“Anybody who says we shouldn’t look into Russia at this point is either in on it or a traitor" Scott Dworkinhttps://t.co/J4Joqi5COd
— Scott Dworkin (@funder) June 6, 2017
I’m with Mr. Dworkin, but YOU CAN’T FIX STUPID:
… Left-wing skepticism of the “Trump/Russia” story has existed since Clinton’s campaign first blamed hacks of the Democratic National Committee and campaign Chairman John Podesta’s emails on Russian interference. For five awkward months, Democrats from Clinton down to interim DNC Chairman Donna Brazile dodged questions about the contents of the emails by saying they would not comment on what appeared to be foreign meddling in the election…
“False thrillers will now be written about the Russians hacking the American elections,” wrote director Oliver Stone last year. “Money and TV serials will be made. I’ve never read such hysterical junk in the New York Times (call it what it is — ‘fake news’), in which the editorials have become outrageous diatribes of alleged crimes by Russia.”
Stone, who wrote a blurb for “The Plot to Scapegoat Russia,” is now promoting his own sit-down interviews with Putin, early clips from which show Putin making eyebrow-raising arguments — “our intelligence agencies always conform to the law” — with no on-camera pushback…
The crux of the complaint is that Democrats, locked out of power in Washington, are focusing on Russia to the exclusion of other issues. That criticism befuddles some elected Democrats, who have seen the Russia issue boil over in their town halls, and who’ve simultaneously voted against most of the Trump agenda, slowing it to a snail’s pace.
“People want us to keep trying to advance legislation that will strengthen infrastructure, that will affect their lives,” said Sen. Christopher A. Coons (D-Del.). “But they also say: What the heck was that? Get to the bottom of it.” Asked about the idea that Democrats were being hawks toward Russia, Coons, laughed. “I’m sorry, you’re concerned that our response might be too bellicose? I’m concerned that we might not be responding enough,” he said…
But we still have no single-payer national health plan, much less the rainbow-pooping unicorns that some of the differently hinged promised during the 2016 campaign!
Breaking: people who hate Dems and/or defend Putin continue to hate Dems and/or defend Putun
— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) June 6, 2017
Alternative/complementary explanation: you want to end Russia investigation so people won't realize Hillary would've won w/out Comey/RUS
— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) June 6, 2017
Six months, tops, there will be a roadshow headlining RoseAnne DeMoro, Michael Tracey, and Kyle Chapman, Based Stickman…
More alt-right praise for Russia, this time in Portland: https://t.co/rKoojdUK8E pic.twitter.com/dK9aDv1BUp
— Casey Michel (@cjcmichel) June 6, 2017
Best part of this moron's comments: Russia's actually had more major terrorism incidents than the US or Europe. https://t.co/Ru7v2eenGp
— Tom Nichols (@RadioFreeTom) June 6, 2017
MariedeGournay
“The sixth and fatal vote—frame 313—takes Clinton out the electoral college due to the white working class. This is the key vote. Clinton going back to her left. Totally inconsistent with the tampering from Russia. Again… back and to the left… back and to the left… back and to the left… back and to the left.”
Kathleen
Good morning, everyone. Continuing theme below of Rethugs’ war with the media, I’m old enough to remember when New York Times reporter claimed Obama administration was biggest enemy of the press:
http://www.politico.com/blogs/media/2015/02/risen-obama-administration-is-greatest-enemy-of-press-freedom-202707
Ah, good times.
Kathleen
Does that include people who say Ohioans/Americans don’t care about Russia?
NotMax
Was mostly away from the computer; hoping someone remembered to note it was 49 years ago that Bobby Kennedy died from an assassin’s bullet.
(Still June 6 here, although not for much longer.)
Morzer
http://edition.cnn.com/2017/06/06/politics/russian-hackers-planted-fake-news-qatar-crisis
Good thing we don’t have an impetuous, ignorant moron as a president, isn’t it?
Morzer
http://www.thedailybeast.com/wikileaks-declares-war-on-the-intercept
Bruce K
Is it me, or has Assange kind of exhausted his credibility at this point?
Morzer
Kathleen
@NotMax: I remember feeling when I heard that news that the world was coming to an end. For some reason I felt terrified. I had just seen him a couple of weeks before that at the University of Portland when he was running in Oregon primary.
Morzer
https://www.axios.com/trump-pitched-republican-leaders-on-a-solar-paneled-border-wall-2435037888.html
NotMax
@Kathleen
The memory remains raw all these years later.
Truly felt as if the circuit breaker for the room labeled “The Future” had been flipped to off.
Kathleen
@NotMax: Yes. Especially coming on the heels of MLK’s murder.
TenguPhule
Fortunately the universe is not so picky.
Kathleen
The Frezian Fuhrer is headed to Cincinnati today to talk about infrastructure. Is there any kind of repellent with which I can arm myself?
TenguPhule
@Morzer:
Yes, because Trump is malicious, not impetuous.
Morzer
And, speaking of morons, Bill Maher’s life just got a little more interesting:
https://www.salon.com/2017/06/06/mahers-n-word-politically-incorrect-2001-real-time/
That was back in 2001. Seems that not only can’t you teach an old dog new tricks, most of the time you don’t need to.
Morzer
@TenguPhule:
Do you even know what those words mean?
NotMax
@Morzer
Any East German companies submitting bids?
“Ve haff eggshperienze in zuch matters.”
Morzer
@NotMax:
Ve can a STASIs achieve on your borders! Und vithin your borders also too!
lowtechcyclist
Kevin Drum says it’s all-hands-on-deck time for Obamacare if we want to keep it:
Especially if you’ve got one of those ‘moderate’ GOP Senators, it’s time to burn up the Capitol phone lines.
TenguPhule
@Morzer:
Of course I do, who do you think I am, Donald Trump?
TenguPhule
@Kathleen:
Mace.
Morzer
@lowtechcyclist:
https://morningconsult.com/2017/06/06/congressional-republicans-losing-voters-trust-many-issues/
The polling on healthcare is interesting. The GOP have ceded their fairly small advantage and then some to the Democrats since March. I wonder why that could be.
Morzer
@TenguPhule:
You seem to experience similar cognitive issues when using the English language.
TenguPhule
@Morzer: Do you see me going out of my way to insult your lack of humor? I mean, I get that as a Lib Dem supporter you’re already mentally impaired and make allowances for it.
lowtechcyclist
Indivisible Guide passes on a good Vox summary of the Senators in play on Obamacare repeal.
Ladyraxterinok
@Kathleen: I was in CA. (I had voted for McCarthy earlier that day in the CA primary.) Ķennedy’s murder was a major shock. But 1968 was a year of shocks. Remember, MLK was murdered just 2 months earlier!!
?BillinGlendaleCA
@TenguPhule: Lib Dems are mentally impaired? Dude, I think you’re on the wrong blog. RedState’s —>
ETA: I’m not a progressive, I’m a liberal.
Amir Khalid
It could be that “some on the left” are in fact Wilmeristas who fear that, if the already well-founded suspicions about Russian interference in the election are confirmed, that would help vindicate Hillary Clinton’s claim that the election was stolen from her. I can’t imagine why else they would want the Democratic party to ease up on the matter.
SectionH
@NotMax:
@Kathleen:
That was a srsly bad year. I was 16, but already political. MLK hurt worse, for me, probably because I was in England by June, though that was its own kind of hurt. But when I got home (missed the Chicago circus, thank FSM – not rich, college teacher parents who took 1 year out of all to not teach summer school) I started college, and spent most of my first semester doing what we now call GOTV for HHH. He was so not even my second choice, but damn, the alternative was fucking Nixon.
Some nights I get what “fighting the long defeat” feels like. Still fighting though.
Ladyraxterinok
@Kathleen: I was in CA. (I had voted for McCarthy earlier that day in the CA primary.) Ķennedy’s murder was a major shock. But 1968 was a year of shocks. Remember, MLK was murdered just 2 months earlier!!@Ladyraxterinok: And the Tet Offensive was on-going. 1968 was a year of just one shock after the other. For years I had a box labelled 1968 filled with clippings, fliers, etc.
Mustang Bobby
@NotMax: I was a freshman at a boarding school in New England. When I woke up that morning and heard the news about “Kennedy shot in the head,” I thought it was a retrospective about JFK and wondered why they were running it at 6 a.m. on a June morning. It took a couple of minutes for me to realize it was Bobby.
ThresherK
@Amir Khalid: Oh, that already been measured and poured into the batter.
Full faith and confidence that the leaked emails.are 200% genuine, and nothing was altered, added, or twisted in any way, is pretty much announcing their tell.
Morzer
@TenguPhule:
I assumed that you were not very good at English, since the alternative was to recognize that you are embarrassingly ignorant of the topics you attempt to discuss. I thought it more charitable to give you credit for struggling valiantly with linguistic incompetence, but, since you assure me that such is not the case, I am perfectly willing to fall in with your demand that I should accept your ignorance instead.
Keith P.
I’m watching the umpteenth pundit say that Comey will have to answer for why he didn’t report Trump’s behavior “up the chain”. First, he’s the head of the FBI…up the chain is Jeff Sessions. However, do we know that he didn’t report this up the chain? It’s always been assumed, but he did go to Sessions after the conversation with *some* concerns. And he did document his concerns via memo. I just think this is a pretty shaky indictment of Comey, if that’s what the GOP is going to go after tomorrow.
raven
@Mustang Bobby: I was stationed at Ft Lewis. We went to Seattle on a pass, bought some acid, dropped and got on the bus and went back to the fort. When we go back it was getting late and we were tripping like mad. We couldn’t stay in the barracks bay so we took a radio and went in the laundry room. The news came on about the assassination and that, boys and girls, was my first trip!
If you watch Petty’s “Learning to Fly” about a young man and his acid adventures, there is a 5 second clip of Rosie Grier holding Bobby after he was shot. Apparently it was just randomly put in the video but not for me.
Morzer
@Keith P.:
http://www.cnbc.com/2017/06/06/comey-reportedly-told-sessions-he-did-not-want-to-meet-alone-with-trump.html
JAFD
Greetings from New Jersey !
We had a primary election here yesterday. There was underwhelming excitement and no surprises in the results. My thots upon it:
One of the surprising things about moving to metropolitan NYC is the morning traffic reports. You wake up one morning, hear “From Jersey, delays of forty minutes on the Holland, an hour on the Linc, fifty on the Geedubyabee…”, stumble to the window thinking there’s a blizzard or …, realize it’s June, and after a week realize “That is the normal here”
Back in 2010 there were plans for a new tunnel under the Hudson, with the stimulus program paying much of the cost. Had that gone ahead, ‘twould likely have been completing now, and Kim Guadagno, Christie’s lieutenant governor and the GOP nominee to succeed him, would have been in pictures of the opening ceremonies, all over the front pages. But Christie cancelled “an open-ended letter of credit…” and news of Amtrak/NJTransit service cutbacks during Penn Station repair work, and likely future closure of one and then the other, of the century-old Pennsy tunnels, for overhaul, will be recurring for a good while. Paradigmatic example of GOP foresight for Phil Murphy to stress.
Two-thirds of NJ voters get TV from NY stations and the other third from Philly – 1st & 4th biggest US media markets, commercials not cheap, not much coverage of NJ state government, and most of that of the ‘it bleeds it leads’ sort of malfeasance. So Trenton is very hard place for ambitious pol to make a good reputation in, the state political organizations keep winning elections and running the place in a way to keep most of the voters satisfied, despite ‘the story’ about them; and NJ has become place where outsiders with wealth, or reputations made outside of the state capital, run for high office.
Note that of the 18 Democratic candidates for offices besides Governor, in my chunk of Essex County (Newark, etc), only one had competition.
Note, also, that NJ’s governor is the only official, beside the two US senators, elected on a statewide ticket. No state ‘row offices’ to become known in.
Now Phil Murphy, who has lots of money, gave lots to other Dem candidates, took over Hilary’s storefront office on Broad Street in Newark and kept it open since November, and has sent me an Email every day since I got on his list last September. In 2017, for a Democrat to get started well ahead of the election, get maximum supporters and keep them organized and committed to the campaign, have the resources to compete effectively and use them to get the word to the voters – These Cannot Be Negatives. The bottom line is not Purity, but Governing.
Some of the countys of New Jersey are run by a Board of Freeholders, others by a Board of Chosen Freeholders. Oneovdezedaze I wanna find out why.
Spent yesterday as one of precinct (‘district’ in NJ) workers for Board of Elections. Was ghodawful weather for June, in 50’s, on and off light rain, windy, humid so that noise of jets takingoff overhead carried and eardrumshatter volume, couldn’t give much blame to voters who stayed inside. Was in firehouse, big door open, space heaters down for summer, flannel shirt and fleece-lined overshirt and sweater. Supposed to be in 90’s by Sunday. I don’t mind cold weather, don’t mind hot weather, but 40-degree shift within week tough on me old bones. However, one of our precinct workers brought in a dozen custard tarts from Teixeira’s Bakery – a paradigmatic example of culinary hedonism – and I ‘got stuck with’ the leftovers. There are worse fates.
Forty-nine years ago. Was seventeen, about to get diploma, lookoutworld… My senior prom was night before RFK’s funeral, woke next day in time to get to side of Pennsy tracks… Sic transit gloria mundi.
Yesterday also seventy-fifth anniversary of Battle of Midway. Paradigm of ‘Ghod On the Side of The Good Guys’
PS – Note to yesterday’s thread. I’ve always liked The Society of Historians of Early California. They may not be a very prestigious learned society, but they have a great Mission statement.
Yoda Dog
@Bruce K: Not just you. When do we get to stop caring about what this dicknozzle thinks about anything? Cuz I’ve been there for awhile now..
SiubhanDuinne
@JAFD:
Good post, very interesting. Thanks for the insights into NJ politics.
Your P.S. made me laugh.
Matt McIrvin
@TenguPhule: And yet Heinlein managed to make it to the age of 80 while getting stupider and stupider with each year.
BC in Illinois
@Mustang Bobby:
@NotMax:
I was in the Washington DC area, home from college. It was the only time I ever remember that my father woke me up to tell me the news. He wouldn’t have been a RFK voter, but I would have been.
1968. MLK. RFK. Poor People’s March. Chicago. Viet Nam. Nixon.
” . . .and every time I read the papers, the old feeling comes on, that we’re knee deep in the Big Muddy . . .”
But what I am feeling now is 1972, 1973, 1974 – – when the feeling (increasing in strength almost daily) was
” . . . This can’t go on. This has to stop. . . “
That’s where I am now.
+ + +
Yesterday was my day to remember where my parents were, when they were 22. On D-Day, my father was a weatherman with the Army Air Corps, stationed with the British in Baghdad. My mother was a WAC, stationed in London.
+ + +
And while I’m being nostalgic.
On the 50th anniversary of V E Day, a woman at church was going on about how wonderful it was on V E Day for her, because she was in New York. You couldn’t imagine how exciting it was to be in New York on V E Day.
My mother didn’t have the heart to tell her that on V E Day, she was in Paris.
My mother was a kinder woman than most of us.
Matt McIrvin
@Amir Khalid: The American left has always had a faction who make a great show of hating the Democrats more than the Republicans–the Republicans are like wild beasts who aren’t responsible for their actions, but the Democrats are always betraying them. Sometimes they say they’d prefer the Republicans to be in power (the Jill Stein/Nader/Matt Stoller 2012 impulse), because both parties are evil but the Democrats are more competently evil and therefore actually worse, or because the Dems will bring complacency but the horror of the Republicans will bring the revolution. And no damage Republicans do to the country and the world sways them on this for very long.
Many of them are obsessed with foreign policy to the exclusion of almost anything else, and primarily want the US global empire taken down–these are the “leftists” who were cheering for Ron Paul when he ran for President. They kind of like the alt-right’s isolationist streak, and they eat up propaganda from RT and Sputnik because whatever the American foreign-policy establishment thinks, they say the opposite. To some extent, it’s understandable–Obama didn’t break with Bush foreign policy cleanly enough. But they are easily rolled.
zhena gogolia
I guess this guy missed the 70+ years when Russia was tearing down churches or using them as bathhouses.
Seth Owen
@Matt McIrvin: This is an accurate summary. This end of the movement really does fit the conservative stereotypes about ‘feel good’ politics. Damn whether we are effective, just so long as we get to be ‘right.’ Relatively few elected officials fall into this group, because they quickly learn our system requires compromise in order to get things done. As soon as they start compromising they get labeled ‘sell outs.’ These are the people who thought Barney ‘freaking Frank wasn’t Left enough.
Being a pragmatic Yankee, I prefer my progressive cup half full rather PURELY empty.
Another Scott
@Amir Khalid: Naah, nobody’s more transparent than Wilmer. Just look at his financial disclosure report to the Senate Select Committee on Ethics for 2016.
Oh wait…:
If he finally filed it, there’s no obvious news about it. I can’t find any sign of it on the Committee web site.
Cheers,
Scott.
Camembert
@Matt McIrvin:
At some point, you stop getting mad at the abuser, who is, after all, utterly predictible, and start getting mad at the enabler who keeps asking to be taken seriously.
Of course, the correct answer is to steal every scrap of power you can from both, by any means possible. The primaries for the Dems, the general and news media for the Repubs. We’re getting there.
Kathleen
@Ladyraxterinok: Yes. That eas horrifying enough. Then RFK. I still think murdets erre connected.
Kathleen
@SectionH: It was a terrible year.
Matt McIrvin
@Seth Owen: These people called Bernie Sanders a sellout when he endorsed Hillary instead of Jill Stein.
Carl Marks
Just want to point out that “people are literally demanding war with Russia well before the facts are in & that’s unwise” =/= “we shouldn’t look into Russia.”
TenguPhule
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Lib Dems are a UK party