Whether it is
an appearance under oath on Capitol Hill or the inevitable FBI
interview, every sentence Kushner utters will bring with it possible
legal jeopardy.”
“Kushner may have once thought that he established his tough-guy
credentials when he stared down angry creditors and impatient bankers
over his ill-timed 2007 purchase of a $1.8bn Fifth Avenue office
building. But the worst thing that can happen to an over-leveraged
real estate investor (as Trump himself knows well) is bankruptcy. When
the FBI and special prosecutor Robert Mueller get involved, the
penalties can theoretically involve steel bars locking behind you.”
Miscreants are beginning to learn what happens when one moves into the
public political sector. Once you do that, you expose yourself to a
microscopic inspection of every detail of your lives. It starts with the
media and can shift into law enforcement territory. Things you have
done that would have escaped scrutiny in the business world suddenly
become of great interest to one and all.
If the underbelly of your operations is caked with muck and
excrement from being dragged through untold swamps and garbage pits, all
of that will be fodder for the investigators, who now have unlimited
access to your every action and subterfuge. Your illegal doings,
fraudulent activities and supposedly hidden communications will now see
the light of day.
This is why crooks and blackguards should never seek political
office. As long as they avoid public scrutiny, they can often carry on
with impunity. But, as soon as they are elected by the people, interest
in them increases and investigations begin apace, both official and
unofficial. Everything will be turned over and what's underneath will be
analyzed.
It was not a good idea, Mr. Trump, to run for President and win. Not
a good idea at all. Now, everyone around you is subject to close
inspection and examination. Some, who you thought were loyal to you, may
not be as stalwart as you believed. Once your carefully knitted story
begins to unravel, the truth will eventually emerge.
Prepare yourself,
Donald, to be fully exposed. Fear is appropriate at this time.
Welcome home, Mr. President. Happy Memorial Day weekend, and
congratulations on an international trip free of major faux pas. Almost
forgotten is that within minutes of your wheels-up departure from the
United States more than a week ago came yet another revelation
pertaining to Russia and the election. It remains to be seen whether you
can keep some positive momentum going from your recent voyage. Let me
help by giving you some unsolicited advice, pro bono. I don’t know if
you’re not getting good counsel, or are ignoring the good counsel you
are receiving, but I’m going to assume it’s the former.
First, Robert Mueller’s appointment is the official statement of official Washington that if you broke the law, you’re out, one way or another: impeachment, indictment, or cabinet removal under the 25th Amendment.
I don’t know if you have broken the law, meaning whether you
have impeded official investigations, but I don’t agree with you that
this is a “witch hunt.” Not when former CIA chief John Brennan last week
testified to the House intelligence committee: “I encountered and am
aware of information and intelligence that revealed contacts and
interactions between Russian officials and U.S. persons involved in the
Trump campaign that I was concerned about because of known Russian
efforts to suborn such individuals. It raised questions in my mind about
whether Russia was able to gain the cooperation of those individuals.”
Brennan aside, there was already enough evidence relating to Michael
Flynn and the Russians to warrant the extraordinary act of the
appointment of Mueller as special counsel. After all:
You fired the person who was investigating Flynn (and maybe yourself)
after you allegedly first asked that investigator (former FBI Director
James Comey) for a loyalty pledge over a Jan. 27 one-on-one dinner at
the White House, according to the New York Times.
Then two weeks later, on Feb. 14, according to the Times, and
allegedly supported by a contemporaneous memo Comey wrote, you dismissed
Vice President Pence and Attorney General Jeff Sessions from the Oval
Office before asking Comey to stop investigating Flynn by saying, “I
hope you can let this go.”
And despite your initial contention that you’d relied on a May 9 memo
from Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein that discussed Comey’s
handling of the probe into Hillary Clinton, we know from your Comey
termination letter of the same date that you very much had Russia on
your mind (“While I greatly appreciate you informing me, on three
separate occasions, that I am not under investigation…”).
Then in March, according to the Washington Post, you urged Adm.
Michael Rogers, the director of the National Security Agency, and Daniel
Coats, the director of National Intelligence, to “push back” against an
FBI inquiry into possible coordination between Russia and your
presidential campaign.
The Post said that both refused and at least one
of them, Rogers, had his version recorded in a contemporaneous memo.
Further, according to the Post, “…senior White House officials sounded
out top intelligence officials about the possibility of intervening
directly with Comey to encourage the FBI to drop its probe of Michael
Flynn.”
That sounds awfully like President Richard Nixon conspiring with
chief of staff H.R. Haldeman to get the CIA to persuade the FBI to stop
its probe of Watergate.
And of course, just as you departed for Saudi Arabia, the New York
Times reported that you told the Russian foreign minister and ambassador
to the United States on May 10 in the Oval Office that Comey was a “nut
job,” and that his termination would relieve “great pressure,” a
revelation that your White House did not deny in its written response.
Taken together, that sounds like the behavior of someone impeding an
official investigation. And you can’t make what has happened go away.
Not by tweeting. Not by rallying the base or having your allies in
Congress or the conservative media complain.
We’re beyond that now. You need to hire a criminal defense lawyer and
follow that lawyer’s advice, which will no doubt include restraint. You
also need to engage a political adviser who will stand up to you — and
tell you when you are wrong — and you need to follow that advice.
The road ahead is pretty clear: It is nearly certain that the truth
will come out. Mueller is a straight-shooter who will get to the bottom
of this, and if you committed crimes, you will be removed. But
I’m not prejudging you. It’s premature and inappropriate to talk about
initiating impeachment.
Even if you get past your legal issues, the way — the only way — to
save your presidency is to stop talking about this issue, stop being
controlled by impulse and instead be governed by discretion and the law.
Assuming you do not become legally entangled, your presidency can be
rescued. After all, President Ronald Reagan faced many dark days in his
second term in relation to the Iran-contra scandal, but he got through
it by focusing on his work, not complaining, and maintaining discipline.
And pretty much the same thing happened with President Bill Clinton,
though that scandal was different.
You can pull out of the downward spiral. But only if you have it in
you to stay focused, stay on message, and follow the rules, the law, and
good advice.
Michael Smerconish can be heard 9 a.m. to noon on SiriusXM’s POTUS Channel 124. He hosts Smerconish at 9 a.m. Saturdays on CNN.
The White House's real position on bringing back coal jobs was revealed
after Trump economic adviser Gary Cohn made it clear in a meeting with
reporters that coal isn't even good feedstock anymore, and the future of
American energy is in natural gas, solar, and wind.
Here is what Cohn told reporters according to The White House Press Pool:
Cohn’s comments are the opposite of what Trump promised during the campaign when he said,
“We’re going to get those miners back to work … the miners of West
Virginia and Pennsylvania, which was so great to me last week, Ohio and
all over are going to start to work again, believe me.
They are going to
be proud again to be miners.”
The truth is that the coal jobs are gone, and they aren’t coming
back. Trump lied to former and current coal miners in places like West
Virginia, Ohio, Kentucky, and Western Pennsylvania.
It was a rare moment of truth from the Trump administration that is
likely to be walked back by the White House. The coal jobs aren’t coming
back. Trump’s advisers know this even as the President continues to
sell a fantasy to a depressed economic region of a coal based revival
that is never going to come.
U.S. House candidate Greg Gianforte
has been cited for assaulting a reporter from the Guardian at the
Republican's campaign headquarters in Bozeman, Montana.
Gianforte was cited for misdemeanor assault, according to the Gallatin County Sheriff's Office.
In a recording of the incident, Guardian reporter Ben Jacobs said he was "body-slammed" by Gianforte and wanted to call police.
A Fox News TV crew in the room reported seeing Gianforte grab Jacobs by the neck and slam him to the ground.
There is a genre of news story lately that has gotten old really damn
fast. It's the "Hey, here's a fucking dumbass who voted for Trump and is
now gonna be fucked by him" variety. Essentially, a diligent reporter
goes to some shitty place, finds one or more of the aforementioned
dumbasses, and gets them to say something along the lines of "Well,
Trump's budget and health care plan will leave me dying of cancer in a
ditch while my Congress member pisses on me, but I still support my
president."
For instance, on CNN, we meet Barbara Puckett
of Beattyville, Kentucky, which is the deepest shithole for white
people in the nation. Puckett's got sclerosis and is on Social Security
disability and food stamps, both of which are on the cutting board in
Donald Trump's savage budget. But she's not abandoning her man: ""I am
still happy with President Trump," she said.
AP reporters headed out across the country
to talk to a spectrum of people, from white idiots in New York to white
morons in Georgia to white dolts in Iowa. They all agree that they
couldn't give a happy monkey fuck about the stories about Trump and
Russia. It's all lies or bullshit, they say. Or you just ignore it, as
one Staten Island hairdresser said, "I didn’t want to be depressed. I
don’t want to feel that he’s not doing what he said, so I just choose to
not listen." A college student there offered his support by saying, "If
you’re wishing for him to fail, you’re basically wishing for the pilot
of the plane to crash." To which one could point out that if the pilot
doesn't know how to fly the plane, all the wishing in the world ain't
gonna help you.
(To be vaguely fair, one of the Staten Islanders did get off a decent
joke. When asked if anything could turn him against Trump, a man
replied, "If he gases his own people, yeah, I would be against him,"
which, c'mon, is kind of funny. Well, until Trump starts gassing
Brooklyn.)
Back in April, Nicholas Kristof wrote
about a whole bunch of Americans who will suffer if even a fraction of
Trump's budget were to be passed (which, let's face it, is the goal in
putting out such a nut-punchingly vicious document). They include a
70-year-old woman in Tulsa, Oklahoma, who is dependent on a job from the
Senior Community Service Employment Program, which Trump has proposed
slashing. She voted for the president because "he was talking about
getting rid of those illegals," of course. If the program is cut, she
said, "I’ll sit home and die."
But like almost everyone in these stories, she says she would vote for
Trump in 2020. That's just sick. These are sick fucks who don't care if
the god they worship wants to kill them.
The best mark in a con is the kind who doesn't believe they've been
conned, even when the con is revealed. Either they are so embarrassed
that it's easier just to double down on the delusion or they're that
fucking stupid. And, in the end, it doesn't matter because they'll line
up to be fleeced again.
Another genre of news story is of the wishful thinking variety. They say things like "Trump's Budget
Cuts Target His Voters" or "Wait Until Trump's Supporters See the Size
of the Dildo He's Fucking Them With" or "Man, Grandpa's Gonna Be Mad
When He Catches Trump Stabbing His Grandkids." And they all posit a
fantasy that Trump will cross some line, be it with health care or other
cuts, or even in his canoodling with Russia, that will make his
followers turn against him.
It's the same sort of hoping without any evidence that got us Trump in
the first place. I've said it before: Fuck the dumbasses. The hell with
the sick fucks. Don't court them. Don't count on them. Build up the
outreach to the people who didn't vote. And then get elected and pass
programs that help the dumbasses and everyone else.
Donald
Trump championed the 1,100 jobs he saved at a Carrier plant in Indiana,
but the real number of jobs saved was 800, and now out of those 800,
300 are moving to Mexico by Christmas, so Carrier got a $7 million
taxpayer handout and still shipped jobs to Mexico.
CNN reported,
“Donald Trump may have convinced Carrier not to move its Indianapolis
furnace plant to Mexico. But the company is still shipping about 300 of
its jobs to Mexico right before Christmas. In a formal notice to the
state of Indiana, the company detailed its plans to eliminate 338 jobs
at the plant on July 20, four supervisor jobs in October and a final 290
jobs on Dec. 22.”
Many more of the Carrier jobs that are staying in the US are going to
be gone in the future because more factories are moving towards
automation. The biggest threat to US manufacturing sector jobs isn’t in a
foreign country. It’s technology.
The Carrier scheme was always a fraud that designed to give a
corporation millions of dollars while making it look like Trump was
saving jobs, but just like everything else in the Trump presidency, the
talk never matches the action.
