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You are here: Home / Clap on, clap off, the Clapper

Clap on, clap off, the Clapper

by DougJ|  March 8, 20172:49 pm| 312 Comments

This post is in: Manic Progressive

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Stuff like this makes it hard to take Glenn Greenwald seriously.

First, Clapper is a liar so Dems shouldn’t quote him about not wiretapping Trump

Shouldn't Democrats get someone more credible than James Clapper to make these denials? Like any randomly chosen person.

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) March 5, 2017

A few hours later, Clapper is a trusted authority on Trump’s (lack of) ties to Russia and we get a retweet of this.

Obama’s intelligence chief says he knows of no evidence of Trump-Russia collusion https://t.co/o3qch9L3xR pic.twitter.com/Io7W3t0s3z

— McClatchyDC (@McClatchyDC) March 5, 2017

(Obama’s intelligence chief is Clapper.)

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Reader Interactions

312Comments

  1. 1.

    Mnemosyne

    March 8, 2017 at 2:52 pm

    So we should listen to Clapper when he says what GG wants to hear, but not when he says things GG doesn’t want to hear.

    That sounds about typical.

  2. 2.

    smintheus

    March 8, 2017 at 2:52 pm

    Fair point. I’m uniformly skeptical of pretty much everything Clapper says, wouldn’t dream of taking his word on anything without independent evidence.

  3. 3.

    Mike in DC

    March 8, 2017 at 2:52 pm

    What’s Greenwald’s fallback if/when things go t*ts-up?
    “It’s not a crime to be skeptical of the intelligence community…”

  4. 4.

    bobbo

    March 8, 2017 at 2:54 pm

    I am starting to think that this Greenwald fellow is not very bright

  5. 5.

    gene108

    March 8, 2017 at 2:54 pm

    Greenwald has some nice articles against Bush & Co.’s torture policies. After that he’s sucked, big league.

  6. 6.

    hovercraft

    March 8, 2017 at 2:55 pm

    Like his new hero GG is prone to cite or dismiss a person based on whether that persons views advance his point. You cannot trust this evil corrupt man he lies about everything, except when he says I am a good and honest man.

  7. 7.

    Mike J

    March 8, 2017 at 2:55 pm

    @bobbo: Bright isn’t the issue. Honest is what he isn’t.

  8. 8.

    Major Major Major Major

    March 8, 2017 at 2:55 pm

    Didn’t mentioning Greenie used to result in pretty contentious threads here? As the world turns…

  9. 9.

    Thru the Looking Glass...

    March 8, 2017 at 2:56 pm

    Btw…

    Front page lead page of the SF Chronicle hard copy this morning:

    Hacking by CIA Alleged

    Front page lead story of Wall Street Journal hard copy this morning:

    Wikileaks Dumps US Spy Trove

    At least the Chronicle had the decency to put the word ‘alleged’ in their head line…

    Damn, I wish I had laid some bets down last night before going to bed…

    You KNEW this was going to happen… you could have set your watch by it…

    So now, a certain percentage of the population thinks Breitbart, Fox News, Info Wars, and PUTIN are a better source of information than their own stinkin’ government…

    It’s going to take years, if not decades, if it’s even possible, to fix the damage those arses have done to this country in less than 2 months…

    (Reposted from prior thread…)

  10. 10.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 2:56 pm

    Even without stuff like this, you would find something in which to shat upon GG with. Generally speaking, GG-Hatred-Syndrome has more to do with style rather than substance. His entire body of work that you choose to peck on some rather inconsequential tweets says more about you than Greenwald.

    Glad to see the GGHS still strong over here.

  11. 11.

    FlipYrWhig

    March 8, 2017 at 2:56 pm

    It’s almost like Greenwald is touchy and defensive about the deeds of Russia-friendly hackers for some reason.

  12. 12.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 2:58 pm

    @Mike in DC:

    What’s Greenwald’s fallback if/when things go t*ts-up?
    “It’s not a crime to be skeptical of the intelligence community…”

    WTF? Perhaps the most batshit inane comment I’ve seen in a while.

  13. 13.

    Yutsano

    March 8, 2017 at 2:58 pm

    Did Greenwald even bother to read the tweet? All Clapper said was that he had no knowledge, not that it didn’t happen. He really just wants his biases confirmed all the time.

  14. 14.

    Major Major Major Major

    March 8, 2017 at 2:58 pm

    @El Tiburon: I had no idea you were a fucking idiot. Good to know.

  15. 15.

    Mnemosyne

    March 8, 2017 at 3:01 pm

    @FlipYrWhig:

    It’s almost like Greenwald is touchy and defensive about the deeds of Russia-friendly hackers for some reason.

    Gosh, I can’t imagine why a guy who helped Snowden escape to the welcoming arms of the Russians would be resistant to believing that the Russians would then use the information Snowden gave them to screw with the US’s intelligence capabilities.

    Quite a mystery, that.

  16. 16.

    Mnemosyne

    March 8, 2017 at 3:02 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    The fact that GG is an apologist for Russian hackers has lost him a lot of friends around here, yes. Are you surprised that people would not feel very kindly towards a Russian apologist right now?

  17. 17.

    Jeffro

    March 8, 2017 at 3:03 pm

    It would surprise me a bit if there was ever direct evidence of Trump-Putin collusion.

    HowEVer, there most certainly, almost without a doubt, is quite a bit of evidence of Trump’s campaign and administration officials colluding with agents of the Russian government (to include its intelligence services and its puppet, Wikileaks) for the express purpose of causing havoc in our election (initially) and then electing Trump (later). Manafort, Page, Stone, Cohen, Flynn, and Kushner should, in any sane world – i.e., one with Democrats enjoying the majority they deserve in Congress – be testifying under oath about their involvement with Russia. And then subsequently going to jail.

    I still say Page will be the one to roll over on the rest.

  18. 18.

    hovercraft

    March 8, 2017 at 3:04 pm

    Since I despise GG , OT.

    Paying for Trump’s dubious immigration goals isn’t easy (or cheap)
    03/08/17 11:39 AM—Updated 03/08/17 12:19 PM
    By Steve Benen

    CNBC’s John Harwood talked this morning to a U.S. security official who described Donald Trump’s proposed cuts to the Coast Guard as “insane.” The official added it’d be a good idea to take a look at what it costs the Coast Guard to help oversee security “at Mar-a-Lago every weekend.”

    What’s this all about? The Washington Post reported on the Republican White House’s approach to paying for some of its security and immigration priorities.

    The Trump administration, searching for money to build the president’s planned multibillion-dollar border wall and crack down on illegal immigration, is weighing significant cuts to the Coast Guard, the Transportation Security Administration and other agencies focused on national security threats, according to a draft plan.

    The proposal, drawn up by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), also would slash the budget of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which provides disaster relief after hurricanes, tornadoes and other natural disasters. The Coast Guard’s $9.1 billion budget in 2017 would be cut 14 percent to about $7.8 billion, while the TSA and FEMA budgets would be reduced about 11 percent each to $4.5 billion and $3.6 billion, respectively.

    ……………The Post’s report added, “The plan puts the administration in the unusual position of trading spending on security programs for other security priorities at the southern border, raising questions among Republican lawmakers and homeland-security experts.”

    A Politico report, meanwhile, said Trump’s proposal for moving funds around – away from the Coast Guard and FEMA, towards his illegal immigration crackdown – “defies logic if the White House is serious about defending against terrorism and keeping out undocumented foreigners.”

    FSM forgive me, but I so want to pray for her to send a hurricane the likes as hasn’t been seen in decades to wipe Mar-a-Lago away. No casualties or anything, and I know he’d get the insurance money, but just to piss him off.

  19. 19.

    Doug!

    March 8, 2017 at 3:04 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    In this case, it’s substance.

  20. 20.

    rikyrah

    March 8, 2017 at 3:04 pm

    The Steele Dossier Is Increasingly Being Corroborated
    by Nancy LeTourneau
    March 8, 2017 11:15 AM

    One of the lessons that reverberates from the whole Watergate investigation is that “Deep Throat” counseled Woodward and Bernstein to “follow the money.” To the extent that holds for the investigation into whether or not the Trump campaign cooperated with Russian attempts to influence the 2016 election, a guy by the name of Mikhail Kalugin – head of the Economics Section of the Russian Embassy in the U.S. at the time – is a critical piece of the puzzle.

    While his name is misspelled, here is what the Steele dossier says about Kalugin:

    …a senior Russian MFA official reported that as a prophylactic measure, a leading Russian diplomat, Mikhail Kulagin, has been withdrawn from Washington at short notice because Moscow feared his heavy involvement in the US presidential election operation, including the so-called veterans’ pension ruse (reported previously), would be exposed in the media there.

    The “so-called veterans’ pension ruse” is reported in the dossier to be the way that Russia arranged to pay hackers and others who were involved in the presidential election operation. That report is dated September 14th and, as it turns out, Kalugin actually left DC and returned to Russia in August. Even more significantly, here is what McClatchy reported about Kalugin last month.

    A Russian diplomat who worked in the Washington embassy left the country last August while federal investigators examined whether he played a key covert role in the alleged Kremlin-directed plot to influence last fall’s U.S. elections.

    Two people with knowledge of a multi-agency investigation into the Kremlin’s meddling have told McClatchy that Mikhail Kalugin was under scrutiny when he departed. He has been an important figure in the inquiry into how Russia bankrolled the email hacking of top Democrats and took other measures to defeat Hillary Clinton and help Donald Trump capture the White House, said the sources, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the investigation.

  21. 21.

    Yutsano

    March 8, 2017 at 3:04 pm

    @Major Major Major Major: He’s been a Greenwald fluffer for quite a while now. It’s almost Pavlovian how he shows up whenever GG gets mentioned.

  22. 22.

    Calouste

    March 8, 2017 at 3:05 pm

    @Yutsano: Clapper said he knows of no evidence. He didn’t say he knows of no indications, suspicions, allegations, or suggestions that collusion was happening.

  23. 23.

    Brachiator

    March 8, 2017 at 3:06 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    Generally speaking, GG-Hatred-Syndrome has more to do with style rather than substance.

    No, it’s substance. I never thought much of him, and don’t find him worthy of being some special object of hatred.

  24. 24.

    rikyrah

    March 8, 2017 at 3:06 pm

    Why President Trump’s Leaked Immigration Order Is a Threat to Us All
    by Wendy Cervantes March 8, 2017

    In his first address to Congress, President Donald Trump boasted about his recent executive orders and promised to continue to push an immigration agenda that will prove deeply harmful and divisive.

    So far, the president’s immigration orders have had or threatened to have dire consequences for citizens and non-citizens alike—from tearing families apart to creating a climate of fear within whole communities. A leaked executive order threatens to undercut basic lifelines for low-income immigrant families, and could have serious long-term implications for us all, regardless of immigration status. As proposed, the executive order would deny admission to anyone deemed likely to receive a wide range of income-based supports that low-wage workers and their families, native-born as well as foreign-born, rely on in tough times. This proposal is not only inhumane, it is grossly unfair to millions of taxpaying Lawful Permanent Residents who would be denied benefits.

    For nearly a century, U.S immigration law has used the “public charge” test to ensure that newcomers do not end up relying on the government for their “subsistence” or basic survival, such as using public cash assistance—like the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program—as their primary source of support. But it has never been used to completely exclude people who will be working their way up from low-wage jobs. In fact, that is the traditional story of immigrants in America. Trump’s proposal, however, would drastically reverse longstanding guidelines for who would be excluded from the country.

    The proposal, for example, could make someone inadmissible to the United States if the Department of Homeland Security determines that she may at some point in the future attempt to access public nutrition assistance or health care. It would also punish permanent residents with deportation if they use these same types of programs within the first five years of entering the United States, a severe consequence only currently used in extremely rare circumstances.

  25. 25.

    Cacti

    March 8, 2017 at 3:07 pm

    @gene108:

    Greenwald has some nice articles against Bush & Co.’s torture policies. After that he’s sucked, big league.

    Yeah, it only took what 4, 5 years for Greenwald to realize that Bush sucked?

    Sharp as a tack, that one.

  26. 26.

    WereBear

    March 8, 2017 at 3:07 pm

    Hubris.

    Trump getting the Presidency will bring down the Trump Empire.

    And, I hope, the Republicans (your little dog) too.

    We haven’t seen brand-undermining like this since New Coke (which is even worse in retrospect, since they chose Bill Cosby for the roll out.)

  27. 27.

    tomanjeri

    March 8, 2017 at 3:07 pm

    > First, Clapper is a liar so Dems shouldn’t quote him about not wiretapping Trump

    Funny, when the cia/wikileaks broke on reddit, there was a massive influx of comments saying just that on their political subreddits.

  28. 28.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    March 8, 2017 at 3:07 pm

    I think “collusion” would be pretty hard to prove, I also think it’s moving the goalpost. The point of the investigation should be what the Russians did and why, collusion, like Sessions or Kushner having hushed up meeting with the ambassador, is just one part of it.

    @El Tiburon: Glad to see the GGHS still strong over here.

    glad that when I see your nym, I think “huh, haven’t seen a post from that jackass in a while…”

  29. 29.

    Gravenstone

    March 8, 2017 at 3:08 pm

    @Major Major Major Major: Oh no. He’s demonstrated that quite ably through the years. Sometimes seeing a reinforcing post is useful, though.

  30. 30.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 3:09 pm

    Thought experiment:

    I say: Joe Scarborough is a gigantic dbag.

    Then, I say: Even Joe Scarborough thinks Donald Trump is a gigantic dbag.

    Does the former cancel out the latter?

    This seems to me what GG is doing here.

  31. 31.

    Villago Delenda Est

    March 8, 2017 at 3:10 pm

    @rikyrah:

    creating a climate of fear within whole communities

    Fear is the mind killer.

    Donald wants to bring us all down to his level.

  32. 32.

    ? Martin

    March 8, 2017 at 3:10 pm

    @hovercraft: Far more undocumented immigrants are coming to the US on planes than crossing the border. It’s hard to believe, but you can even fly to the US from Mexico.

  33. 33.

    Yarrow

    March 8, 2017 at 3:10 pm

    @FlipYrWhig:

    It’s almost like Greenwald is touchy and defensive about the deeds of Russia-friendly hackers for some reason.

    He’s in deep with Snowden, who is a Russian agent. So…

  34. 34.

    patroclus

    March 8, 2017 at 3:10 pm

    I think Clapper is probably right on both counts. So far, there is no public evidence of actual Trump-Russian collusion; all we know as yet is that there were a series of meetings between the two camps and that the Russians actively hacked the election to the benefit of Trump. It’s certainly possible that the usual incompetence of the Trump team means that they weren’t colluding in the hacking; merely benefiting from it. And Clapper is certainly right about the delusional Trump lies about alleged Obama involvement in the investigation into Trump’s team collusion – that would have emanated, if at all, from the FBI and been presented to the FISA court. Dear Leader Greenwald wants Clapper to be right about the former – hence his approval – and wrong about the latter – hence his disdain. There is no cognitive dissonance in Dear Leader’s mind because he wants to protect/defend Trump and criticize/attack Obama. Meanwhile, Dear Leader’s supposed bugaboo – drones, attacks on Yemen, surveillance etc… continues and is expanding under Trump. So far, his Trump support/defense has overwhelmed his supposed concern about those issues. Eventually, I think he’ll come around, but not until he abets the criticism of the Russian connection. If and only if the Russian connection story fades will Dear Leader Greenwald return to what used to be his pet issues.

  35. 35.

    Doug R

    March 8, 2017 at 3:11 pm

    @El Tiburon: So you think he’s a smart feller?

  36. 36.

    Yarrow

    March 8, 2017 at 3:13 pm

    @Jeffro:

    I still say Page will be the one to roll over on the rest.

    Agreed. And he’s also the who most needs to avoiding drinking tea someone else offers him.

  37. 37.

    hovercraft

    March 8, 2017 at 3:13 pm

    @? Martin:
    When I tell MAGA fans that more people come here legally and overstay their visas then cross the border they don’t believe me.

  38. 38.

    Major Major Major Major

    March 8, 2017 at 3:14 pm

    @Gravenstone: I suppose I don’t keep an encyclopedia of people who are wrong on the internet in my brain.

  39. 39.

    MomSense

    March 8, 2017 at 3:16 pm

    @Major Major Major Major:

    Oh yes. The Drone Wars and l’affaire Snowden were good times.

  40. 40.

    schrodingers_cat

    March 8, 2017 at 3:17 pm

    @MomSense: Cole was a fan IIRC.

  41. 41.

    Brachiator

    March 8, 2017 at 3:17 pm

    @hovercraft:

    The Trump administration, searching for money to build the president’s planned multibillion-dollar border wall and crack down on illegal immigration, is weighing significant cuts to the Coast Guard, the Transportation Security Administration and other agencies focused on national security threats, according to a draft plan.

    Thanks for this. I saw a brief headline about this, but did not have time to go over the story.

    I don’t which I find more appalling. That Trump is so glaringly incompetent, or that the Republican Congress is so determined to back him up to the hilt.

    I joked with co-workers that if Trump somehow actually built his stupid wall, then coyotes should invest heavily in boats and small aircraft to bring people over. With a neutered Coast Guard, I would double down on that bet.

  42. 42.

    ericblair

    March 8, 2017 at 3:18 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    I think “collusion” would be pretty hard to prove, I also think it’s moving the goalpost. The point of the investigation should be what the Russians did and why, collusion, like Sessions or Kushner having hushed up meeting with the ambassador, is just one part of it.

    When we get to dig into this for real, I assume it’s going to be a lot of theft, embezzlement, and money laundering for all of them. The Russian government is a criminal organization that is running a country whose main exports are currently chaos and corruption. There’s no ideology to fight, just endless and boundless grabbing of money and power however possible. Scumbags like Roger Stone are freaking out now because Sessions isn’t there to run interference anymore, they each know what they did, and have a pretty good idea there are bugs under any rock the investigators will turn over.

  43. 43.

    hovercraft

    March 8, 2017 at 3:18 pm

    Remember how freaked out they all were over Ebola?

    CDC funding in the crosshairs in new Republican health plan
    03/08/17 10:26 AM
    By Steve Benen

    As recently as Friday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention expressed some notable concerns about a sudden surge in cases of H7N9 bird flu in China. NBC News reported that the CDC described the cases as “cause for concern,” quoting CDC flu expert Dr. Tim Uyeki saying that the recent infections constitute “by far the largest epidemic wave since 2013.”

    The same report added, however, that CDC officials are “working on a vaccine against H7N9 just in case it’s ever needed and is starting work on a second one now because it’s started to mutate.”

    It’s against this backdrop that House Republicans, just a few days later, announced some new budget cuts they intend to make.

    Bird flu has started killing more people in China, and no one’s sure why. Zika virus is set to come back with a vengeance as the weather warms up and mosquitoes get hungry. Yellow fever is spreading in Brazil, and antibiotic-resistant bacteria are evolving faster than doctors can keep up with them.

    And the new health care replacement bill released Monday night by Republican leaders in Congress would slash a billion-dollar prevention fund designed to help protect against those and other threats.

    Oh.

    The Prevention and Public Health Fund was created by the Affordable Care Act in 2010 as a way to help avert the spread of preventable illness. In recent years, the Fund has been used to support more routine programs, such as efforts to prevent heart disease, suicides, and diabetes, but it’s also included resources to prevent the spread of infectious diseases.

    This year, the Fund will account for 12% of the CDC’s entire budget.

    Vox also had a good piece on this, noting the impact on the federal government’s vaccines program.

    The Section 317 vaccines program has been called “the backbone of our nation’s immunization infrastructure.” It ensures doctors get the vaccination doses they need, helps people who can’t afford vaccines gain access to them, and mobilizes responses to outbreaks like measles, among other things. It would lose half its funding [under the Republican plan], which is frightening at a time when vaccination rates are already down in some states. […]

    So in addition to the potential fallout for individuals’ health care with changes to Obamacare, we are likely to see public health fallout, too.

    But don’t worry, the funding for tax breaks is secure.

  44. 44.

    Elie

    March 8, 2017 at 3:19 pm

    @Yarrow:
    Indeed. So far only Russians have turned up dead, but that can change. That eventuality would mark a real change in dynamics and my guess is there would be more than one willing to “sing”

  45. 45.

    Yutsano

    March 8, 2017 at 3:20 pm

    @Yarrow: I see Page seeing the writing on the wall and booking it back to Russia before that happens. Same for Manafort. But not all of them can run. And the remainder will have no one left to take the heat.

  46. 46.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 3:22 pm

    @Mnemosyne: Gosh, I can’t imagine why a guy who helped Snowden escape to the welcoming arms of the Russians

    Glad to see you are as demented as ever. Not gonna say I missed most of you over here so I won’t. But this statement is filled to the brim with horseshit.

  47. 47.

    Villago Delenda Est

    March 8, 2017 at 3:23 pm

    @patroclus:

    So far, there is no public evidence of actual Trump-Russian collusion; all we know as yet is that there were a series of meetings between the two camps and that the Russians actively hacked the election to the benefit of Trump.

    True, but there’s more evidence of conflicts of interest or improprieties than there ever has been about Hillary, yet ZOMG her emails nonsense went on for months, led by such scum as Mrs. Greenspan and Jake Tapper.

  48. 48.

    aimai

    March 8, 2017 at 3:24 pm

    @El Tiburon: They really aren’t the same thing as what GG is saying. Your analogy sucks.

  49. 49.

    Villago Delenda Est

    March 8, 2017 at 3:24 pm

    @El Tiburon: Well, it’s the sort of horseshit you deal in all the time, so you should know.

  50. 50.

    hovercraft

    March 8, 2017 at 3:24 pm

    @Brachiator:

    That Trump is so glaringly incompetent, or that the Republican Congress is so determined to back him up to the hilt.

    Actually if you follow the link, Steve Benen does have the following caveat at the end:

    t’s worth emphasizing that these cuts have been proposed, not made. This is all part of a budget plan Trump’s White House has sent to Congress, reflecting the president’s wishes and vision for how the administration should approach these security issues.

    It’s likely, however, that lawmakers will have very different ideas about the investments. This is important to the extent that it speaks to Trump’s priorities, but it doesn’t mean his budget goals will be implemented.

    I’m not sure that I’m as optimistic as he is about the GOP standing up to him. I think the only way they push back is if they are losing jobs in their states and districts, this is a signature issue for Twitler, he’s going to go to bat for it.

  51. 51.

    Cacti

    March 8, 2017 at 3:24 pm

    BJ has changed when we’re down to only one Glenn Greenwald groupie.

  52. 52.

    Major Major Major Major

    March 8, 2017 at 3:25 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    Not gonna say I missed most of you over here so I won’t

    By all means, feel free to miss us from somewhere more to your liking, you fucking idiot.

    @Cacti: maybe greenie himself can join us again.

  53. 53.

    Certified Mutant Enemy

    March 8, 2017 at 3:25 pm

    @? Martin:

    Also boats, which will be easier if the proposed reduction in Coast Guard funding goes through.

  54. 54.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 3:26 pm

    @Doug R: So you think he’s a smart feller?

    Compared to the snuff-rats over here, he’s an Einstein.

    I do generally find his analysis and commentary on most issues spot-on. He does wrankle the rank-and-file by not being an Obamabot or towing the party line. As I said, generally most criticisms I come across have less to do with substance (i.e. this post) and more to do with a dislike of him as a person.

  55. 55.

    TenguPhule

    March 8, 2017 at 3:29 pm

    @bobbo: Not being in the direct line of fire contributes to that. Now if he was personally in danger because of events, he’d of course be singing a different canary.

  56. 56.

    TenguPhule

    March 8, 2017 at 3:30 pm

    @El Tiburon: His judgement is on par with Trumps. That either makes him stupid or a Russian shill. Pick one.

  57. 57.

    MomSense

    March 8, 2017 at 3:31 pm

    @schrodingers_cat:

    There were many fans here.

  58. 58.

    rikyrah

    March 8, 2017 at 3:32 pm

    What if Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton Had Swapped Genders?
    A restaging of the presidential debates with an actress playing Trump and an actor playing Clinton yielded surprising results.
    Feb 28, 2017
    Eileen Reynolds
    Feb 28, 2017

    After watching the second televised debate between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton in October 2016—a battle between the first female candidate nominated by a major party and an opponent who’d just been caught on tape bragging about sexually assaulting women—Maria Guadalupe, an associate professor of economics and political science at INSEAD, had an idea. Millions had tuned in to watch a man face off against a woman for the first set of co-ed presidential debates in American history. But how would their perceptions change, she wondered, if the genders of the candidates were switched? She pictured an actress playing Trump, replicating his words, gestures, body language, and tone verbatim, while an actor took on Clinton’s role in the same way. What would the experiment reveal about male and female communication styles, and the differing standards by which we unconsciously judge them?
    Guadalupe reached out to Joe Salvatore, a Steinhardt clinical associate professor of educational theatre who specializes in ethnodrama—a method of adapting interviews, field notes, journal entries, and other print and media artifacts into a script to be performed as a play. Together, they developed Her Opponent, a production featuring actors performing excerpts from each of the three debates exactly as they happened—but with the genders switched. Salvatore cast fellow educational theatre faculty Rachel Whorton to play “Brenda King,” a female version of Trump, and Daryl Embry to play “Jonathan Gordon,” a male version of Hillary Clinton, and coached them as they learned the candidates’ words and gestures. A third actor, Andy Wagner, would play the moderator in all three debates, with the performances livestreamed. Andrew Freiband, a professor in the Department of Film/Animation/Video at the Rhode Island School of Design, provided the video design. (Watch footage from a Her Opponent rehearsal below.)

  59. 59.

    schrodingers_cat

    March 8, 2017 at 3:32 pm

    @TenguPhule: How about a stupid Russian shill.

  60. 60.

    Turgidson

    March 8, 2017 at 3:32 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    Greenwald made his reputation on reporting on American spying and surveillance abuses and/or their capacity to commit abuses. He got so invested in this crusade that he started describing the USA as a rogue police state, where unfriendly journalists get “disappeared” and the NSA is probably reading your emails right this minute!!! While there is, to put it charitably, plenty to criticize the US intelligence apparatus for, the extent to which he relied on hysterics and hyperbole, and occasionally just plain old bullshit, to make his case made him an extremely unreliable source for these stories over the years. But while he had clearly gotten carried away and turned into a full-time activist and ceased to be a straight journalist, it still seemed like he was sincere.

    Now he’s staunchly defending the honor of a regime that actually does all the things he has claimed the US government is a force for unspeakable evil for allegedly doing.

    He’s become a total fucking clown, but he’s too intoxicated on sniffing his own farts and convincing himself they smell like freshly baked cinnamon rolls to realize how ridiculous he has become.

  61. 61.

    Thru the Looking Glass...

    March 8, 2017 at 3:33 pm

    @Yutsano:

    I see Page seeing the writing on the wall and booking it back to Russia before that happens.

    I dunno… wouldn’t fleeing back to Putin’s open arms make it that much easier to disappear him?

    Once he’s inside Russia, who’s gonna know what happened to him?

  62. 62.

    TenguPhule

    March 8, 2017 at 3:35 pm

    @rikyrah:

    As proposed, the executive order would deny admission to anyone deemed likely to receive a wide range of income-based supports that low-wage workers and their families, native-born as well as foreign-born, rely on in tough times.

    Which suggests that 1) that support is in his crosshairs for destruction and 2) not content with our current crop of native rich assholes, he wants to import more foreign ones.

  63. 63.

    Major Major Major Major

    March 8, 2017 at 3:35 pm

    Well, you kids enjoy the troll, I have graphs to make.

  64. 64.

    Cacti

    March 8, 2017 at 3:36 pm

    Glenn Greenwald or Stormfront?

    Current illegal immigration – whereby unmanageably endless hordes of people pour over the border in numbers far too large to assimilate, and who consequently have no need, motivation or ability to assimilate – renders impossible the preservation of any national identity.

  65. 65.

    Brachiator

    March 8, 2017 at 3:36 pm

    @hovercraft:

    I’m not sure that I’m as optimistic as he is about the GOP standing up to him. I think the only way they push back is if they are losing jobs in their states and districts, this is a signature issue for Twitler, he’s going to go to bat for it.

    So far the only con that is bigger than Trump’s scam is the posturing of Congressional Republicans that they are in any way independent of Trump. They are a mutual aid society, supporting each other’s agenda. This is not to say that they are identical. Trump is bringing a special brand of paranoia and virulent white racism to the standard pro-plutocrat Republican platform.

  66. 66.

    hovercraft

    March 8, 2017 at 3:36 pm

    @Major Major Major Major:
    No thanks, I enjoy it when we are troll free.

  67. 67.

    Temporarily Max McGee (Until Death!)

    March 8, 2017 at 3:37 pm

    As I’ve been saying for YEARS, fuck that libertarian Kochsucker, high priest at the Shrine of St. Paul of Surfside, Glenn TL/DR Greenwald.

  68. 68.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 3:37 pm

    @aimai: They really aren’t the same thing as what GG is saying. Your analogy sucks.

    Well, I’ll give that my analogy may not be spot on, but the analogy itself does not suck and is illustrative of the point.

    You can question someone’s credibility but still use them as reference when the reference doesn’t really lean on their credibility. In other words, I don’t think Clapper’s comments on Trump/Russia are self-serving. He gets no benefit from these comments. At least as far as I can see.

    Again, Glen Beck may be batshit crazy, but when he says that Alex Jones IS batshit crazy, then his comment has merit.

  69. 69.

    patroclus

    March 8, 2017 at 3:37 pm

    @El Tiburon: The actual issue is that virtually everyone other than hard-core Trump-supporters believe that the Russian connection is a serious matter because it affects our democratic system and worked to elect a lying sociopath as POTUS. Dear Leader Greenwald, for months, has been downplaying the Russian connection and has more or less stopped covering drone attacks, the Yemeni war, eavesdropping and the like (not to mention gay rights) because downplaying the Russian connection, to him, is far more important. To the Dear Leader, attacking Clapper is, objectively, more important that questioning Trump. Is Dear Leader a Trump supporter/defender? He (presumably) says no, but there is no evidence of it. Why don’t you address Dear Leader Greenwald’s actual behavior rather than dreaming up nonsensical “thought experiments”?

  70. 70.

    BretH

    March 8, 2017 at 3:38 pm

    As for GG, it’s always best to keep in mind that if one’s argument is strong enough to stand on its own you don’t need to go overboard to make it. Consider just the last GG article – here are words and phrases that jumped out at me:

    the insane and toxic
    delusional tripe
    collective mania
    classic, evidence-free, unhinged, and increasingly xenophobic conspiracy theorizing masquerading as serious news
    crazed conspiracy mongering
    obsessive narrative
    desire, fantasy, and herd-enforced delusions
    deranged behavior
    spewing the most unhinged Birther-level conspiracies
    flagrantly insane
    unhinged, mainstream anti-Trump fanatics
    tripe
    crazed fanatical follower
    MSNBC’s partisan warriors

    and so on…

  71. 71.

    Barbara

    March 8, 2017 at 3:39 pm

    @hovercraft: Let’s pay to protect ourselves from imaginary threats by axing the budget for measures that protect us from actual threats.

  72. 72.

    Turgidson

    March 8, 2017 at 3:40 pm

    @BretH:

    The projection is strong in that one. Sheesh.

  73. 73.

    amk

    March 8, 2017 at 3:41 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    an Obamabot

    There it is. Moron with ODS.

  74. 74.

    aimai

    March 8, 2017 at 3:42 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    That is rankle. And toe, toe the party line.

  75. 75.

    Yarrow

    March 8, 2017 at 3:42 pm

    @Yutsano: I think they don’t always see the polonium tea coming. So far Page has stayed super busy being interviewed all over the place. Does he think there’s safety in publicity?

  76. 76.

    Barbara

    March 8, 2017 at 3:43 pm

    @? Martin: A lot of undocumented immigrants are just documented visitors that don’t leave.

  77. 77.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    March 8, 2017 at 3:43 pm

    Greenwald unclear on the concept “extraordinary claims, need extraordinary evidence”. Oh that’s right, Libertarian so Post Trurther. Perhaps Greenwald should be asking why the Democrats don’t have Commander Vrillon from the planet Asteron denying the allegations since he is such a fan of fantasy?

    Were are the little green space men Democrats?

  78. 78.

    amk

    March 8, 2017 at 3:43 pm

    @BretH: rush limbaugh of loony left.

  79. 79.

    aimai

    March 8, 2017 at 3:43 pm

    @El Tiburon: No, you really can’t use them as a reference point once you have said that they are unreliable. You should google Daniel Davies and “fibber’s forecasts”to understand why that is true.

  80. 80.

    JDM

    March 8, 2017 at 3:44 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    Even without stuff like this…

    But there is “stuff like this”, isn’t there?

    Greenwald is one of those guys who, for me, is like Christopher Hitchens or Bill Maher. I like their ability to write or talk when it’s something I can agree with, but much – maybe most – of the time they’re just idiotic.

  81. 81.

    pamelabrown53

    March 8, 2017 at 3:44 pm

    @Mnemosyne: #16.
    “GG…an apologist for Russian hackers”. Some where along the line, right about when wikileaks (Assange) and GG helped Snowden to have a safe landing in Russia, their ideology and rationale became garbled. It’s like they hate America so intensely that they only recognize American mistakes. And somehow, because of our economic and military hegemony, we must be thwarted. Doesn’t matter what say Russia, Brazil or even Equador does in the here and now the X-ray vision is focused on us. Truly epitomizes the far left fringe of “Hate America First”.

  82. 82.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 3:44 pm

    @

    just plain old bullshit,

    Can you link to a credible article to back this up?

  83. 83.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 3:45 pm

    @JDM:

    But there is “stuff like this”, isn’t there?

    Can you explain what the “stuff like this” is, is, exactly?

  84. 84.

    XTPD

    March 8, 2017 at 3:46 pm

    @BretH: I assume he writes the drafts to his blog posts entirely in green ink.

    Speaking of which: Why is it that the British press — especially the tabloids –are always at least 8x worse than their Transatlantic counterparts over here?

  85. 85.

    hovercraft

    March 8, 2017 at 3:48 pm

    What If Republicans Fail to Repeal Obamacare?
    by Nancy LeTourneau
    March 8, 2017 2:18 PM

    It’s time to imagine what might have seemed unthinkable just a few short months ago: what if Republicans fail to repeal Obamacare? The reason it seemed unthinkable is that as of November 8th, we knew that the GOP would control not only both houses of Congress – but the presidency too. They all made if very clear that their number one priority was to repeal Obamacare. What was there to stop them from doing so?

    It’s obvious now that VP Pence and Speaker Ryan are hoping to rush through their bill before the pushback gains any more steam and basically dare their colleagues to oppose it. Some pundits are suggesting that – in the end – conservatives will have no choice but to vote for it. On the other hand, the one guy who knows the inner workings of the Republican caucus better than anyone and has nothing to lose, John Boehner, has predicted that they won’t be able to pull it off. Who are you going to believe?

    Conservative John Fund captured the problem perfectly in one tweet.

    John Fund @johnfund

    Biggest obstacle to House health bill: 7 GOP senators on fence – 4 who said didn’t adequately protect Medicaid, 3 who say bill too generous
    8:46 AM – 7 Mar 2017

    12 12 Retweets
    11

    o the extent that those who are calling the Republican plan “Obamacare lite” are successful in making it less generous, moderate Republicans (especially those in the Senate who represent states that expanded Medicaid) will be further alienated. Ryan, Pence and Price have already gone farther than the right wing elements in the GOP will allow in protecting portions of Obamacare that the moderates want to see. So any changes will further alienate one group or the other. It’s pretty hard right now to envision a compromise that gets them the votes they need. House conservatives have even suggested that in order to pass, this bill will require Democratic support. Yeah, right. Like that is going to happen.

    The question becomes: what happens if they fail? As the Republican battle over this one takes shape, right now Trump is siding with the folks his base has often called the “establishment” in supporting the repeal bill. Not only does that put him at odds with groups like the tea party’s Freedom Works and the Heritage Foundation. Breitbart is going all-in on trashing the bill – as are right wing media stars like Laura Ingraham and Ann Coulter. This is probably part of the reason why Steve Bannon has been getting cold feet on repealing Obamacare. Any bill that can garner support from these folks is guaranteed to break every promise this administration has made about their “great” Obamacare replacement.

    If Trump continues to support a bill that the folks I have often called the “lunatic caucus” in his party oppose so strongly, that could destroy the one thing that has kept his base in line. He would become part of the establishment that cow-tows to Democrats – which is inhabited by RINOs like Ryan and McConnell.

    Because of this I expect that the president himself will be fairly quiet in his public statements about this bill, regardless of what Politico is reporting. Based on what conservatives said following a meeting with OMB Director Mulvaney last night, “the White House isn’t completely sold on the Republican House bill advancing through committees on Wednesday.” When/if it fails, he’ll re-join the lunatic caucus in blaming Republican leadership – which will be interesting to watch.

    On a larger scale, failure to repeal Obamacare puts the entire Republican agenda at risk. Pointing the fingers of blame will empower the lunatic caucus to revolt against GOP leadership in much the same way they battled against and finally brought down former Speaker Boehner.

    This is why the Democrats were right to go all-in on this fight for Obamacare – including assigning former Governor Steve Beshear to give the response to Trump’s speech, as Saahil recently pointed out. Nothing will do more damage to Republican control of Congress and the presidency than a momentum-stopping failure right out of the gate.

  86. 86.

    XTPD

    March 8, 2017 at 3:48 pm

    @JDM: William Maher SUPERGENIUS is a good ratfucker spoiled, and his views on health science are literally THE WORST.

  87. 87.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 3:50 pm

    @aimai:

    No, you really can’t use them as a reference point once you have said that they are unreliable

    So, if you say The Club for Growth are a bunch of charlatans and not to be trusted, you can’t then make note that they are against Trumpcare?

  88. 88.

    hovercraft

    March 8, 2017 at 3:51 pm

    @Barbara:
    You don’t have to worry about those “actual threats” anymore, you now have an administration that says”radical islamist terrorism”, that takes care of that problem, so now we can move all those resources to Mexico and the wall.
    See if you know what you’re doing, governing is easy.

  89. 89.

    West of the Rockies (been a while)

    March 8, 2017 at 3:52 pm

    @hovercraft:

    Bottom line, most Republicans are cheapskates: if they’re getting something free or inexpensively, awesome. If someone else is (in particular if they’re liberal, non-white, atheist or adherents to an “unapproved” religion, LGBTQ, etc.), screw them! Those people are just takers.

  90. 90.

    Turgidson

    March 8, 2017 at 3:53 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    From Glenn’s own mouth:

    “[Snowden is] doing very well, he’s obviously very happy for the obvious reason that he’s not going to be subjected to the standard whistleblower treatment that the United States government gives to people, which is to put them in a cage for decades and render them incommunicado.”

    Total fucking bullshit.

    Quote from this interview: http://www.nbcnews.com/video/andrea-mitchell/52655276#52655276

  91. 91.

    patroclus

    March 8, 2017 at 3:57 pm

    @El Tiburon: Of course one can say that. And you can also say that Dear Leader Greenwald wrote some really good articles from 2005-2008 and that what he is saying now in defense of Trump and in minimizing the Russian connection story is plainly wrong. Whereas he could be trusted a decade ago, he can’t be now because downplaying the Russian connection and defending Trump is not more important than drones and Yemen and surveillance. He should get back to what he did well – attacking Clapper rather than Trump is a colossal misjudgment and the Dear Leader should be accountable for what he is saying now.

  92. 92.

    Davebo

    March 8, 2017 at 3:58 pm

    I’m a little confused. Did Greenwald tweet the McClatchy story?

  93. 93.

    Yarrow

    March 8, 2017 at 3:58 pm

    @rikyrah: Mnem posted this last night. It’s a really fascinating article. People were really surprised by how they perceived both candidates once the roles were reversed. Very interesting.

  94. 94.

    Shalimar

    March 8, 2017 at 3:58 pm

    @MomSense: There was a time when Greenwald deserved a lot more fans. He has always been a condescending asshole who focused to hyper-dedication on his pet hobby horses to the exclusion of any context or nuance, but at least through the first year or so of the Obama administration you could argue that Greenwald was being consistent in his criticism even when our government became better on so many other issues.

    His biases have became far more apparent since then, and were probably obvious even before to those who had the patience to read all the way through the novels he called blog entries.

    eta: when he was really hilarious was defending the FDL PAC, when he and Hamsher raised a lot of money they mostly used to pay themselves.

  95. 95.

    Kay

    March 8, 2017 at 3:59 pm

    More Trump voters who hated Obamacare but also hate Trumpcare.

    These people are ridiculous. They want free healthcare – they don’t want to pay for it and they don’t want the government to pay for it either.

    One of them, a person who self-identifies as a Republican, is mad because he didn’t get the Medicaid expansion fast enough.

    I don’t want these voters. Under no circumstances should we even accept them. We can do better.

  96. 96.

    Yarrow

    March 8, 2017 at 4:01 pm

    @Barbara:

    A lot of undocumented immigrants are just documented visitors that don’t leave.

    Yep. They don’t put a tracking device on visitors with visas at the border so if they overstay their visa it’s not like someone can track them down. Wouldn’t surprise me if tracking devices started being required, though.

  97. 97.

    hovercraft

    March 8, 2017 at 4:03 pm

    @Kay:
    This is what I keep saying, these people are incoherent, even if we could contort ourselves into the pretzel logic required to be on the page as them, it would mean abandoning all of our principles and logic.
    We are definitely better than this, we just have to do a better job of getting the non crazy people to care enough to get out and vote.

  98. 98.

    Mnemosyne

    March 8, 2017 at 4:05 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    I can’t imagine why I would dislike a person who aided and abetted in the escape of a Russian operative while he was loaded down with NSA secrets.

    It must be because I dislike GG’s neckties, because there’s certainly no substantive reason to dislike someone who protected and defended a Russian operative in his flight to Russia.

  99. 99.

    aimai

    March 8, 2017 at 4:06 pm

    @El Tiburon: They can, and probably are, against Trumpcare for the wrong reasons. Two groups of Republican Senators oppose it right now for completely different reasons–one because its too generous to the poor, the other because its not generous enough. The Chamber of Commerce and I might share a conviction that it is also fiscally unsound, but they aren’t against it for that reason.

    You really don’t understand how thinking about things works, do you? I’m shocked, I remember you fondly from years ago on shared blogs. But this is just jaw droppingly dumb. This is not how logic or analogy or reasoning works. Not how any of it works.

  100. 100.

    Mike in DC

    March 8, 2017 at 4:06 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    Being skeptical of news about Russian interference and potential Trump collusion, in light of the weight of evidence,circumstances, etc, is an increasingly indefensible posture. Masha Gessen notwithstanding.

  101. 101.

    hovercraft

    March 8, 2017 at 4:08 pm

    So I guess today is Republican’s in Disarray day. The most read at WaPo today.

    The Daily 202: Trump will use bully pulpit to counter conservative revolt over Obamacare replacement
    Four risks the president takes by wading into the civil war
    By James Hohmann •

    Trumpism is now getting exposed as a monumental fraud
    The GOP health-care bill and Trump’s immigration plans are unmasking the scam.
    By Greg Sargent • Opinions •

    Ryan downplays conservative backlash against health-care plan
    “We’re going to keep our promises,” he said, calling the bill an “exciting conservative reform.”
    By Elise Viebeck

    Your “grown ups party” in action America.

  102. 102.

    Gin & Tonic

    March 8, 2017 at 4:08 pm

    @Yutsano: I’ll bet my next paycheck neither Page nor Manafort sets foot in Russia again.

  103. 103.

    Ksmiami

    March 8, 2017 at 4:09 pm

    @hovercraft: as someone who would benefit from the tax cuts they are immoral and Trump is quickly making the USA a place that will be unliveable: The GOP must be destroyed for America to survive. it’s binary

  104. 104.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 4:09 pm

    @patroclus:

    Dear Leader Greenwald

    What is this about?

    what he is saying now in defense of Trump and in minimizing the Russian connection story is plainly wrong

    Whoa, I don’t think either of these statements are true at all. My understanding is Greenwald’s contention is 1. to be very wary of what the intelligence agencies say, and 2. No evidence has yet to be presented on the ‘Russian connection’ story.

    So, 1. do you have a problem being extremely wary of the intelligent agencies.

    2. Can you link to any credible source showing actual proof on the “Russian Connection” at least when it comes to collusion in the election, or whatever it may be?

    FTR, I think there is something there, and I hope it is a shitstorm of material. I do feel that at some point Greenwald will have to eat a certain amount of crow. But, regardless, this in no way contradicts the strong statement of being very wary of US intelligent agencies.

  105. 105.

    XTPD

    March 8, 2017 at 4:09 pm

    @Mike in DC: You mean Keith Gessen, I believe.

  106. 106.

    gene108

    March 8, 2017 at 4:10 pm

    @? Martin:

    but you can even fly to the US from Mexico.

    That’s going to be one big ass border wall. Probably have to top out a bit higher than the Himalaya mountain range.

  107. 107.

    West of the Rockies (been a while)

    March 8, 2017 at 4:11 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    You’ve offered zero substance, just name-calling. Snuff rats?

  108. 108.

    Turgidson

    March 8, 2017 at 4:12 pm

    @Shalimar:

    There was a wide lane for Glenn to provide a blunt accounting of the areas where intelligence and surveillance and state secrets in the Obama presidency were failing to live up to the promises or hoped-for improvements of the Obama candidacy. And like you said, he seemed to be on that path for a while. Then it became more important for him to offer sneering, sanctimonious rants about how pretty much all Democrats are raging hypocrites who would walk off a cliff like lemmings if “Dear Leader” Obama told them to.

    Then he started ripping off quotes like the one I offered above – not just suggesting but explicitly claiming that the US government is ever and always a force for evil, with either no evidence or deliberately obfuscated and misleading evidence. This extended into his coverage of the Snowden Chronicles, where he stated as incontrovertible fact that the USA was absolutely doing all these things, all the time, to all people. Contrary evidence, such as to the safeguards that existed to prevent or minimize abuses by intelligence gatherers, was crammed into paragraph 973 where no one would see it or realize that it cut the legs out from the hysterical point Glenn was determined to make.

    And now, after all that, he’s just horrified that people would say mean things about Russia. Clown. Total clown.

  109. 109.

    satby

    March 8, 2017 at 4:12 pm

    OT rescue alert: anyone in CA looking for a dog? This guy is in trouble.

  110. 110.

    aimai

    March 8, 2017 at 4:15 pm

    @El Tiburon: There’s plenty of evidence of the russian connection—All of trump’s top people have either worked for the russians, or met with them, during the campaign. People’s suspicion of the russians is not based on the dossier, or intel at all. Its based on stuff Trump’s own people have admitted to.

  111. 111.

    Yarrow

    March 8, 2017 at 4:15 pm

    Pro Publica is doing good work:

    A Trump campaign aide who argues that Democrats committed “ethnic cleansing” in a plot to “liquidate” the white working class. A former reality show contestant whose study of societal collapse inspired him to invent a bow-and-arrow-cum-survivalist multi-tool. A pair of healthcare industry lobbyists. A lobbyist for defense contractors. An “evangelist” and lobbyist for Palantir, the Silicon Valley company with close ties to intelligence agencies. And a New Hampshire Trump supporter who has only recently graduated from high school.

    These are some of the people the Trump administration has hired for positions across the federal government, according to documents received by ProPublica through public-records requests.

    While President Trump has not moved to fill many jobs that require Senate confirmation, he has quietly installed hundreds of officials to serve as his eyes and ears at every major federal agency, from the Pentagon to the Department of Interior.

    Unlike appointees exposed to the scrutiny of the Senate, members of these so-called “beachhead teams” have operated largely in the shadows, with the White House declining to publicly reveal their identities.
    …
    The list we obtained includes obscure campaign staffers, contributors to Breitbart and others who have embraced conspiracy theories, as well as dozens of Washington insiders who could be reasonably characterized as part of the “swamp” Trump pledged to drain.

    There’s a description of a lot of them in the above article. Here’s the full list.

  112. 112.

    Betty Cracker

    March 8, 2017 at 4:16 pm

    @Turgidson: Excellent summary.

  113. 113.

    Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.)

    March 8, 2017 at 4:17 pm

    @Jeffro: I don’t know; I don’t think Trump is smart enough to keep out of that shit if his campaign was doing it. My guess is if they were in it, he was, too.

  114. 114.

    Yarrow

    March 8, 2017 at 4:19 pm

    @Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.): I think Trump’s meltdown last weekend happened because he got info showing he was recorded. That’s why he freaked out that “Obama spied on him.”

  115. 115.

    Miss Bianca

    March 8, 2017 at 4:20 pm

    @pamelabrown53:

    It’s like they hate America so intensely that they only recognize American mistakes. And somehow, because of our economic and military hegemony, we must be thwarted.

    I think you’ve hit on it. And while I might have fallen for this type of BS hook, line and sinker in my rabidly-lefty salad days, now…not so much. As others have pointed out, to become so blinded by one’s own hype as to ignore the *actual abuses* of a state like Russia in order to defend one’s hatred of *alleged abuses* by the US intel community is to become so exquisitely mentally challenged as to be almost poignant.

    Almost.

  116. 116.

    lgerard

    March 8, 2017 at 4:20 pm

    “We’re going to keep our promises,” he said, calling the bill an “exciting conservative reform.”

    it is all about demolishing Medicaid, the rest is just window dressing

  117. 117.

    Davebo

    March 8, 2017 at 4:21 pm

    I guess my point is that while I may be weak on the twitter machine I can find no evidence that Greenwald actually re-tweeted the McClatchy story. Maybe he deleted it.

  118. 118.

    Davebo

    March 8, 2017 at 4:22 pm

    Oops! Never mind. Found it. My tweet fu is obviously weak.

  119. 119.

    germy

    March 8, 2017 at 4:22 pm

    @West of the Rockies (been a while):

    You’ve offered zero substance, just name-calling. Snuff rats?

    I think he meant womp rats, but google translate wouldn’t recognize it.

  120. 120.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 4:23 pm

    @aimai:

    There’s plenty of evidence of the russian connection

    Well, now, I’m gonna get a bit Greenwald on you. Is the story really about a “connection”? And what exactly does a “connection” mean? Correct me if I’m wrong, but the story is simply not a ‘connection’ but some kind of collusion regarding the election or something else nefarious.

    And to be very specific, my understanding is Greenwald has said and continues to point out that no evidence from the intelligence agencies have been provided.

  121. 121.

    schrodingers_cat

    March 8, 2017 at 4:23 pm

    @Cacti: Not that different from a Senate speech in defense of the Johnson-Reed act of 1924. Designed to keep Italians and Jewish people out among others.

  122. 122.

    satby

    March 8, 2017 at 4:25 pm

    @satby: And update, the alert helped line up some potential adopters, so fingers crossed.
    Carry on.

  123. 123.

    rikyrah

    March 8, 2017 at 4:25 pm

    @Kay:

    I don’t want these voters. Under no circumstances should we even accept them. We can do better.

    truth Kay

  124. 124.

    schrodingers_cat

    March 8, 2017 at 4:25 pm

    @Turgidson: He delivered Snowden to Putin.

  125. 125.

    Yarrow

    March 8, 2017 at 4:28 pm

    Trump having dinner with Ted and Heidi Cruz tomorrow night.— Alan Rappeport (@arappeport) March 8, 2017

    Cruz has spoken out against the healthcare bill because it doesn’t go far enough. So this is likely Trump trying to twist his arm.

  126. 126.

    patroclus

    March 8, 2017 at 4:31 pm

    @El Tiburon: In my first post on this thread, I said that there was no evidence in public as yet that there was any collusion between the lying Trump team and the Russians. Can you read? There is, however, loads of evidence of all kinds of meetings and connections – ALL of which Dear Leader Greenwald has downplayed and minimized. There is no need for a link – I have personally witnessed Dear Leader Greenwald saying this many many many times on my very own TV. There is no doubt whatsoever what Dear Leader Greenwald’s position is on this. None. He is wrong. Plainly wrong. It comes from 19 different intelligence agencies from many countries; it comes from admissions out of the very mouths of the perpetrators; Manafort, Sessions, Flynn, Page and today – Trump himself. Dear Leader thinks that none of this matters – he has devoted articles, tweets, TV appearances and webchats to stating his view that the Russian connection is meaningless; that there is nothing to it. No conflicts of interest, no sleaze, no money connections, nothing. Let alone collusion. Moreover, until Dear Leader Greenwald is convinced that the meaningless Russia connection story is put to bed, he is not going to cover Trump-ordered drone strikes, special forces operations in Yemen, electronic surveillance, GITMO, gay rights or any other action by Trump until he is completely cleared on the Russian connection story. In pursuit of his Trump defense, he has virtually abdicated everything else – that is all he seems to care about. Please provide a credible link disputing any of this. Please provide a credible link that there was no Russian connection. Please provide a credible link of any article which Dear Leader has written critical of Trump in any way whatsoever.

  127. 127.

    germy

    March 8, 2017 at 4:32 pm

    Andrea Mitchell was escorted out of a “photo op” yesterday because she asked Tillerson too many questions. Shows how far the pendulum has swung to the right when people like Ms. Greenspan are considered … unruly.

  128. 128.

    Yarrow

    March 8, 2017 at 4:33 pm

    @germy: Wow. Really? I don’t think this kind of thing is going to go well for the Trump administration. It’s just going to piss off reporters.

  129. 129.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 4:33 pm

    @Davebo:

    Oops! Never mind. Found it. My tweet fu is obviously weak.

    Right. Now that I see the tweets in context, major hole in Doug’s original premise where he wrote this:

    A few hours later, Clapper is a trusted authority on Trump’s (lack of) ties to Russia and we get a retweet of this.

    The first tweet about Clapper’s credibility comes in at 12:04. The retweet about the McClatchy article comes in at 12:29, which is really not a few hours later. So, I think Greenwald saw Clapper’s comments, said shouldn’t dems find someone better, then retweets the story.

    Still not getting what the the “there” is all about. Sounds like the infamous Nothingburger.

    Shocked, I am not.

  130. 130.

    Mike in DC

    March 8, 2017 at 4:33 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    False. The confidential version of the IC report was substantially longer than the public version and included some info on sources and methods.

  131. 131.

    Stacy

    March 8, 2017 at 4:34 pm

    @Thru the Looking Glass…: @Jeffro: My bet is on Page too. He is just so squirrely.

  132. 132.

    Gin & Tonic

    March 8, 2017 at 4:34 pm

    @El Tiburon: You don’t need the CIA or NSA to know that Trump and his people met with Kislyak at the RNC in Cleveland and, hours later, the one and only change made to the Republican platform was inserted by the Trump team on explicit instructions, specifically on an issue that directly concerned Russia. You don’t eed the CIA or the NSA to know that Trump hired as his campaign manager a bloodsucking mercenary who has worked for VV Putin and who was only forced to quit the campaign when stories came out that he’d received a $12M cash payment from Putin-allied forces in Ukraine. You don’t need the CIA or the NSA to know how much Kushner owes Mogilevich and his allies. I can go on. This is all completely public knowledge that has been written about in various sources. “Collusion” or “connection”, it’s all the same to me.

  133. 133.

    Turgidson

    March 8, 2017 at 4:35 pm

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Of course. But Glenn is so morally pure, so virtuous, so true to his cause (just ask him, he’ll tell you!) that you’d think he would have negative things to say about Russia’s “disappearing” of whistleblowers, journalists, and the like, and defend Snowden’s presence there as the least-bad option available at the time, when the US was revoking his passport and trying to get him extradited so that he could face the music. But I don’t see any of that. Nope, just variants of “saying mean things about Russia is NeoMcCarthyism!!!” over and over. Clown.

  134. 134.

    germy

    March 8, 2017 at 4:35 pm

    @Yarrow: Yes. Reporters didn’t really begin negatively covering Combover Caligula until he started shitting on them.

    People you don’t want to piss off: traffic cops, administrative assistants, tigers… and people whose job it is to write stories about you.

  135. 135.

    patroclus

    March 8, 2017 at 4:36 pm

    @Mike in DC: El Tiburon, in his defense of the Dear Leader, apparently likes to ignore public documents which directly contradict his claims. Just like Dear Leader does.

  136. 136.

    Cacti

    March 8, 2017 at 4:36 pm

    My favorite Greenwald comment of late:

    I don’t believe that unelected intelligence officials should go rogue and undermine the elected government.

    -February 13, 2017

    Quite a change from his position during the previous administration.

  137. 137.

    Gin & Tonic

    March 8, 2017 at 4:36 pm

    @germy: Tillerson was meeting at the time with the FM of Ukraine, Pavlo Klimkin. What do you think she might have been asking about?

  138. 138.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 4:37 pm

    @patroclus: Look, obviously you are bit warped so I’m done with you. I leave you with this.

    U.S. Spy Report Blames Putin for Hacks, But Doesn’t Back It Up
    The long-awaited public report on Russia’s role in the DNC hack accused the Kremlin of working to elect Trump—without providing much new information to prove it.

  139. 139.

    nominus

    March 8, 2017 at 4:37 pm

    @aimai: …stuff they only admit to after they’re caught lying about it, which normally raises more questions.

    Especially since we’re dealing with a crowd that thought an HRC speech to Goldman was obviously a conspiracy amongst globalists, but sure, all of 45’s staff just happened to have meetings with several Russian officials that they clearly didn’t want to be public knowledge but they were just harmless, repeated, secret get-togethers to discuss the weather and sports.

  140. 140.

    Mnemosyne

    March 8, 2017 at 4:37 pm

    @Gin & Tonic:

    Ah, but you misunderstand the game. The game is to insist that all Western intelligence services are all corrupt liars, but that the only evidence you’ll accept is what comes directly from those intelligence services.

    It’s quite a catch, that catch-22.

  141. 141.

    Peale

    March 8, 2017 at 4:38 pm

    @Kay: Yep. America is exceptional because no one in the world spends the %GDP on health care. Not even close. We lap the world on that. At the same time, no one has figured out how to make it actually “Free”.

  142. 142.

    Thru the Looking Glass...

    March 8, 2017 at 4:39 pm

    @Gin & Tonic:

    I see Page seeing the writing on the wall and booking it back to Russia before that happens.

    I’ll back you on that one…

    What’s that old saying about the roach Motel?

    They can check but they can never check out?

    I saw some footage of Manafort, I think, being interviewed recently about this whole mess… and by the end of the interview he was a babbling wreck…

    If anyone here knows exactly which piece of video I’m referring to, pls post al ink… I’ve been looking for it since then and can’t find it…

    It was really rather astonishing… past a certain point, he appeared to be completely flummoxed…

  143. 143.

    Barbara

    March 8, 2017 at 4:39 pm

    @Yarrow: If I were Heidi Cruz I would not show for that dinner. They are like mistreated dogs, excusing Trump’s disgusting, perverted, or just pointlessly cruel behavior for a little pat on the head. It makes me ill.

  144. 144.

    patroclus

    March 8, 2017 at 4:39 pm

    @Gin & Tonic: Actually, it wasn’t a specific change to the platform – it was a proposed amendment to the platform which the Trump forces deliberately stopped from being included. Right after the Kislyak meeting. This is all public information. Was it “collusion”? Maybe not, but it was certainly influence. And it was certainly a “connection” right after a “meeting.” Dear Leader Greenwald and his acolytes just ignore the while thing.

  145. 145.

    Cacti

    March 8, 2017 at 4:39 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    And what exactly does a “connection” mean?

    Donald himself, Carter Page, Michael Flynn, Jeff Sessions, Jared Kushner, etc. meeting privately with Russian officials while Trump unequivocally denied it in public.

  146. 146.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 4:40 pm

    @Cacti:

    I don’t believe that unelected intelligence officials should go rogue and undermine the elected government.

    How so? Going rogue to undermine the elected government does not equal whistle-blowing to expose corrupt government. So, can you explain?

  147. 147.

    germy

    March 8, 2017 at 4:41 pm

    Here’s footage of Ms. Greenspan and others being shooed out of the Tillerson photo op
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hY3FNKPRatQ
    “We don’t have time to answer questions; this is just for appearances.”

  148. 148.

    trollhattan

    March 8, 2017 at 4:41 pm

    @Major Major Major Major:

    maybe greenie himself can join us again.

    His demonstrated affinity for sock-puppeting opens the possibility he is already.

  149. 149.

    Thoroughly Pizzled

    March 8, 2017 at 4:42 pm

    I never know to feel proud or ashamed that I’ve been personally insulted by a guy that Zachary Quinto played.

  150. 150.

    patroclus

    March 8, 2017 at 4:42 pm

    @El Tiburon: Typical. When confronted with facts, Dear Leader Greenwald’s minions refuse to respond. Just like Dear Leader Greenwald does. Despite that, the meetings occurred, the connections were made, the evidence exists. And the Dear Leader’s bots just walk away.

  151. 151.

    Yarrow

    March 8, 2017 at 4:43 pm

    @Barbara: She’s a Good Wife so she’ll be there. I feel bad for their daughters. Their older daughter has dad Ted’s number though. She knows he’s a shithead.

  152. 152.

    Captain C

    March 8, 2017 at 4:43 pm

    @Thru the Looking Glass…: Other than investigators, who’s going to even care?

  153. 153.

    Mike J

    March 8, 2017 at 4:43 pm

    I can not believe how badly PSG choked.

  154. 154.

    trollhattan

    March 8, 2017 at 4:44 pm

    @germy:
    Wow. Maybe now she can question her irrational exuberance for Republicans in general.

  155. 155.

    rikyrah

    March 8, 2017 at 4:44 pm

    @Yarrow:

    Completely unqualified hacks.

  156. 156.

    germy

    March 8, 2017 at 4:44 pm

    @Gin & Tonic:

    What do you think she might have been asking about?

    Mating habits of the wallaby?

  157. 157.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 4:45 pm

    @Cacti:

    Donald himself, Carter Page, Michael Flynn, Jeff Sessions, Jared Kushner, etc. meeting privately with Russian officials while Trump unequivocally denied it in public.

    Well, this is not merely about ‘connections’ in relationship to Greenwald’s reporting. He’s talking about the charges of hacking of DNC e-mails, etc. Not meetings.

    To date, there is no evidence of Russian hacking of the e-mails is there? Just speculation.

    See here.

    4. The U.S. government still has provided no evidence of its theories about Russian hacking.

    That Putin ordered Russian hacking of the DNC’s and John Podesta’s emails in order to help Trump win is now such consecrated orthodoxy that it’s barely acceptable in Decent Company to question it. But that obscures, by design, the rather important fact that the U.S. government, while repeatedly issuing new reports making these claims, has still never offered any actual evidence for them. Even the New Yorker article, which clearly views the theory as valid, acknowledges this fact:

    Recall that even hardened Putin critics and Western journalists in Moscow were aghast at how evidence-free these government reports have been. The lack of evidence for these theories does not, of course, prove their falsity. But, given the stakes, it’s certainly worth keeping in mind.

    And it further underscores the reasons why no conclusions should be reached absent a structured investigation with the evidence and findings made publicly available. Anonymous claims from agenda-driven, disinformation-dispensing intelligence community officials are about the least reliable way to form judgments about anything, let alone the nature of the threats posed by the governments they want Americans to view as their adversaries.

  158. 158.

    Captain C

    March 8, 2017 at 4:49 pm

    @BretH: Projection on his part, perhaps?

  159. 159.

    patroclus

    March 8, 2017 at 4:49 pm

    @El Tiburon: Exactly – Dear Leader Greenwald ignores the meetings because they don’t support his minimization of the obvious connections. Are you gonna provide the links asked for or are you gonna ignore the meetings just like every other Greenwald bot? Did the meetings occur? Can you even admit that? Or are you so much of a bot that you can’t even do that?

  160. 160.

    schrodingers_cat

    March 8, 2017 at 4:50 pm

    @El Tiburon: Does Putin pay per word? What about cut and paste?
    Asking for a friend. Thanks.

  161. 161.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 4:50 pm

    @Gin & Tonic:

    You don’t need the CIA or NSA to know that Trump and his people met with Kislyak at the RNC in Cleveland and,

    You are conflating ‘connections’ with the hacking of DNC/Podesta e-mails and the Russians releasing them. This is what Greenwald is referring to. According to Greenwald, there is no evidence from the intelligence agencies supporting this, is there? They’ve made the claims, but have not provided the evidence. I’m inclined to it being there, but it has not been provided yet. Do you disagree with this? I don’t think Greenwald has made any assertions denying there were meetings, etc.

  162. 162.

    Cacti

    March 8, 2017 at 4:50 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    Going rogue to undermine the elected government does not equal whistle-blowing to expose corrupt government

    Taking a job under false pretenses to steal classified information then fleeing with it to China and then Russia =/= whistle blowing under even the most generous legal definition of the term.

    Glad I could clear that up for you.

  163. 163.

    germy

    March 8, 2017 at 4:50 pm

    @trollhattan:

    Wow. Maybe now she can question her irrational exuberance for Republicans in general.

    the funny (or sad) thing is, the youtube video was uploaded by a RWNJ who calls her a “leftist” in the video title, and suggests she spent 8 years lazily kissing Obama’s ass, and now suddenly she’s got all this energy to attack our new and wonderful president. So I guess it’s bubbles within bubbles.

  164. 164.

    Mnemosyne

    March 8, 2017 at 4:50 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    Yes, the fact that Russian-financed Wikileaks had all of the emails is just a total co-inkydink.

    Weird how there are dozens and dozens of similar coincidences that all just happen to tie back to Russia, but of course GG never dares to look at the whole forest. He has to concentrate on a single leaf on a single tree lest he realize that he’s part of that same forest himself.

  165. 165.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 4:51 pm

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Asking for a friend

    LOL LULZ. No, really, that’s very funny, you know, the ‘asking for a friend’ thing. Very current. Glad you are on your game. Stay tough, sparky.

  166. 166.

    TenguPhule

    March 8, 2017 at 4:51 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    To date, there is no evidence of Russian hacking of the e-mails is there? Just speculation.

    Wikileaks is a Russian outlet.

    Wikileaks got the DNC emails.

    Donald Trump called on Russia to Hack the Democrats and leak.

    Wikileaks leaked.

    A + B = C

  167. 167.

    Cacti

    March 8, 2017 at 4:52 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    Well, this is not merely about ‘connections’ in relationship to Greenwald’s reporting.

    You asked what was meant by connections, and your question was answered.

  168. 168.

    Turgidson

    March 8, 2017 at 4:52 pm

    agenda-driven, disinformation-dispensing

    Greenwald knows a thing or two about this from personal experience. I’ll grant him that.

  169. 169.

    patroclus

    March 8, 2017 at 4:52 pm

    @El Tiburon: Are you ever gonna admit that the meetings occurred or are you gonna just be like Greenwald and never admit obvious facts?

  170. 170.

    germy

    March 8, 2017 at 4:52 pm

    @schrodingers_cat: The humorist Robert Benchley defined a free-lance writer as someone “who is paid per piece or per word or perhaps.”

  171. 171.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 4:53 pm

    @Mnemosyne:

    Yes, the fact that Russian-financed Wikileaks

    Holy shit, I knew you were Alex Jones!

  172. 172.

    TenguPhule

    March 8, 2017 at 4:54 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    According to Greenwald, there is no evidence from the intelligence agencies supporting this, is there?

    When every IC across the world except for Russia and China agree Russia did it, I would be inclined to believe them.

  173. 173.

    Stacy

    March 8, 2017 at 4:54 pm

    @Stacy: Squirrelly. :)

  174. 174.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 4:55 pm

    @patroclus:

    Are you ever gonna admit that the meetings occurred or are you gonna just be like Greenwald and never admit obvious facts?

    You are off your meds. This is not about meetings. LInk to where Greenwald said ‘no meetings have occurred”

    He is talking about Russia hacking DNC/Podesta e-mails then giving them to Wikileaks. Is there any evidence of this? Not just statements from whomever?

  175. 175.

    Turgidson

    March 8, 2017 at 4:55 pm

    @germy:

    Well I must admit that I’m surprised to see Mrs. Greenspan so full of vigor so soon after the election. I assumed she went into a catatonic state of deep depression when she realized there would be no reason for her to spend four more years yammering on about Hillary’s damned emails. That had become her sole purpose in life, and it can be tough on anyone when that’s taken away.

  176. 176.

    divF

    March 8, 2017 at 4:56 pm

    Thank Bog we don’t thread comments. It makes it much easier to skip over El Tiburon’s moronic screeds.

  177. 177.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 4:56 pm

    @TenguPhule:

    When every IC across the world except for Russia and China agree Russia did it, I would be inclined to believe them.

    I. AM. TOO.

    Doesn’t change this fact: has any IC provided any evidence? If the answer is no, then this proves what Greeenwald has been saying. Don’t you get this?

  178. 178.

    Mike in DC

    March 8, 2017 at 4:56 pm

    Evidence, in this case, and at this point, is going to largely consist of SIGINT and HUMINT. Disclosing the first publicly has the problem of revealing to those you are monitoring that you are doing so, and potentially how you are doing it. Disclosing the second publicly has potentially fatal consequences for your sources.

    Transcripts might eventually be produced, along with photos and some confessions by co conspirators, but we are not there yet. I’d point out that the conclusion that Russia was behind the hacks was the universal consensus of the IC, plus several private cybersecurity firms, other European Intel agencies and several prominent experts.

  179. 179.

    germy

    March 8, 2017 at 4:56 pm

    In the weeks after WikiLeaks released the D.N.C. e-mails, John Mattes, a Bernie Sanders organizer who ran a Facebook page for supporters in San Diego, noticed a surge of new adherents with false profiles. One “Oliver Mitov” had almost no friends or photographs but belonged to sixteen pro-Sanders groups. On September 25th, Mitov posted to several pro-Sanders pages: “new leak: Here Is Who Ordered Hillary To Leave The 4 Men In Benghazi!—USAPoliticsNow.” It was a baseless story alleging that Clinton had received millions of dollars from Saudi royals. Mattes said, “The fake news depressed and discouraged some percentage of Bernie voters. When I realized it, I said, ‘We are being played.’ ”

    http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/03/06/trump-putin-and-the-new-cold-war

  180. 180.

    TenguPhule

    March 8, 2017 at 4:57 pm

    @Gin & Tonic: Or at least, not upright.

  181. 181.

    Archon

    March 8, 2017 at 4:57 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    So multiple people around Trump met with Russia, our intelligence agencies (which Republicans in Congress don’t dispute) say that Russia interfered to help Trump get elected but we aren’t supposed to believe that Russia and Trump were in collusion?

    I get Trump fanboys reasoning for pretending all that smoke equals no fire, what’s your excuse?

  182. 182.

    patroclus

    March 8, 2017 at 4:57 pm

    @El Tiburon: You’re one of the best Greenwaldbots I’ve ever seen. Are you ever going to admit that the meetings occurred or are you so blinded by your love for Greenwald that you can’t? Please provide a link from either Dear Leader or you admitting that the meetings occurred. Can you at least go that far or are you going to persist with your non-factual denials?

  183. 183.

    Thru the Looking Glass...

    March 8, 2017 at 4:58 pm

    @Captain C: I have no idea what point you think you’re making…

  184. 184.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 4:58 pm

    @Cacti:

    You asked what was meant by connections, and your question was answered.

    True. That’s why I’ve been veering back to what Greenwald has actually been saying: No evidence provided by Intelligence on Russia hacking e-mails. Don’t think he has said anything on ‘connections’ or meetings.

  185. 185.

    Thru the Looking Glass...

    March 8, 2017 at 4:59 pm

    @TenguPhule: Don’t forget…

    For all the leaking going on… not one email from the RNC…

    And given that Sean Spicer was so astute that he tweeted his own password…

  186. 186.

    Cacti

    March 8, 2017 at 4:59 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    You are off your meds. This is not about meetings.

    You asked what was meant by connections. Ample evidence of connections between the Trump campaign and Russian officials was provided.

    Now you’re trying to move the goalposts.

    You’re a bore.

  187. 187.

    TenguPhule

    March 8, 2017 at 5:00 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    has any IC provided any evidence? If the answer is no, then this proves what Greeenwald has been saying.

    No it doesn’t. Our executive branch is COMPLETELY COMPROMISED. No IC worth their salt is going to endanger their sources and operations just because GG thinks he knows better then they do. But whatever happened in the closed door briefings got even TRUMP to admit the Russians were involved.

  188. 188.

    patroclus

    March 8, 2017 at 5:00 pm

    @El Tiburon: Why do you think he’s avoiding the issue of whether the meetings occurred? Why are you? Did the meetings occur?

  189. 189.

    pamelabrown53

    March 8, 2017 at 5:01 pm

    @Miss Bianca: #115,
    Thank you. My past history was to go to and with the rabbitty left. Oh, you said “rabidly”. I just can’t do pure ideology anymore. For instance, you mentioned ignoring Russian “actual abuses”. Yet somehow there are leftetly-lefts who might accuse of me “red-baiting”. I just don’t get it: if your government defines classes of people as enemies and either kills or incarcerates them, then what does it matter? Horrific outcome is horrific..

  190. 190.

    Thru the Looking Glass...

    March 8, 2017 at 5:01 pm

    @Turgidson: Thanks a lot… I’m gonna have a really hard time going anywhere near cinnamon rolls now…

  191. 191.

    Gin & Tonic

    March 8, 2017 at 5:01 pm

    @El Tiburon: I am not ‘conflating’ anything. I said not one word about Greenwald or the DNC or Podesta. I am pointing out the obvious publicly-available sources pointing to Russian influence over the Trump campaign and administration. Influence which you and Greenwald avoid discussing at all costs.

  192. 192.

    randy khan

    March 8, 2017 at 5:01 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    I was once a fan of GG, but as I’ve said before I got tired of him, largely because he desperately needs an editor and because it seems to be impossible for him to concede even the slightest point (even the possibility that people who disagree with him do so in good faith).

    Despite that, I admired his courage in the Snowden affair (although I’m fairly ambivalent about Snowden’s actions, for a variety of reasons). Lately, though, he’s just come across to me as a crank and strangely on the side of Russia, even though his avowed principles would suggest that he should dislike the Russian government as much as he’s disliked the U.S. government. And, frankly, it’s hard to fathom why he isn’t going after Trump 24/7 – whatever he disliked about the Bush and Obama approaches to intelligence, etc., it’s evident that the current administration will be worse.

  193. 193.

    EriktheRed

    March 8, 2017 at 5:01 pm

    @El Tiburon: You’re in a hole…stop digging.

  194. 194.

    bemused

    March 8, 2017 at 5:02 pm

    @Kay:

    A very large percentage of Republican voters are chronic cranks. They bitch about everything even when they get what they want.

  195. 195.

    TenguPhule

    March 8, 2017 at 5:02 pm

    @Thru the Looking Glass…: The RNC must be trading kiddie porn on their emails. It would explain a lot.

  196. 196.

    germy

    March 8, 2017 at 5:03 pm

    While officials in the Obama Administration struggled with how to respond to the cyberattacks, it began to dawn on them that a torrent of “fake news” reports about Hillary Clinton was being generated in Russia and through social media—a phenomenon that was potentially far more damaging. “The Russians got much smarter since the days of rent-a-crowds and bogus leaflets,” one Obama Administration official said. “During the summer, when it really mattered, when the Russian social-media strategy was happening, we did not have the whole picture. In October, when we had it, it was too late.”

  197. 197.

    Thru the Looking Glass...

    March 8, 2017 at 5:03 pm

    @Stacy: Perhaps that is why Page keeps giving interviews… the more he appears in public, the safer he thinks he is?

  198. 198.

    Boatboy_srq

    March 8, 2017 at 5:04 pm

    @TenguPhule: Plus, most of us know how lot use English and not get tripped up by those nasty homophones.

  199. 199.

    Thoroughly Pizzled

    March 8, 2017 at 5:04 pm

    “These emails present the unvarnished truth about the evils of the Clinton campaign.”

    “You can’t say that Russia hacked the emails without proof!”

  200. 200.

    patroclus

    March 8, 2017 at 5:04 pm

    @randy khan: El Tiburon won’t even admit that the Russians met with members of the Trump campaign. Just like Greenwald. Greenwald and his bots just will not concede the smallest point – even when it’s obvious.

  201. 201.

    Roger Moore

    March 8, 2017 at 5:04 pm

    @hovercraft:

    The Trump administration, searching for money to build the president’s planned multibillion-dollar border wall and crack down on illegal immigration, is weighing significant cuts to the Coast Guard

    Because there’s no chance that illegal immigrants could come here by boat.

  202. 202.

    Thru the Looking Glass...

    March 8, 2017 at 5:05 pm

    @TenguPhule: I do wonder if the Russians did manage to blackmail the RNC into going along w/ this… something along the lines of:

    Go along with us and you’ll end up in control of the country… buck us and we’ll destroy you…

  203. 203.

    TenguPhule

    March 8, 2017 at 5:07 pm

    @Roger Moore: Trump knows Mexicans can’t swim. They live in a desert, right?

  204. 204.

    randy khan

    March 8, 2017 at 5:08 pm

    @Kay:

    I don’t want these voters. Under no circumstances should we even accept them. We can do better.

    I want all of the voters we can get. In the case of people like these, I want them to come because they’re really mad at the Republicans, or because they have seen the error of their ways, not because our side changed its positions to get them. (I’m okay with some targeted messaging, so long as it’s consistent with our positions, but nothing more.)

  205. 205.

    Yarrow

    March 8, 2017 at 5:09 pm

    Well, look at this…Jeff Sessions likely met the Russian Ambassador a third time.

    Attorney General Jeff Sessions was forced to amend prior testimony to Congress this week, acknowledging that contrary to an earlier statement, he’d encountered the Russian ambassador to the United States twice in the last year.

    Sessions appears to have left out a third instance in which they crossed paths.

    In April of 2016, Sessions attended a VIP reception at a hotel in Washington, D.C., with President Donald Trump and roughly two dozen guests, including four ambassadors. One of them was Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak. The cocktail meet-and-greet took place in a private room at the Mayflower Hotel near the White House. Shortly thereafter, Trump delivered a foreign policy speech in the hotel’s ballroom, where he called for improved U.S.-Russia relations. Kislyak was seated in the front row.
    …
    Sessions did not mention the Mayflower event when he was asked during his confirmation hearings if he had any contact during the presidential campaign with Russian officials. Nor did he put that event in his amended testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee this week.

    So many meetings. So hard to remember them all!

  206. 206.

    Another Scott

    March 8, 2017 at 5:10 pm

    @germy: Thanks for the pointer. It’s almost a book, but it looks like a really good read.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  207. 207.

    TenguPhule

    March 8, 2017 at 5:12 pm

    @randy khan:

    I want them to come because they’re really mad at the Republicans, or because they have seen the error of their ways, not because our side changed its positions to get them.

    I believe the term you’re looking for is expendable meatshields.

    Which is all they’re really good for.

  208. 208.

    germy

    March 8, 2017 at 5:15 pm

    @Boatboy_srq:

    Plus, most of us know how lot use English and not get tripped up by those nasty homophones.

    google translate is working on that. Should be up to speed on homophones in time for the 2018 elections; definitely by 2020. Expect a lot of dirt on Gillibrand’s venture capitalist husband, etc.

  209. 209.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 5:15 pm

    @Gin & Tonic:

    Influence which you and Greenwald avoid discussing at all costs.

    At all costs? Don’t be so dramatic. There is no doubt there is something there between Russia and the Trump people.

    To be concise: no evidence of Russia hacking e-mails.

  210. 210.

    Another Scott

    March 8, 2017 at 5:17 pm

    @Thru the Looking Glass…: I don’t think the second half would even need to be said. The GOP has demonstrated time and again that they will do anything to win.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  211. 211.

    Major Major Major Major

    March 8, 2017 at 5:18 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    To date, there is no evidence of Russian hacking of the e-mails is there? Just speculation.

    Figured I’d scroll through the thread and see what I missed, but it’s just more of you being a fucking idiot, quelle surprise.

  212. 212.

    Hobbes83

    March 8, 2017 at 5:18 pm

    @El Tiburon: lol, GGHS? You made a funny. The man is so intellectually and morally bankrupt that it is no surprise that he is burning what’s left of the infinticimally small credibility he has left in defending Trump. It’s almost as if Glenn sees Trump as a kindred spirit.

  213. 213.

    Miss Bianca

    March 8, 2017 at 5:19 pm

    @pamelabrown53: Actually, I like “rabbity-lefty salad days” better, but that’s because the image tickles me so much! MAD RED RABBIT IS MAD!! AND RED!!

    There, now I’ve got both the “rabidly” and the “rabbity” in there!

  214. 214.

    randy khan

    March 8, 2017 at 5:20 pm

    @TenguPhule:

    Expendable meatshields who vote the straight Democratic ticket are still voting the straight Democratic ticket, if you know what I mean.

    On a more serious note, my Lutheran upbringing makes me believe in grace and redemption, so I always will hold out hope that people will see the light. Heck, I saw it with one of my Facebook friends in 2016, who keeps saying he’s a conservative, but who gradually shifted from “what am I going to do?” to “I might have to vote for her” to affirmatively saying “I’m with her” (and who now might as well have one of those resistance jpegs as his Facebook photo). So it can happen.

  215. 215.

    TenguPhule

    March 8, 2017 at 5:21 pm

    @El Tiburon: Except the closed door briefings say otherwise. There’s no evidence that GG can see, but then again, GG is selectively blind.

  216. 216.

    Miss Bianca

    March 8, 2017 at 5:21 pm

    @Yarrow: Yeah, but no evidence of Russian hacking of emails, so we’re all good here, comrade.

  217. 217.

    Another Scott

    March 8, 2017 at 5:22 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    To be concise: no evidence of Russia hacking e-mails.

    You’re either being willfully blind or you[‘]r[e] playing semantics.

    Here’s a link for you.

    HTH.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  218. 218.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 5:22 pm

    @patroclus:

    El Tiburon won’t even admit that the Russians met with members of the Trump campaign.

    This is utter bullshit. Going back to the McClatchy article, there is no evidence of COLLUDING.

    Again, for the record, will state it again: I believe there is some dirty shit going on here and I think it will come out. But right now, as I type this, there is NO evidence* of any collusion. I believe there is smoke which will lead to the fire.

    Otherwise, someone please link to the actual contents of these meetings that will lead us to Trump or others getting thrown in jail ’cause I’d love to see it.

  219. 219.

    trollhattan

    March 8, 2017 at 5:22 pm

    @Yarrow:
    Jesus, these people.

    If Teflon Don can wriggle through all this subterfuge and misdeeds then he’s effing INVINCIBLE. Not placing my bet, yet.

  220. 220.

    patroclus

    March 8, 2017 at 5:23 pm

    @El Tiburon: “Something there”?????? That must have been real hard for you to admit – it only took you 209 posts in the thread to do it after being asked directly repeatedly. Wow! What do you think about the “something there”? Is it meaningless like Greenwald says/implies? Or is it possibly circumstantial evidence of something? Please be specific.

  221. 221.

    Turgidson

    March 8, 2017 at 5:24 pm

    @Kay:

    I’m fine with these people and anyone else voting for Democrats. What I’m not fine with is watching the Party launch some sort of snipe hunt where they try to figure out how to shamelessly dupe and pander to these voters’ grievances and delusions as effectively as Hair Furor did. Make the case for our priorities to these voters, but don’t change our priorities to cater to their resentments and misunderstandings.

  222. 222.

    Yarrow

    March 8, 2017 at 5:26 pm

    Trump: “Wikileaks. I love Wikileaks!” Video.

  223. 223.

    trollhattan

    March 8, 2017 at 5:27 pm

    @Another Scott:

    willfully blind

    Okay to stop right there.

  224. 224.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 5:27 pm

    @Another Scott:

    You’re either being willfully blind or your playing semantics.

    No, but you took my comment out of context. I’ll try again for you.

    To date, and I’ll gladly be corrected, none of the intelligence agencies have provided evidence that the Russians (govt, not some random hackers) hacked into the DNC e-mails and provided those to Wikileaks.

    This is the crux and genesis of the entire: “GREENWALD WON’T ADMIT TRUMP PEOPLE MET WITH THE RUSSIANS!!!!!”

    All of the intelligence agencies say this is so, yet they have provided no evidence. We’ve all been fooled before, so it is wise to be skeptical. But until clear evidence emerges of hacking or actual collusion, then I’m not going to count my chickens. Trust me: I want it to be true.

  225. 225.

    Barbara

    March 8, 2017 at 5:30 pm

    @El Tiburon: What would be evidence of colluding? Colluding is a state of mind. You have no idea what was or was not said at these meetings and most likely we will never know because no one who is there has any interest in incriminating themselves. This is like people refusing to believe the incidence of child abuse because the abuser didn’t do it right in front of them. What abuser ever does? The president should be an OPEN BOOK about contact with Russian agents or bankers or spies or ambassadors. Instead he and his minions have deceived us at every turn. This is one case where yes, we are entitled to an explanation and to be given some evidence that there is no there there. This isn’t a criminal trial with a jury that needs to be persuaded beyond a reasonable doubt. There is no other president in the history of the United States that has raised this kind of suspicion. WE SHOULD NOT HAVE TO WONDER AT ALL WHETHER THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OR ANY OF HIS CLOSEST ADVISERS HAS MORE LOYALTY OR FEALTY TO RUSSIA OR ANY OTHER FOREIGN POWER THAN HE DOES TO THE UNITED STATES.

  226. 226.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 5:31 pm

    @patroclus:

    Is it meaningless like Greenwald says/implies? Or is it possibly circumstantial evidence of something? Please be specific.

    Ok, you be specific: Is what meaningless exactly? That there have obviously been meetings between Trump folks and the Russians? If so, did Greenwald imply this was meaningless? If so, can you show me where?

    Again, I think and believe there is something going on. But what is it? I don’t know. I have not seen any evidence of what it is. I’ve never once stated that any meetings were meaningless because I don’t believe it. But this does not negate the very real fact there zero evidence exists of what transpired during these meetings. Or at least none that I’ve seen.

  227. 227.

    patroclus

    March 8, 2017 at 5:31 pm

    @El Tiburon: I’m amazed – you avoided answering the direct question for so long that I was beginning to think you were just like Greenwald in blatantly ignoring the obvious and abjectly refusing to deal with it in any way. You held out for so long not admitting the obvious that it was like you were going for some kind of a record. I asked and asked and asked, politely, with sarcasm, and parroting your personal insults and you held out and held out and held out. In following the Greenwald modus operandi, you were really quite good.

    Now that you’ve finally, after being asked for so long and so many times, admitted the obvious, what do you think the obvious connections reveal? Does it bother you that, in the 3 meetings that Sessions had with Kislyak, that something definitive resulted therefrom? In 4/16, it resulted in a part of a “foreign policy” speech. In 7/16, it resulted in the rejection of a platform plank amendment. In 9/16, it was in the context of the reports that the Russians were hacking and it resulted in even more Wikileaks material. Do you, like Greenwald, believe that this is all merely a coincidence? Will it take repeated questions to get you to address this or are you just going to pull a Greenwald again?

  228. 228.

    FlipYrWhig

    March 8, 2017 at 5:31 pm

    Glenn Greenwald repeatedly voiced a theory that Democrats worked in concert to sandbag progressive achievements by taking turns being the one responsible for there being too few votes to make it past the requisite threshold. He called it “villain rotation.” He said there could be no other explanation for why progressive agenda items didn’t pass. IOW, he was quite willing to believe that all Democrats are part of a cabal dedicated to inflicting harm on their own voters for spite. But he’s not willing to believe that Russian hackers hacked things, because there’s just not enough evidence to satisfy him. He is one of the most hideous, un-self-aware, rotten little dipshits afflicting American leftish politics.

  229. 229.

    Another Scott

    March 8, 2017 at 5:32 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    none of the intelligence agencies have provided evidence that the Russians (govt, not some random hackers) hacked into the DNC e-mails and provided those to Wikileaks.

    They haven’t provided evidence to you or to Glenn.

    As you know, that’s not their job. Their job is to inform policy makers in the US government.

    They have done so.

    You can believe the policy-makers statements about what they have been told about the Russian interference, or not.

    But the evidence is out there, and other trusted sources outside the government say the same thing.

    So, again, either you’re being willfully blind, or you’re playing semantics.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  230. 230.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 5:33 pm

    @Barbara:

    What would be evidence of colluding? Colluding is a state of mind. You have no idea what was or was not said at these meetings and most likely we will never know because no one who is there has any interest in incriminating themselves.

    So, you want your gut feeling to do what? You want to impeach Trump on a ‘state of mind’ that may or may not exist? Do you realize what you are saying? Evidence be damned, a crime was committed!!! You sound like a typical Republican.

  231. 231.

    Aleta

    March 8, 2017 at 5:34 pm

    Think Progress, Nov. 2016:

    On December 11, 2015, in the depths of a biting Moscow winter, The Right to Bear Arms hosted a delegation from its American counterpart, the NRA. David Keene, an NRA board member and former national president of the organization, flew to Russia to attend the event. Also at that meeting were NRA First Vice President Pete Brownell, CEO of the world’s largest firearm accessories supplier; NRA funder Dr. Arnold Goldschlager and his daughter, NRA Women’s Leadership Forum executive committee member Hilary Goldschalger; and Outdoor Life channel head Jim Liberatore. Perhaps the most famous guest at the gathering, trading his customary uniform for a black leather vest over a button-down shirt, was Milwaukee County Sheriff and Fox News regular David A. Clarke.

    The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel’s Daniel Bice noticed that Clarke’s January 2016 ethics disclosure filing shed some light on the trip. Part one was $20,155 trip to Israel, paid for by the NRA Ring of Freedom. During his week-plus of travel there, he did a remote interview from Jerusalem for Fox Business Network. The remaining days were spent in Russia. His airfare to Moscow and visas, totaling $13,785.10, were paid for by Brownell; his $6000 worth of meals, hotel, transportation, and excursions were provided by the “All-Russia Public Organization ‘The Right to Bear Arms.’”
    Clarke’s office declined to release any records to Bice about the trip, the reporter wrote, “saying it was personal — not official — travel, even though personal trips (a.k.a. vacations) are not supposed to be listed on the ethics form.”

    More about the Russian organization in the article.

  232. 232.

    J R in WV

    March 8, 2017 at 5:34 pm

    @WereBear:

    Well, now, WereBear, New Coke’s introduction served its purpose admirably.

    Which was to change the recipe for original Coca-Cola from pure cane sugar to High-Fructose Corn Syrup without setting off the storm of criticism that welcomed New Coke. Thereby making the Coke Corp several extra jillions of dollars annually, and making Coke more addictive than it was originally.

  233. 233.

    Mike in DC

    March 8, 2017 at 5:34 pm

    What we know:
    1. Hacks occur
    2. Trump says nice things about Russia
    3. Numerous people in Trump campaign meet with Russians
    4. Intel community concludes hacks are by Russia
    5. Trump.orders change to platform re Russia policy
    6. Wikileaks starts publishing hacked docs
    7. Trump.messaging starts to coincide/correlate with leaked docs, sometimes preceding by a day or three
    8. Trump continues to express skepticism that Russia behind the hacks, even when a lot of Republicans say they’re convinced.
    9. Insert whole Flynn episode here

    There’s a bunch of other stuff, but this is at the very least what would be called “pattern evidence”. You have party A acting in a manner that benefits party B; the parties meeting on numerous occasions; party B suggesting their election will benefit party A and taking real measures to show that; the two parties seemingly coordinating their messaging; party B going out of its way to challenge the conclusions of the intelligence community; etc.

    There’s no smoking gun, but that doesn’t mean there’s zero evidence of collusion. More correct to say no “conclusive” or irrefutable evidence of collusion.

  234. 234.

    Miss Bianca

    March 8, 2017 at 5:35 pm

    @Kay: I’m sorry, but these people are “common-clay-of-the-New-West” morons, and I am sick to death of their whining about shit they obviously don’t understand and don’t care to try to understand. They have “gold-plated healthcare” but hate the ACA – which probably made it possible?Their son has a $13,000 deductible, and they blame the ACA for that? What was it before? What would it be without it? And he had to take a second job to pay for such a high-deductible insurance plan? Honky, please. Something about that story smells like fish, and not in a good way.

    Emerson Slain, a nonprofit worker and Republican in Ferriday, Louisiana, says he’s been harmed by Obamacare. But like the protesters in Washington on Tuesday, he’s not sure the replacement plans will improve matters. He also gained coverage under the law that he doesn’t want to see disappear.

    “Obamacare” forced the guy to stop paying for private insurance when he qualified for Medicare? Obamacare was responsible for his doctor’s not taking Medicare? Or was that the doctor’s decision? Or state law getting in the way? Why does this reporter not even pose these questions?

    I just…I can’t even…Oh, Christ on a cracker. If only it was just the common clay that would be swept up in the shit tsunami that looms on the horizon. But no…

  235. 235.

    TenguPhule

    March 8, 2017 at 5:35 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    But what is it? I don’t know. I have not seen any evidence of what it is.

    We’ve drawn you a picture, illustrated it in color, added stop motion effects and you still can’t admit what it is?

  236. 236.

    Mnemosyne

    March 8, 2017 at 5:36 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    Alex Jones writes for the Guardian?

    Careful, your circle of trusted news sources keeps shrinking the more you keep trying to stick to Dear Leader’s approved line of discussion.

  237. 237.

    Another Scott

    March 8, 2017 at 5:37 pm

    @Mike in DC: 0. “Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross-section of a lot of our assets,” Trump’s son, Donald Jr., told a real estate conference in 2008, according to an account posted on the website of eTurboNews, a trade publication. “We see a lot of money pouring in from Russia.”

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  238. 238.

    Kay

    March 8, 2017 at 5:37 pm

    @FlipYrWhig:

    He says in the piece that Trump is the result of the “complete failure of the Democratic Party”. Completely exonerates Trump and his voters.

    I don’t think it matters. The whole premise of this thing is Clinton was too hawkish on Russia and Trump won’t start wars. Since this belief that Trump won’t start wars is solely based on what Trump said it’s just fanciful. Trump lies constantly. No one has any idea what Trump thinks or will do. None.

  239. 239.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 5:38 pm

    @Another Scott:

    They haven’t provided evidence to you or to Glenn.

    Agreed. To date: no evidence has been provided (to the public.) Is what I just wrote in BOLD wrong in any way? You can choose to believe what intelligence agencies tell our politicians without seeing it for yourself. Fool me once, you know?

    So I’ll say again: NO evidence has been provided (to the public) on any collusion/hacking/or anything else. By me saying this does not mean I believe there is nothing going on. It proves I want to see the evidence before I believe it. And have I said that I want to believe it? Yes, I have said that.

    Hey, and Cheers to you mate!

  240. 240.

    Mike in DC

    March 8, 2017 at 5:39 pm

    @Another Scott: well, yeah. The full list would number in the hundreds.

  241. 241.

    TenguPhule

    March 8, 2017 at 5:39 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    All of the intelligence agencies say this is so, yet they have provided no evidence.

    Why do you keep repeating this lie?

    Members of Congress got to look at it. TRUMP GOT TO LOOK AT IT. Even TRUMP had to admit the Russians were involved.

  242. 242.

    Barbara

    March 8, 2017 at 5:39 pm

    @El Tiburon: The minimum requirement of patriotism is for Congress to refuse to do anything Trump wants until he comes clean with them. If that results in impeachment then it results in impeachment. What I am talking about goes way beyond the technicalities of criminal law. You and Greenwald: throwing around insults and grand accusations without data as if they were confetti, and then requiring the finest, most precise and highest caliber of evidence once anybody challenges you.

  243. 243.

    Mnemosyne

    March 8, 2017 at 5:39 pm

    @randy khan:

    And, frankly, it’s hard to fathom why he isn’t going after Trump 24/7 – whatever he disliked about the Bush and Obama approaches to intelligence, etc., it’s evident that the current administration will be worse.

    When you look at GG’s soft spot for white supremacists — and I’m talking about his love for Ron Paul and Julian Assange, not his work as an ACLU lawyer — it’s not very mysterious at all.

  244. 244.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 5:40 pm

    @Mnemosyne: Can you point to the place in the article where it states Wikileaks is financed by the Russians?

  245. 245.

    TenguPhule

    March 8, 2017 at 5:40 pm

    @El Tiburon: Moving the goalposts…again.

    Look, even Trump couldn’t deny it after the briefing. Why are you insisting on being dumber then Trump? It does you no favors.

  246. 246.

    Baud

    March 8, 2017 at 5:41 pm

    @FlipYrWhig:

    Glenn Greenwald repeatedly voiced a theory that Democrats worked in concert to sandbag progressive achievements by taking turns being the one responsible for there being too few votes to make it past the requisite threshold.

    I believe the term is “kabuki.”

    Now that I think about it, that seems unfair to the Japanese.

  247. 247.

    Turgidson

    March 8, 2017 at 5:41 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    Evidence be damned, a crime was committed!!! You sound like a typical Republican.

    Or like, you know, Glenn Greenwald, when the target of his ire is the US government and not…Russia. When Russia is accused of malfeasance, it is irresponsible to draw conclusions from a mountain of confirmed circumstantial evidence which includes multiple key members of the Trump campaign/administration meeting with Russian officials and then feeling it necessary to lie about it, sometimes under oath. Nope, we need to wait for some sort of smoking gun, but only the kind of smoking gun Glenn Greenwald approves of. And if that evidence originated with the US intelligence community, it is ipso facto false. But accusing the US government of throwing whistleblowers in cages for decades with no evidence is totally A-OK.

  248. 248.

    patroclus

    March 8, 2017 at 5:41 pm

    @FlipYrWhig: Exactly. What we’re asking El Tiburon to do (and by extension, Greenwald) is to put on their usual hats hat they use towards Obama and Clinton and apply it to Trump and his team. Analyze. Imagine. Deduce. Induce. Spend some time thinking about what all these connections and meeting mean. Who benefits? What was happening in the context of the meetings? What resulted therefrom? What was the timeline? Who said what to whom? When you’re like Greenwald (and El Tiburon up until post #209), you never even get to these questions because you won’t even admit that the meetings occurred, so it’s all meaningless. Why won’t Greenwald treat this issue like he does every other issues? Why the constant defense of Trump and his team? Those are the real questions. Hanging it all on actual proof of “collusion” before one can even discuss the whole issue is a defense lawyer’s trick. One will never get anywhere dealing with that kind of stonewalling.

  249. 249.

    Baud

    March 8, 2017 at 5:41 pm

    FWIW, GG is boring. Can we haz a new thread?

  250. 250.

    Villago Delenda Est

    March 8, 2017 at 5:43 pm

    @El Tiburon: Risotto recipes, anyone?

  251. 251.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 5:43 pm

    @Barbara: Well, Barbara, with all due respect: if the Russian government hacked DNC e-mails, then provided that to Wikileaks, I want to know. If Trump and his people met with the Russians to discuss how they can help them win the election, or other nefarious discussions, I want to know that. I want investigations and the truth. I don’t want to go on my gut and PATRIOTISM.

  252. 252.

    TenguPhule

    March 8, 2017 at 5:43 pm

    @Baud: And what is Baud’s answer to Republicans too stupid to appreciate the benefits they are now about to lose from the ACA?

  253. 253.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 5:44 pm

    @patroclus:

    Why the constant defense of Trump and his team?

    This proves you are not serious.

  254. 254.

    Kay

    March 8, 2017 at 5:44 pm

    @Miss Bianca:

    I know. I would say 75% of the Medicaid recipients I see have no idea where it came from. They say “I’m on the Buckeye”. I say “that’s Medicaid” but what the fuck did they think it was? This health insurance card just appeared? I can’t imagine not even wondering where it came from.

    I feel bad for their kids at this point. The adults can go fuck themselves. It’s one thing not to be able to afford health insurance. It’s another to just refuse to think about it at all.

  255. 255.

    Baud

    March 8, 2017 at 5:45 pm

    @TenguPhule: Turn in your healthcare. We’ll use those resources to cover dogs and cats.

  256. 256.

    J R in WV

    March 8, 2017 at 5:45 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    What’s your mother tongue? I can tell it isn’t English, as your usage of common words is so strained and wrong. But I won’t take a guess as I don’t have secondary languages myself. Just English. Which I know pretty well.

  257. 257.

    TenguPhule

    March 8, 2017 at 5:46 pm

    @Baud: And for those of us that consider Cats the Fifth Great Evil?

  258. 258.

    Thru the Looking Glass...

    March 8, 2017 at 5:46 pm

    @Yarrow:

    So many meetings. So hard to remember them all!

    And I would not be surprised if there are more to come…

  259. 259.

    Barbara

    March 8, 2017 at 5:46 pm

    @El Tiburon: Well, sunshine, who is going to make sure that if those things happened they come to light? It takes LEVERAGE. Congress has LEVERAGE.

  260. 260.

    patroclus

    March 8, 2017 at 5:47 pm

    @El Tiburon: You’re making progress!!!! I don’t know anything more than you do, so now we’re more or less in agreement. Like you say, there is as yet no direct public evidence of collusion (which is what I said in my first post). But that doesn’t mean that the whole thing should be minimized. There is, as I indicated, evidence of cooperation and influence (with Sessions). Some of it was just a text of a speech; some was a platform plank; some was just more hacking. There might also be graft, theft, embezzlement, hotel stuff, investments and the like. The British spy’s dossier looks far more credible than it did when all the stonewalling was going on. It needs an independent counsel; it needs public hearings. Hopefully, you (and Greenwald) will start calling for some of this.

  261. 261.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 5:47 pm

    @Turgidson:

    And if that evidence originated with the US intelligence community, it is ipso facto false

    This is not true. What part of “want to see the evidence” do you people not get? It’s like Iraq never happened.

    Is it wrong to be skeptical? Is it wrong to hold off final judgement until seeing the evidence?

    Can you despise Trump and all he stands for, but yet not be ready to commit to firmly believing he colluded with the Russians?

  262. 262.

    Baud

    March 8, 2017 at 5:47 pm

    @TenguPhule: All the more reason for you to appease them.

  263. 263.

    Raven

    March 8, 2017 at 5:48 pm

    Y’all been arguing with this dickhead all afternoon.

  264. 264.

    Barbara

    March 8, 2017 at 5:49 pm

    @Baud: No kidding. He became a one note song and a one word chant — in other words, a drone — a long time ago.

  265. 265.

    TenguPhule

    March 8, 2017 at 5:50 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    Is it wrong to be skeptical? Is it wrong to hold off final judgement until seeing the evidence?

    Since the Russians in the dossier on Trump keep getting assassinated before they can spill the beans, your skepticism is wearing a little thin. At some point, admit that the picture is damning and start putting the pieces of the puzzle together yourself.

  266. 266.

    Thru the Looking Glass...

    March 8, 2017 at 5:50 pm

    @Another Scott: you’re probably right about that…

    I’d just like to think that a) there are at least a couple of GOPpers with vestigial consciences left and b) fear of failure and the subsequent destruction of the party might have inhibited them at least a little…

    I know… i know… naive on my part…

  267. 267.

    patroclus

    March 8, 2017 at 5:51 pm

    @El Tiburon: Oops – you’re backtracking again. By continuing not to even address the obvious facts of the meetings and contacts, you (and Greenwald) were – objectively – acting like Trump’s defense lawyer. You had taken a first baby step towards enlightenment – are you really just going to start up with the insults and stonewalling again? I sense that’s where you want to go – abandoning Greenwald’s position must have so hard for you. You can do it – you too can call for an independent counsel and public hearings. You don’t need Greenwald’s permission to stop defending Trump.

  268. 268.

    Kay

    March 8, 2017 at 5:53 pm

    @Miss Bianca:

    The Tea Party couple are even worse than the Medicaid man. They’re incoherent. They’re mad that their daughter has a 13k deductible (I’ll need to see proof of that, BTW) and they’re also mad that any health care bill is an “entitlement”

    What do they want? They want the President to purchase health insurance just for their daughter? No one else?

  269. 269.

    Barbara

    March 8, 2017 at 5:53 pm

    @El Tiburon: As one senator said during the Watergate hearings about Republicans who refused to see wrongdoing, “if an elephant walked into the room there would be some people who would say, wait a minute, let’s not jump to conclusions, it could be a mouse with a glandular condition!” We get where you are coming from — a foregone conclusion in search of a justification. Good night.

  270. 270.

    Another Scott

    March 8, 2017 at 5:53 pm

    @El Tiburon: You’re continuing to play games.

    I pointed you to a Krebs on Security article with lots and lots of links that discuss the evidence. Did you read it?

    You can say that you don’t think the evidence is compelling if you want, for whatever reason you like, but you cannot claim that the evidence does not exist.

    You’ve heard of “sources and methods”, I assume? The Russians are very good about demanding to see “the evidence” whenever they’re caught red-handed (heh) and get called out. You know why? Because they don’t really care about the evidence – they know what they did. They want to know how we know what they did. And that is information that is not going to be disclosed without a “need to know” – something that you, and I, and Glenn, and the Russians aren’t going to be told. And the public doesn’t need to be told either. We have elected representatives for many reasons, including the protection of intelligence techniques.

    So, which is it? Are you playing word games (asking for things that will never be disclosed because doing so would compromise “sources and methods” and declaring victory when they’re not), or are you willfully blind (and refuse to even look at the evidence and use your head)?

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  271. 271.

    Yarrow

    March 8, 2017 at 5:53 pm

    @Baud: Agreed.

  272. 272.

    Villago Delenda Est

    March 8, 2017 at 5:53 pm

    @Raven: Cats playing with the mouse they caught.

  273. 273.

    TenguPhule

    March 8, 2017 at 5:54 pm

    @Kay:

    They want the President to purchase health insurance just for their daughter? No one else?

    Yes.

    This has been another edition of SATSQ.

  274. 274.

    patroclus

    March 8, 2017 at 5:57 pm

    @Villago Delenda Est: If we can wean just one Greenwaldbot away from Trump defense, it’s worth it.

  275. 275.

    Raven

    March 8, 2017 at 6:00 pm

    @Villago Delenda Est: yea, if I had actually read any of that mess. . .

  276. 276.

    J R in WV

    March 8, 2017 at 6:01 pm

    @Barbara:

    @hovercraft: Let’s pay to protect ourselves from imaginary threats by axing the budget for measures that protect us from actual threats.

    This. CDC protects us against epidemics of new and strange diseases, creeping from tropical areas to the Midwest of North America. From yellow fever and Zika virus to measles and mutant bird flu, the CDC is out only defense.

    The Coast Guard needs a ton of additional funding to build new icebreaker cutters to defend North American Arctic waters from Russian icebreakers seeking to affect our sovereign rights in the Arctic arena. We have one Coast Guard Icebreaker, Russia has dozens.

    Trump’s executive branch is deliberately broken…

  277. 277.

    Turgidson

    March 8, 2017 at 6:03 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    It’s like Iraq never happened.

    I’m not sure if this is deliberately obtuse or what. The intelligence agencies, foreign and domestic, did not all collude to agree on a big lie about Iraq’s weapons programs. That was the Bush Administration, with some help from Bush’s little pal Tony Blair. They took the intelligence that supported the conclusion they began with and wanted to sell to the country and plastered it all over every media outlet they could find, and buried the rest, which was voluminous. Outside of a few outlets, the doubt and skepticism within the intelligence community about WMD was not reported on at length.

    Here, every single fucking intelligence agency on earth other than Russia’s seems to be in agreement that Russia orchestrated the hacking. It’s not particularly controversial to believe them (unless you’re Glenn “the US throws whistleblowers in cages for decades” Greenwald), especially when considered along with all the circumstantial evidence about Hair Furor’s shadowy Russian ties and his team’s collective decision that their best way forward was to lie about them and hope it blows over.

  278. 278.

    FlipYrWhig

    March 8, 2017 at 6:04 pm

    @Kay:

    The whole premise of this thing is Clinton was too hawkish on Russia and Trump won’t start wars.

    It’s pretty well evident that Trump is itching to start many wars, just not one with Russia. Even his criticism of the Iraq War was that they fought it like politically-correct wussies, i.e., they cared about people’s feelings and killed too few people indiscriminately. Somehow no one ever tried to pin him down on what he thought the problem with the Iraq War actually was. That’s what it was. It didn’t leave enough of a splatter.

  279. 279.

    Kay

    March 8, 2017 at 6:05 pm

    Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback will be named the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations for Food and Agriculture, according to a public radio report.
    A possible appointment to the Trump administration for Brownback has been rumored since November, but the governor has been tight-lipped about his prospects. His office would not confirm the accuracy of the report from Kansas Public Radio when asked for comment late Wednesday afternoon.

    Great news for Kansas but I extent my heartfelt apologies to whoever gets stuck with him.

    The Kansas Supreme Court might order him to raise taxes to fund schools. That is one powerful court. I didn’t know they could do that.

  280. 280.

    GregB

    March 8, 2017 at 6:06 pm

    Greenwald spent quite a bit of energy declaring that the Trump/Russia connection was a total fantasy and that people looking into the story were a pack of McCarthyites smearing the noble Russian state.

    Now his news organ is taking Democrats to task for not pishing hard enough on this line of inquiry.

  281. 281.

    Barbara

    March 8, 2017 at 6:10 pm

    @Kay: Probably took the job to make sure farmers everywhere are stuck paying exorbitant rates for high tech seeds. But wow, what a potential deus ex machina for Kansas.

  282. 282.

    Miss Bianca

    March 8, 2017 at 6:10 pm

    @Kay: Yes. Yes. Government exists only to help them and their own, and God help us all if government insists on trying to help *everyone* – that’s SOCIALISM!!

    I would be the world’s worst politician. I’d be all like Barney Frank at my town halls going, “I’ve had more intelligent conversations with a kitchen table” – but all. the damn. time.

  283. 283.

    Kay

    March 8, 2017 at 6:10 pm

    @FlipYrWhig:

    I agree. This NOTION (as Obama would say) that Trump is a peacenik is just delusional. I love how people pick and choose which Trump bullshit to believe. None of it. Believe none of it.

  284. 284.

    Fair Economist

    March 8, 2017 at 6:11 pm

    @Mnemosyne:

    Weird how there are dozens and dozens of similar coincidences that all just happen to tie back to Russia, but of course GG never dares to look at the whole forest. He has to concentrate on a single leaf on a single tree lest he we realize that he’s part of that same forest himself.

    FTFY

  285. 285.

    patroclus

    March 8, 2017 at 6:15 pm

    @Turgidson: It’s a lingering effect of how successful the Bushies were in blaming the Iraq debacle (and the failure to find WMD’s) on the intelligence agencies. As you say, the IC were browbeaten into making certain findings which were then blown completely out of proportion by Bush/Cheney and then they were subsequently blamed when the bald-faced whoppers became common knowledge. And, the IC stonewalled on reports of black sites, extraordinary rendition and torture even while Greenwald and others were providing more credible evidence that they did in fact exist. It’s not completely black and white – while one must not always believe what the IC says, one must also not always disbelieve what they say. Greenwald is in the camp of the latter and it makes him lose credibility.

    In this case, though, it’s not just the unanimous IC around the world; it’s also the reports from numerous other countries of Russian meddling in their elections and it’s the way the Russians conduct their own elections. This isn’t just smoke – in the other countries, it’s been fire. That, coupled with all the now-verified meetings and connections between the Trump team and the Russians, the fact that the very existence of those meetings were stonewalled for months and the all-in nature of the Greenwaldians in their desire to act as Trump’s defense team makes the IC’s findings on this issue far more credible, in my view.

  286. 286.

    Kay

    March 8, 2017 at 6:16 pm

    @Barbara:

    Kasich did the same thing Brownback did but more moderately. Kasich now has a one billion dollar budget hole which is part of the reason he’s freaking out about Trumpcare cutting Medicaid funding.

    It doesn’t work. Their theory on taxes doesn’t work. It has never worked.

  287. 287.

    les

    March 8, 2017 at 6:29 pm

    @Kay:

    Great news for Kansas but I extent my heartfelt apologies to whoever gets stuck with him.

    The Kansas Supreme Court might order him to raise taxes to fund schools. That is one powerful court. I didn’t know they could do that.

    The KS constitution requires that the state adequately fund education. Since the fabulous Brownbackian experiment began, numerous suits have found (at various levels now including KS Supremes) that the current funding doesn’t meet the standard. Surprising, I know.

  288. 288.

    Mike in DC

    March 8, 2017 at 6:40 pm

    What’s at stake for the GGite Russia defenders:
    1. The notion that Russia is a viable counterbalance to American overreach, and not a sordid collection of the worst bloody bastards on the planet
    2. That Russia Today is an objective purveyor of news and left viewpoints, and not a propaganda farm for the HRU
    3. That Wikileaks is a brave force challenging the deep state, not an instrumentality of the FSB/HRU
    4. That Jill Stein is a respectable voice and viable alternative to the Democrats, not Putin’s useful idiot
    5. That GG critiqued the Obama administration and Clinton campaign in good faith and didn’t help to catapult rw and Russian propaganda to left leaning voters.

  289. 289.

    Villago Delenda Est

    March 8, 2017 at 6:51 pm

    @Kay: I think their true ideology is opposition to the idea of “public good”. Their ideas about taxes feed into that core belief, and all the empirical data to the contrary will be sacrificed…pretty much a form of Lysenkoism.

  290. 290.

    Just Somebody

    March 8, 2017 at 6:55 pm

    I hate to preface anything with, “in fairness to Greenwald”, but, in fairness to Greenwald, did he actually say that Clapper was a reliable source after Clapper denied any collusion between Trump and Russia? The second tweet is from McClatchy, not GG.

  291. 291.

    Mnemosyne

    March 8, 2017 at 6:59 pm

    @Kay:

    So, basically, the Republicans are parachuting him out ahead of the looming disaster in Kansas. I hope all of the Kansas Republicans who went to the mat for Brownback are aware that they’re about to become his scapegoats.

  292. 292.

    petesh

    March 8, 2017 at 7:10 pm

    @patroclus: Russia, being saintly and all, hath no need of black sites. It is merely an amazing coincidence that thorns in the flesh of the government tend to be pulled out of this human plane of existence.

  293. 293.

    Tim in SF

    March 8, 2017 at 7:32 pm

    Please help me understand this post. Here is how it reads to me:

    1. GG says Clapper is untrustworthy.
    2. McClatchy News Service says Clapper is trustworthy.
    3. Therefore, GG is an idiot.

    Or something?

    Note that I don’t disagree on point #3, I just don’t know how you get there from #1 and #2. Seems kind of underpants-gnomes.

  294. 294.

    West of the Rockies (been a while)

    March 8, 2017 at 7:33 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    Way to put that fool in his place! Using “asking for a friend” as sarcastic humor is sooo unoriginal.

    And calling someone “sparky” is inventive?

    Nice try.

  295. 295.

    Turgidson

    March 8, 2017 at 7:40 pm

    @Tim in SF:

    I think it’s more:

    1) GG says Clapper is more untrustworthy than “any random person”
    2) Soon after, McClatchy article cites Clapper saying something that comports with GG’s agenda, so
    3) GG retweets said McClatchy article as evidence supporting his agenda, even though the source supplying this evidence is, in GG’s own recent telling, less trustworthy than “any random person”, so
    4) GG is an idiot.

  296. 296.

    NR

    March 8, 2017 at 7:41 pm

    @El Tiburon: Mnem has a real problem with posting articles that don’t say the things she claims they do.

    It’s very strange.

  297. 297.

    Archon

    March 8, 2017 at 7:45 pm

    @Tim in SF:

    You have to turn the argument around. If Clapper did say there was collusion between Trump and Russia would GG believe him? The first tweet suggests not. So he can’t use him as evidence to disprove collusion.

  298. 298.

    cokane

    March 8, 2017 at 7:47 pm

    GG’s biggest issue is that he really is nothing more than a pundit, save for one incredibly lucky break that fell into his lap. But he pretends to be so much more than this.

    As such, opining all day, every day, about just about everything (the man writes with equal stridency about UK, US, mideast and Brazilian politics) and no sense of his own limitations, these kinds of hypocrisies are bound to arise.

  299. 299.

    Tim in SF

    March 8, 2017 at 7:56 pm

    @Turgidson:

    3) GG retweets said McClatchy article as evidence supporting his agenda, even though the source supplying this evidence is, in GG’s own recent telling, less trustworthy than “any random person”, so…

    Got it. I missed the fact that GG retweeted McClatchy.

    God, I fucking hate Greenwald. I really do. I can’t get my friends to dump him. My former colleagues at EFF gave him a god damn award. It’s infuriating.

  300. 300.

    cokane

    March 8, 2017 at 8:01 pm

    @Turgidson: the problem is, greenwald doesn’t do any actual reporting. Writing opinion columns isn’t reporting. Seriously link me to the last story of greenwald’s on natsec or cybersec or even marginally related that has ORIGINAL reporting. I think even some of his critics don’t appreciate the depth of the greenwald sham.

  301. 301.

    Thru the Looking Glass...

    March 8, 2017 at 8:14 pm

    @Kay:

    Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback will be named the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations for Food and Agriculture…

    What the?

    You gotta be kidding me…

    I swear… Trump & the GOP are going out of their way to give the entire world the finger right now… unbelievable…

    it’s

    TRUMPTASTIC!!!

  302. 302.

    schrodingers_cat

    March 8, 2017 at 8:18 pm

    Troll has earned his stipend, 106 comments are either by him or responses to him.

  303. 303.

    Thru the Looking Glass...

    March 8, 2017 at 8:33 pm

    @schrodingers_cat: Actually, I think I read in a Rand paper that it’s 135 posts per shift, of at least 200 characters… 12 hr shift… they’re working 24/7…

  304. 304.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 8:36 pm

    Matt Taibbi’s piece here.

    hmmm…

    Moreover, the case that the Russians hacked the Democratic National Committee now appears fairly solid. Even Donald Trump thinks so. This of course makes it harder to dismiss stories like the one in which former Trump adviser Roger Stone appeared to know that Wikileaks was about to release the hacked emails of Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman John Podesta.

    If there’s any truth to the notion that the Trump campaign colluded with the Russian state to disrupt the electoral process, then yes, what we’re seeing now are the early outlines of a Watergate-style scandal that could topple a presidency.
    But it could also be true that both the Democratic Party and many leading media outlets are making a dangerous gamble, betting their professional and political capital on the promise of future disclosures that may not come.

  305. 305.

    El Tiburon

    March 8, 2017 at 8:38 pm

    @GregB:

    Greenwald spent quite a bit of energy declaring that the Trump/Russia connection was a total fantasy and that people looking into the story were a pack of McCarthyites smearing the noble Russian state.

    Everything you just wrote is bullshit.

  306. 306.

    amk

    March 8, 2017 at 8:52 pm

    @schrodingers_cat: doug’s mission accomplished. mea culpa too.

  307. 307.

    J R in WV

    March 8, 2017 at 9:13 pm

    @El Tiburon:

    And, again, what is your mother tongue? Your first language that your parents spoke with you?

    We can all see that it isn’t American English, probably isn’t British English, but only you can tell us what it really is.

    You won’t say it, will you.

  308. 308.

    Another Scott

    March 8, 2017 at 9:14 pm

    @gene108: Speaking of flying over mountains, our local PBS is showing a program on hummingbirds. They have magical blood that lets them grab available oxygen very efficiently. Air at sea level is ~ 21% oxygen. They showed a test of hummingbirds in the mountains that could still fly in air with ~ 6.5% oxygen – equivalent to ~ 43,000 feet.

    Amazing little beasties.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  309. 309.

    J R in WV

    March 8, 2017 at 9:19 pm

    @NR:

    Ohhh, Wow! Now we have two Russian trolls in place here.

    NR, what is your mother Tongue? We all know it isn’t American English, and it doesn’t seem to be British English, so what is it, really?

    We all have an opinion, but only you can tell us what your mother and father spoke with you when you were a babe in arms. German? Russian? We really want to help you, but we can’t unless you help us reach out to you.

  310. 310.

    Thru the Looking Glass...

    March 8, 2017 at 9:28 pm

    @Another Scott: Ahhh… hummingbirds…

    I am very fond of birds in general and even fonder of hummingbirds…

    Little bio-mechanical marvels…

    They’re only in the new world…

    The majority of species are down in SA, mostly in Ecuador…

    Their wings beat in a figure eight, which is why they can hover so effortlessly…

  311. 311.

    patroclus

    March 8, 2017 at 9:45 pm

    @El Tiburon: It’s sad that Taibbi is taking the “both sides do it” position – he is often a good journalist and if he put his mind to it, he could be a good one on this issue as well. Russian hacking of the U.S. election is a huge issue just as Russian hacking of other countries’ elections are a huge story. Those of us who wish an independent counsel to look into it and a public hearing by Congressional investigatory committees are not taking much of a risk in losing political capital by asking for both of those to occur. Even if it never results in criminal indictments or findings of “collusion” – whatever that means. It might merely result in findings of financial ties by Trump and his cronies – that, for the most part, are legal. It might result in findings of mere political conversations about policy. It might result in mere findings about conversations that had nothing to do with the hacking. But, even if it’s just that, it still concerns the POTUS and his team and is relevant information that the public should know. Taibbi’s position that, only if absolutely proves “collusion” that it should not even be looked into, is ridiculous. Especially given all the lying and stonewalling that has occurred. Manafort, in July, said that the Trump campaign was not involved in any way with the platform amendment. Stone was aware of the Podesta hacking before Wilkileaks actually released them. Flynn, Page, Manafort, Sessions and others all denied any contacts whatsoever. All of those were lies. And we have only, in the last 6 weeks, learned that definitively. Why did they lie? Why did they cover-up all of what we have only recently learned? Regardless of legal ramifications, the hacking of the 2016 election is an enormous issue which will be pored over by investigations and historians for years (and probably decades). Why is Greenwald minimizing this? Why is Taibbi claiming that merely to raise the issue is risking political capital? Why did Trump’s team stonewall this for months? if we don’t get an independent counsel and a public airing now, the curiosity will only grow with time.

  312. 312.

    different-church-lady

    March 8, 2017 at 9:56 pm

    Greenwald Unit: automatic 300 comments whenever GG’s name is mentioned.

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