Sound The TRUMPets! A Thread for Presidential Pondering 2016-2020(?)

[BasilValentine]

     The Catastrophic Performance of Bill Barr

     Wittes had hopes that Barr would only hand wave in the direction of stoogification while acting like an AG should, and I thought his argument made sense. That's all gone now.

Barr had a decades long career as a stooge and he was appointed by Trump. So how is anyone surprised he turned out to be a scumbag? For all we know, Barr could have acted to end the investigation prematurely, and we won't know until we get Mueller to testify publicly. Barr should be impeached — at least.

[drogulus]

Barr had a decades long career as a stooge and he was appointed by Trump. So how is anyone surprised he turned out to be a scumbag? For all we know, Barr could have acted to end the investigation prematurely, and we won't know until we get Mueller to testify publicly. Barr should be impeached — at least.

     I am not surprised, I thought that Wittes was correct to wait for confirmation of the worst.

[BasilValentine]

     I am not surprised, I thought that Wittes was correct to wait for confirmation of the worst.

Actually, the time to express dismay was before confirmation  — before Barr's confirmation to the post, that is. It was clear from the beginning why he was nominated.

[drogulus]

Actually, the time to express dismay was before confirmation  — before Barr's confirmation to the post, that is. It was clear from the beginning why he was nominated.

     I never doubted why he was nominated, or that Barr shouldn't be confirmed.

[SimonNZ]

Trump and Putin talked about the Mueller report — but not Russian meddling in 2020

"President Donald Trump's phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday was less notable for what was said than what wasn't.
In a more than hour-long call, which Trump characterized as a "very good and long conversation," the two leaders discussed what he referred to as the "Russian hoax," including their reactions to the Mueller report. Trump didn't, however, confront Putin directly about Russian meddling in upcoming US elections, a threat that was raised as one of the biggest takeaways in the incredibly comprehensive 400-page report.

According to White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders, Trump and Putin "very briefly" spoke about special counsel Robert Mueller's conclusion not to charge the Trump campaign with conspiring with Russia to interfere in the 2016 election. The conversation was "essentially in the context that it's over and there was no collusion, which I'm pretty sure both leaders were both very well aware of long before this call took place," Sanders said.

Sanders is right that Mueller did not find that Trump deliberately worked with Moscow to sway the 2016 election. But as a key line of the report states, the special counsel's 22-month investigation did establish "that the Russian government perceived it would benefit from a Trump presidency and worked to secure that outcome, and that the campaign expected it would benefit electorally from information stolen and released through Russian efforts."

Many top national security officials have also emphasized that Russian interference efforts aren't expected to subside as 2020 approaches. "We recognize that our adversaries are going to keep adapting and upping their game," FBI Director Christopher Wray said during an event last week, where he noted that Russia's ongoing meddling is a "significant counterintelligence threat."

Trump, however, said he did not question Putin about Russian meddling in future US elections during their recent call.

[...]

Despite the overwhelming evidence laid out in the Mueller report to the contrary, it appears Trump's feelings haven't exactly changed in the year since. Trump's dedication to pushing his "no collusion" message seems to have obscured his willingness to note that Russia was trying to mess with the US election at all."

[Todd]

Word of the week: Snitty.

Apparently, if press reports are to be believed, some Dems want Barr impeached.  Maybe said Dems can use the GMG Big Brain Brigade cum Constitutional Law Experts as advisors.

[BasilValentine]

Word of the week: Snitty.

Apparently, if press reports are to be believed, some Dems want Barr impeached.

Must be those crazies who think lying to Congress is a crime.

[SimonNZ]

Florida approves bill allowing teachers to carry guns in classrooms

[SimonNZ]

Trump tweets support for far-right figures banned by Facebook

"Donald Trump criticized social media companies after Facebook banned a number of far-right figures, declaring that he was "monitoring and watching, closely!!"

The president, who tweeted and retweeted complaints, including complaints from rightwing figures themselves, on Friday and Saturday, said he would "monitor the censorship of AMERICAN CITIZENS on social media platforms".

On Saturday, Trump tweeted harsh criticism of mainstream news organizations such as the Washington Post and New York Times, while lashing out against social media platforms for banning the editors of a prominent American conspiracy theory website, Infowars.

Trump retweeted multiple tweets denouncing the social media bans from an Infowars editor, as well as a one from far-right activist Lauren Southern, who has been banned from entering the UK for being deemed "not conducive to the public good".

Southern was part of a 2017 far-right expedition that hired a ship to attempt to interfere with operations to rescue refugees in the Mediterranean.

Trump has previously asserted that social media companies exhibit bias against conservatives, something the companies have rejected as untrue. His comments came after Facebook this week banned Louis Farrakhan, Infowars host Alex Jones and others, saying they violated its ban on "dangerous individuals".

The company also removed far-right provocateurs Milo Yiannopoulos and Laura Loomer, and Paul Nehlen, a white supremacist who staged an unsuccessful congressional bid in 2018, along with Jones' site, Infowars. The latest bans apply both to Facebook's main service and to Instagram and extend to fan pages and other related accounts.

Trump appeared on Infowars in 2015, during his Republican presidential primary campaign, and praised Alex Jones. "Your reputation is amazing. I will not let you down," he said."

[SimonNZ]

^compare and contrast with the above:

Trump Goes Totalitarian: Retweets Demand For Fox News To Pull Judge Napolitano Off The Air

"On Saturday, Trump retweeted a comment from a Twitter feed that had only 235 followers at the time that called for Judge Napolitano's removal from their airtime. A major component of the dictatorship/totalitarian rulers is to have a monopoly on the means of communication.
Napolitano has not shied away from refusing to bend the knee to Trump and support his every move, unlike so many allegedly patriotic Republicans. And for that, Trump is now calling for his removal from the Fox News Channel."

[SimonNZ]

Trump: 2 years of my term were 'stollen'

"President Donald Trump on Sunday floated the idea of extending his constitutionally limited time in office, complaining online that two years of his first White House term were "stollen" as a result of special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation.

"I now support reparations — Trump should have 2 yrs added to his 1st term as pay back for time stolen by this corrupt failed coup," Jerry Falwell Jr., a conservative religious leader and Trump ally, tweeted in a message reposted by the president.

Trump echoed Falwell's sentiment in a pair of tweets an hour later, writing online: "Despite the tremendous success that I have had as President, including perhaps the greatest ECONOMY and most successful first two years of any President in history, they have stollen two years of my (our) Presidency (Collusion Delusion) that we will never be able to get back."
[...]

The president's retweets regarding an extended stay in the Oval Office follow a New York Times report on Saturday in which House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she was concerned that Trump would refuse to give up power in 2020 if he lost reelection by a narrow margin."

[SimonNZ]

Trump furiously demands Mueller not appear before House Judiciary Committee in Twitter meltdown

"Reacting to news that special counsel Robert Mueller has made "tentative" plans to appear before a House Committee, President Donald Trump went on a furious Twitter rampage demanding Mueller not show up.

On Twitter, Trump ranted, "After spending more than $35,000,000 over a two year period, interviewing 500 people, using 18 Trump Hating Angry Democrats & 49 FBI Agents – all culminating in a more than 400 page Report showing NO COLLUSION – why would the Democrats in Congress now need Robert Mueller" before adding, ..."to testify. Are they looking for a redo because they hated seeing the strong NO COLLUSION conclusion? There was no crime, except on the other side (incredibly not covered in the Report), and NO OBSTRUCTION. Bob Mueller should not testify. No redos for the Dems!"

[SimonNZ]

US sends aircraft carrier and bomber task force to 'warn Iran'

"The US has deployed an aircraft carrier to the Middle East to send a "clear and unmistakable message" to Iran.

John Bolton, US national security advisor, said they were acting "in response to a number of troubling and escalatory indications and warnings".
The deployment of the warship was based on claims of a possible attack on US forces, Reuters news agency reports, quoting an unnamed US official.
Mr Bolton added that they would counter any attack with "unrelenting force".

In a statement, Mr Bolton said: "The United States is deploying the USS Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group and a bomber task force to the US Central Command region to send a clear and unmistakeable message to the Iranian regime that any attack on United States interests or on those of our allies will be met with unrelenting force."

[BasilValentine]

Anyone who has read the report carefully would respond "Duh!," but it's good to hear the opinions of former prosecutors:

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/hundreds-former-prosecutors-say-trump-would-have-been-indicted-if-n1002436

[Daverz]

US sends aircraft carrier and bomber task force to 'warn Iran'

"The US has deployed an aircraft carrier to the Middle East to send a "clear and unmistakable message" to Iran.

John Bolton, US national security advisor, said they were acting "in response to a number of troubling and escalatory indications and warnings".
The deployment of the warship was based on claims of a possible attack on US forces, Reuters news agency reports, quoting an unnamed US official.
Mr Bolton added that they would counter any attack with "unrelenting force".

In a statement, Mr Bolton said: "The United States is deploying the USS Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group and a bomber task force to the US Central Command region to send a clear and unmistakeable message to the Iranian regime that any attack on United States interests or on those of our allies will be met with unrelenting force."

That'll teach 'em not to interfere in our elections!

[71 dB]

Trump: 2 years of my term were 'stollen'

"President Donald Trump on Sunday floated the idea of extending his constitutionally limited time in office, complaining online that two years of his first White House term were "stollen" as a result of special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation.

"I now support reparations — Trump should have 2 yrs added to his 1st term as pay back for time stolen by this corrupt failed coup," Jerry Falwell Jr., a conservative religious leader and Trump ally, tweeted in a message reposted by the president.

Trump echoed Falwell's sentiment in a pair of tweets an hour later, writing online: "Despite the tremendous success that I have had as President, including perhaps the greatest ECONOMY and most successful first two years of any President in history, they have stollen two years of my (our) Presidency (Collusion Delusion) that we will never be able to get back."
[...]

The president's retweets regarding an extended stay in the Oval Office follow a New York Times report on Saturday in which House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she was concerned that Trump would refuse to give up power in 2020 if he lost reelection by a narrow margin."

Yeah, because he could not give tax cut's to the rich, de-regulate, appoint Supreme Court Justices, start trade wars, end Iran nuclear deal, witdhdraw from Paris Climate agreement, escalate chaos on southern border, sabotage ACA etc. Without Mueller's investigation he could have achieved all that... ...he hasn't have the time to start even WW3! Poor president!

I'm really feeling I'm done with this insanity. Maybe I should ignore all news and pretent all is fine and dandy in the World...

[BasilValentine]

"President Donald Trump on Sunday floated the idea of extending his constitutionally limited time in office, complaining online that two years of his first White House term were "stollen" as a result of special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation.

By my reckoning the Mueller investigation comes in sixth for time theft:
1. Golf
2. Fox News
3. Executive time
4. Twitter
5. Lying to MAGA yahoos
6. Trying to obstruct the Mueller investigation

[SimonNZ]

and:

What Happened to All the Jobs Trump Promised?

"President Donald Trump likes to claim credit for the American job boom. He's not the only president to celebrate job creation under his watch, but Trump is unusual among his peers for frequently attributing specific jobs at specific companies to his own actions.

The U.S. economy has been producing jobs at a healthy clip for years, creating 188,542 jobs a month on average in the first 24 months of Trump's presidency, compared with 202,417 jobs a month in the last 24 months of the Obama administration.

But how much credit does Trump deserve? We tracked the president's tweets and speeches about job creation to try to figure out how well his claims stacked up. The answer is: Not well.

Since the election, Trump has made 35 claims that companies would create 8.9 million jobs in the U.S. thanks to his policies and actions. Some of the new jobs he touted failed to materialize. Many of the new jobs he took credit for were, in fact, planned before he took office.

We found that only about 154,000 of those jobs have been created so far.

Roughly 122,000 of those were genuinely new positions, as opposed to slots that were planned before the presidential election.

The bottom line: Only 797 jobs are attributable to Trump, according to the companies that did the hiring. That figure is so small it represents less than even one person in this graphic.

Take Trump's claim in February that his daughter Ivanka created "millions of jobs" through the Pledge to America's Workers, a White House initiative to encourage professional development for workers across different industries. Trump later provided a more specific number: "Think of it: 6.5 million. And these are jobs that, for the most part, would not have happened."

But the "opportunities" pledged, which later went up to 7.9 million from over 200 companies, are, in fact, opportunities for retraining and continuing education, not necessarily new jobs.

Just before Trump took office, Alibaba chief Jack Ma stood with the president-elect and promised 1 million U.S. jobs.

But Ma later rescinded that commitment. "The promise was made on the premise of friendly U.S.-China partnership," Ma said in an interview with Chinese media. "That premise no longer exists today." In any case, the Chinese e-commerce giant wasn't planning to build facilities or hire coders in the U.S. The plan all along was to create 1 million indirect jobs by helping American companies sell goods to the Chinese market on its platforms.

Explore these claims for yourself. The promises are organized in chronological order. We confirmed all figures with company representatives and presented the results to the White House, which did not respond to our request for comment.:

[Trump claims compared with actual records for multiple companies continued in link (tl;dr: figures either planned before Trump elected or figures of jobs yet to be created)]

[SimonNZ]

Decade in the Red: Trump Tax Figures Show Over $1 Billion in Business Losses
Newly obtained tax information reveals that from 1985 to 1994, Donald J. Trump's businesses were in far bleaker condition than was previously known.

"By the time his master-of-the-universe memoir "Trump: The Art of the Deal" hit bookstores in 1987, Donald J. Trump was already in deep financial distress, losing tens of millions of dollars on troubled business deals, according to previously unrevealed figures from his federal income tax returns.

Mr. Trump was propelled to the presidency, in part, by a self-spun narrative of business success and of setbacks triumphantly overcome. He has attributed his first run of reversals and bankruptcies to the recession that took hold in 1990. But 10 years of tax information obtained by The New York Times paints a different, and far bleaker, picture of his deal-making abilities and financial condition.

The data — printouts from Mr. Trump's official Internal Revenue Service tax transcripts, with the figures from his federal tax form, the 1040, for the years 1985 to 1994 — represents the fullest and most detailed look to date at the president's taxes, information he has kept from public view. Though the information does not cover the tax years at the center of an escalating battle between the Trump administration and Congress, it traces the most tumultuous chapter in a long business career — an era of fevered acquisition and spectacular collapse.

The numbers show that in 1985, Mr. Trump reported losses of $46.1 million from his core businesses — largely casinos, hotels and retail space in apartment buildings. They continued to lose money every year, totaling $1.17 billion in losses for the decade."

In fact, year after year, Mr. Trump appears to have lost more money than nearly any other individual American taxpayer, The Times found when it compared his results with detailed information the I.R.S. compiles on an annual sampling of high-income earners. His core business losses in 1990 and 1991 — more than $250 million each year — were more than double those of the nearest taxpayers in the I.R.S. information for those years.

Over all, Mr. Trump lost so much money that he was able to avoid paying income taxes for eight of the 10 years. It is not known whether the I.R.S. later required changes after audits."

[SimonNZ]

White House invokes executive privilege to bar former counsel from turning over documents to Congress

The White House on Tuesday invoked executive privilege to bar former White House counsel Donald McGahn from complying with a congressional subpoena to provide documents to Congress related to special counsel Robert S. Mueller III's investigation.

The move triggered an immediate showdown with House Democrats, who threatened to hold McGahn in contempt of Congress if he refused to testify before the committee this month.

In a letter to the House Judiciary Committee, White House counsel Pat A. Cipollone said McGahn does not have the legal right to comply with its subpoena for 36 types of documents — most related to Mueller's nearly two-year probe of Russian interference in the 2016 election. Rather, Cipollone argued the committee needed to send the request to the White House — and even hinted the administration would assert privilege to block the information.


"The White House provided these records to Mr. McGahn in connection with its cooperation with the special counsel's investigation and with the clear understanding that the records remain subject to the control of the White House for all purposes," he wrote. "The White House records remain legally protected from disclosure under long-standing constitutional principles, because they implicate significant executive branch confidentiality interests and executive privilege."

But Democrats rejected the White House moves as illegitimate, arguing that the Trump administration hadn't officially completed the paperwork to assert privilege. And even if it had, the committee continued, it would not apply because the White House waived privileged for McGahn long ago.

In a Tuesday night letter to McGahn, Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) threatened to hold the former White House lawyer in contempt of Congress if he refused to testify before the committee in two weeks, when he faces another deadline to answer questions publicly."


Stephen Moore: Dems Rejected Fed Nomination Because They're 'Stupid and Evil'

"Last Thursday, former Trump campaign adviser Stephen Moore spent the morning telling reporters that his contested nomination for the Federal Reserve Board would not be withdrawn, claiming the White House was "all in." By lunchtime, Moore was all out.

Moore has spent a few weeks defending a library's worth of his past gaffes and bigoted statements in pursuit of the Fed nomination. Now the second half of that press tour has begun, in which the supply-sider is lambasting the left for drawing attention to his life's work. On the "America First" radio show, hosted by former White House deputy assistant Sebastian Gorka, Moore blamed "liberals" for the "campaign" that led to his canceled nomination.

"Why did they run this campaign against me? Because they were terrified of me," Moore said. "We always have this debate: Are liberals just stupid, or are they evil?" he asked. "I don't know — after this, I think they're stupid and evil."

It's an interesting thought, considering that many of Moore's notable quotes could conceivably fall somewhere along that same spectrum — with the bulk leaning toward stupid. A brief survey: Moore said at the 2016 Republican National Convention that he'd "get rid of a lot of these child-labor laws. I want people starting to work at 11, 12." In an appearance on CNN in 2017, Moore said that Robert E. Lee "hated slavery" and that the "Civil War was about the South having its own rights." Moore also made a joke about how Trump's first act as president would be to "kick a black family out of public housing." And in one of the most publicized quotes uncovered in the nomination process, Moore said in the early 2000s that "no women" should be involved in men's sports unless they're hot."