Bannon Loses National Security Council Role in Trump Shakeup (bloomberg.com) 396
Top presidential strategist Steve Bannon has been booted from the National Security Council amid a reshuffling of the key panel, Bloomberg reports Wednesday morning. President Donald Trump reorganized the council, removing Bannon and downgrading the role of his homeland security adviser, Tom Bossert, the report added, citing multiple sources. From the report: Bannon, the former executive chairman of Breitbart News, was elevated to the National Security Council's principals committee at the beginning of Trump's presidency. The move drew criticism from some members of Congress and Washington's foreign policy establishment. A White House official said that Bannon was placed on the committee in part to monitor Trump's first national security adviser, Michael Flynn, and never attended a meeting. He's no longer needed with McMaster in charge of the council, the official said. Trump fired Flynn on Feb. 13 for not disclosing to the president or to Vice President Mike Pence the extent of his conversations with Russia's ambassador to the U.S., Sergey Kislyak, before Trump's inauguration.
How much private citizen data has he already (Score:2, Insightful)
siphoned off? That's the question we should be asking, along with why someone like him would be allowed anywhere near a national security post.
The Cooker (Score:2, Insightful)
How much private citizen data has he already
Not as much as Susan Rice.
Re:The Cooker (Score:4, Informative)
Got any water left in that mud of yours?
President Trump's wild charge that Susan Rice committed a crime, explained [vox.com]
What we're seeing now, in short, is not a legitimate debate about the threat posed to civil liberties by improper unmasking.
We are seeing a toxic combination of Trump's penchant for wild speculation, a right-wing media echo chamber, and the legacy of the Benghazi controversy coming together to produce an absurd pile-on - one that seems to have brought the Republican Party together around their remaining hatred for Rice and the Obama administration.
What the article fails to mention though, is that all this water-muddying is taking place at the same time as Trump's "foreign policy adviser" Carter Page admitted, publicly, that he was "unmasked" by the FBI - as being recruited by the Russian spies.
Russian Spies Tried to Recruit Carter Page Before He Advised Trump [go.com]
Two years before joining the Trump campaign as a foreign policy adviser, New York business consultant Carter Page was targeted for recruitment as an intelligence source by Russian spies promising favors for business opportunities in Russia, according to a sealed FBI complaint.
Page confirmed to ABC News that he is the individual identified as "Male-1" in a 2015 court document submitted in a case involving the Russian spies.
Unmasking people recruited by foreign spies is BAD, mkay? Just trust in Trump and look the other way.
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Look at any pictures from a leftist rally, and there are always communist groups marching with them. Most if not all receive funding from Russia. This has been happening since forever [bbc.com]
What part of "US Communist Party suffered a crippling blow with the collapse of the Soviet Union" do you not comprehend?
I find it highly amusing to see leftist marching with groups that supposedly helped Trump get elected. HGHLY amusing.
Kushner (Score:5, Interesting)
Bannon lasted longer than I thought he would. For a time it almost seemed like he might be able to outmaneuver the Kushners, but having Ivanka installed in the White House and having Jared running around as an official messenger and errand boy demonstrates that in the end, the only people Trump will ever really trust is his family.
And that's fine by me. Whatever I think of Trump, I actually think the Kushners are half-way reasonable people, and it's a lot better having them whispering in his ear than that vile racist troll Bannon.
Re:Kushner (Score:5, Insightful)
I think your right, its ultimately a positive thing to see Bannon removed.
However, the fact that Trump only trusts his family is a huge problem. It might "work" in a private family company; but it is fundamentally at odds with how government should be.
IMO There should be laws in place to prevent such nepotism -- because the bond of family is a counter force to transparency and integrity with respect to their obligation to represent the public interest etc.
Hell, many corporations for example have policies prohibiting too much nepotism -- preventing direct reports from being family members, etc. Because it's well documented that loyalty and favortism within the family bond frequently is at odds with their obligations corporate interests.
Trump running the whitehouse like a family business... will ultimately only serves trum; not the public interest.
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I agree with you in general, and certainly there are rules that prevent the Kushners from being paid. But in this case, as I say, I see the Kushners as representing the only people in Trump's inner circle who aren't either Bond-esque villains or just out-and-out incompetent, and seeing as this is a man who seems to be very easily swayed, I'd rather have Ivanka doing the swaying than someone like Bannon. Hopefully Bannon's next stop is right out of the White House. I suspect that the underlying motive for th
Re:Kushner (Score:4, Insightful)
American voters have wanted a King and a ruling dynasty for the longest time.
There's a worship of political families, and just having the right name increases your odds dramatically of getting votes for election to the same position held by someone of a previous generation of your family. It's not just increased access to connections and vertical knowledge transmission, people want the bloodline. And that's external... within the system, those bloodlines have similar supportive effects.
I'm pretty sure it's basic primate psychology at work. We just really, really want to be ruled by a divinely selected bloodine no matter how stupid that idea has repeatedly been shown to be.
Re:Kushner (Score:4, Interesting)
Simpsons nail it again:
Sideshow Bob: "Because you need me, Springfield. Your guilty conscience may move you to vote Democratic, but deep down you long for a cold-hearted Republican to lower taxes, brutalize criminals, and rule you like a king. That's why I did this, to save you from yourselves. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a city to run."
capcha: stamped
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"In the summer of 2004, Kushner was fined $508,900 by the Federal Election Commission for contributing to political campaigns in the names of his partnerships when he lacked authorization to do so.[8] In 2005, following an investigation by the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of New Jersey,[9] U.S. Attorney Chris Christie negotiated a plea agreement with Kushner, under which Kushner pleaded guilty to 18 counts of making illegal campaign
No big deal. (Score:2)
Nothing to see here. Move along. ...
Can I interest you in chemical warfare in Syria? If so, remember, only we know who launched the chemical weapons. Everyone else has it wrong. Everyone!
Remember kids... (Score:3, Interesting)
Bannon appointed himself to the NSC by having Trump signed off on an executive order that he didn't read and didn't find out about until it got mentioned in the media. Your tax dollars at work.
On a related note, Trump had played twice as much golf in two months than Obama did in eight years.
Re:Remember kids... (Score:4, Interesting)
We're seeing the end result of the Kushner's formal installation in the White House. There were some indications early on that Bannon might actually have outfoxed the Kushners, and indeed there were even suggestions Trump wasn't all that happy with his son-in-law. But now that Ivanka is formally in the White House, there simply isn't any room for Bannon. Bannon was useful because his Alt-right credentials gave Trump access to a fairly useful demographic, but people like that are very dangerous to keep by your side too long.
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death from heart disease is theoretical?
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On a related note, Trump had played twice as much golf in two months than Obama did in eight years.
Alternate facts? Obama played 333 rounds of golf in 8 years [golfchannel.com]. Assuming 5 hours per round, that would be 70 days non-stop, 24/7 golfing. I don't think President Trump has golfed that much, yet...
Re:Remember kids... (Score:5, Informative)
I don't think President Trump has golfed that much, yet...
I found a different article (see below) that described the situation more precisely. Obama golfed every nine days in eight years. Trump golfed every five days for the first two months. Trump's golfing is twice the rate of Obama's golfing.
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/for-trump-playing-golf-is-just-another-day-at-the-office-2017-03-31 [marketwatch.com]
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OK. So when you state something, and are proven to be wrong, rather than admitting your error you come back with a "what I meant to say was..."
I stand corrected. Thank you.
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It doesn't matter - he got his fake news posted and up modded. All he cared about.
It's not fake news and I don't care about being modded.
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If you take five hours to play a round of golf, you must really suck. Either that or you've got one leg and no cart.
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Either that or you've got one leg and no cart.
Or a bruised ego to sooth.
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Or you have a staff of Secret Service officers attempting to secure your safety.
At $1M to $3M per round. If Trump plays a game every five days for a year, the estimated cost (~$120M) will exceed the cost for eight years of Obama's golf games (~$90M).
Good (Score:3, Funny)
The Huffington Post said he was a NAZI and that's good enough for me. I don't want NAZIs in the US government and neither should you. And no, I won't bother to research where this information came from, because NAZI.
Have a nice day.
Re:This is relevant, how? (Score:5, Interesting)
Because national security policy drives information security policy. (See, for example, the thread about DHS scaling up invasive border procedures, most of the victims of whom will be innocent Americans.)
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. . .which is not information security policy, it's bureaucrats getting their jollies and over-promoted mall cops living out their Dirty Harry fantasies.
All the REAL infosec policy comes out of NIST in Gaithersburg, not DHS on Nebraska Avenue. . .
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Why is this on Slashdot?
Because it gets lots of posts, even if many are just people complaining about it being on Slashdot. Same for everything Apple does, inequality of various people in the workforce, stuff on millennials, etc. If you want to see less of a topic, just don't even bother opening the discussion.
Re: This is relevant, how? (Score:5, Funny)
Yes, it's a big conspiracy to take away your rights and complete the liberal agenda of switching this county into a communist utopia where bookist academic types rule over small businessmen and blue collar workers.
Close, but not quite. (Score:2)
Re: This is relevant, how? (Score:5, Interesting)
The Civil War already established how that works.
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The US has carried a constant debt since the US Civil War. Debt is literally what makes the world go round.
Re: This is relevant, how? (Score:5, Funny)
The US has carried a constant debt since the US Civil War. Debt is literally what makes the world go round.
If by "literally" you mean "figuratively,"
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The US has carried a constant debt since the US Civil War. Debt is literally what makes the world go round.
If by "literally" you mean "figuratively,"
Or by "go round", OP means "function adequately in an economic way".
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Considering that the conservation of angular momentum is more of a *balance* of attraction, it is quite literally the opposite.
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Nononono. Debt is good! Greece is fine!
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Debt is fine, if you can print money in the denomination of the debt.
If you can't, be careful. And that holds whether you are a nation state, a company, or a person.
Re: This is relevant, how? (Score:5, Insightful)
Joke's on you. I'm a registered Republican. (used to be Libertarian but switched when Ron Paul was in the primaries)
As for SJWs, treating people fairly is not really garbage, and has nothing to do with maxism. Most people who are upset by SJWs are upset because they've been called out on their bullshit. That most SJWs are women and are mostly targeting men has a lot to do with the vitriol that is spewed about SJWs. A lot of guys are just too old fashioned to want to here criticism from a woman. I don't care what gender someone is, as long as the criticism is valid and constructive. Usual response to SJWs is: I don't like what you're saying, so I'll mock you to take that power away from you. But that funny thing is you can't win that way (well at least *I* find it funny)
Democrats like Obama and both Clintons are very right leaning. They are no Howard Dean, Ralph Nader or Bernie Sanders. Not that a 1 dimensional scale for measuring political views is a good metric, it lacks nuance. For example, I'm a Republican and believe in small decentralized government and in supporting small business owners, but I'm against the death penalty. Does that make me a liberal? Probably not.
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I don't care what gender someone is, as long as the criticism is valid and constructive.
People get sick of "SJW criticisms" because they aren't valid, constructive, or solicited. Attempting to engage with them in dispassionate, rational discussion is a waste of effort because before you've finished your first sentence, they fall back to name-calling. So, for the sake of expediency, people simply respond to "SJW criticisms" with "oh, shut up".
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"Joke's on you. I'm a registered Republican. (used to be Libertarian but switched when Ron Paul was in the primaries)"
Don't feel bad. I was the other Johnson voter.
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Re: This is relevant, how? (Score:5, Informative)
So you're one of those fake 'progressive libertarians.' This is what happened to the term 'liberal.' You're just more of the same really. If you were truly for small government you would not buy into the idea of class warfare that today's social justice requires as a basis. Regardless of what you claim to be, such ideas most definitely have a basis in marxism (eg: "we have nothing to lose but our chains").
I found today's "No True Scotsman" comment.
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Tune in next week -- same Bat-time, same Bat-channel!
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What? Looking at those networks (and yes, including Fox News as the other AC suggested) seems to CONFIRM the conspiracy.
Saying something is a conspiracy isn't saying it's bullshit. It's saying it's a clandestine plot. Whether or not it's true doesn't affect whether it should be called a conspiracy or not.
Re: Huh? (Score:5, Interesting)
Stuff that matters, read a few more bytes into the tagline.
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Does this matter? Seems debatable to me.
It does matter, but not in a nerdly way.
Re: Huh? (Score:5, Funny)
How so? Maybe you could take the time to explain it.
Trump will be getting the same advice from the same people, but one of those people will now have a slightly different title. How is that not important?
Re: Huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
Generally having a role removed from your list of duties is seen as a demotion, and the timing of this, after Ivanka's official installation in the White House, is highly suggestive that the rumored power struggle between Bannon and the Kushners has resolved itself in the Kushners' favor. Also note that there have been rumors that Bannon and Priebus weren't getting along all that well either. I don't expect Bannon to work for that much longer at the White House.
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Indeed. Suggestive conjecture about rumors about internal squabbling over relationships is exactly what Slashdot should focus on, because there is nowhere else on the Internet that provides that information.
Re: Huh? (Score:4, Insightful)
Well when you host your own website you can decide what can and cant be posted.
In the mean time, I'll keep reading slashdot and continue to be not surprised about news articles related to major players in major online political movements and how they are fairing in their current role in real world politics.
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But how come no story on Susan Rice having unmasked multiple people in the Trump camp. It should be noted that she stated "she didn't do it, and had no knowledge of it." And of course that was proven untrue. And now we're seeing the claims making the rounds of "It wasn't political" but why wasn't the FBI involved then? Why did she do something that was outside of the preview of her job(advise the President and consume intelligence summaries)? Why does this appear to have been a case of her setting a new precedent(the unmasking). Why were they unmasked by her, when all 3 letter agencies could do this on their own if they're conducting an investigation.
And of course, why are so many of the media silent on this. When they were all over other major events similar to this and licking their chops like a dog seeing a steak. Well you can all have fun now.
Name a media outlet that was silent on the Susan Rice story. I'll wait...
Unmasking is rare in her job, but not unprecedented. She most likely didn't know that she was unmasking Trump associates until she actually asked for them to be unmasked. Unmasking isn't something she can do without asking permission from the relevant intelligence agency.
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Name a media outlet that was silent on the Susan Rice story. I'll wait...
CNN? [grabien.com] MSNBC? They also have pulled a CNN.
... Unmasking isn't something she can do without asking permission from the relevant intelligence agency.
Then I'm sure you can answer how she was able to unmask without the permission of those agencies then, since the order appears to have come directly from her. Or the fact that she ordered detailed spreadsheets on specific people in the Trump camp. [dailycaller.com] This of course is also while she claimed she didn't do it. I'm going to note that DC isn't the only site that has made this claim either, so has the WSJ and Bloomberg.
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I just searched CNN.com for "susan rice" and there is -zero- mention of the accusations against her in the first page of the search results. If I click over to the "Stories" tab, the first result is her denying any spying allegations involving the Brits. I'd love to have a non-conservative opinion on this, and their silence speaks volumes.
Fake news is news that is not true, not news you don't like.
Re:Well that's all interesting and good... (Score:5, Informative)
Zero? [cnn.com] Under "Everything", it's the first 3 links. Under "Stories", it's the first 4 links.
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they're shifting narrative, using the race card (Score:2)
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You want to try that again? I'm sure her word for it, is just as true as when she claimed Benghazi was because of a youtube video. And it came out via wikileaks that this was a deliberate obfuscation of the event.
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Re:Well that's all interesting and good... (Score:4, Insightful)
The whole "Susan Rice story" is largely a concoction, an attempt at distraction from the fact that there is growing evidence of significant ties between Trump and Putin. It's almost like a Nixon supporter saying "Clearly Deep Throat broke the law, so Nixon should get off!"
Re:Well that's all interesting and good... (Score:4, Interesting)
Well you can feel whatever way you want about it, but considering you have multiple agencies stating that there was no evidence or said evidence was circumstantial at best. I'm sure that's working out great for you. I'm guessing you'll be right there in supporting republicans and their demands that she come for an under-oath interview right? That should clean it all up very quickly. It's not like they'd have to subpena her or anything, like several investigative committees did to the current head of the DEA because of bureaucratic stonewalling.
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True. There is no proof, but we all know for damn sure that it is true.
I normally don't respond to AC's. But the irony, I can taste it through the internet.
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The released emails from the Clinton campaign illustrated behavior that many voters can objectionable, and the only response I've ever heard was to accuse the alleged hackers who stole the data and released it.
ie: shoot the messenger.
Amusingly, your Nixon example is actually more relevant when applied to the whole Clinton email thing.
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"The released emails from the Clinton campaign illustrated behavior that many voters can objectionable, and the only response I've ever heard was to accuse the alleged hackers who stole the data and released it."
What the emails did NOT illustrate was whether the Republican campaign was doing any better. While the release the emails gave us data, it did not give us information relevant to the choice between Republican and Democrat yet it was claimed to do so.
You are mistaking curators for messengers.
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"nothing in the hacked Hillary emails depicted illegal behavior"
It is illegal for a political campaign to coordinate strategy with a PAC. The Hillary e-mails certainly seem to depict a blatant disregard for this law.
https://theintercept.com/2016/... [theintercept.com]
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I think one should concern oneself with both. The chief issue with any leak is whether the leak is actually necessary. In an ideal world, Congressional oversight would mean that no one would need to publicly leak alleged or potential misdeeds by public officials or high-ranking individuals. But would Nixon have effectively been pushed from office (yes, he resigned before his almost inevitable removal) if Mark Felt hadn't leaked Nixon's misdeeds to Bob Woodward?
In other words, apart from any legal restrictio
Re:Well that's all interesting and good... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Really? Did Rice actually break any laws? It strikes me that her conduct is part of her job, no?
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the fact that there is growing evidence of significant ties between Trump and Putin
The rest of your post is on point, but this part.......there isn't much evidence of "significant ties." The whole thing looks like another attempt at a red scare.
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Clinton didn't lose the election that badly. She won in the popular vote, and Trump hardly won the electoral college by some sort of a landslide. If anything, the closeness of the race demonstrates that Trump is anything but the consensus winner.
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Maybe Trump's proxies shouldn't have been secretively communicating with the Russians. There's a lot of noise about the likes of Flynn being outed, but strangely little outrage about what they were doing, at least from Republicans.
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There's a lot of noise about the likes of Flynn being outed, but strangely little outrage about what they were doing, at least from Republicans.
There isn't much talk about "what they were doing" because there wasn't much going on at all and that takes all the fun out of the story for the Democrats. There's a reason that even Obama's DNI said that despite having access to everything, he say no evidence of anything out of bounds. There's no there there. All the hype is just the ongoing Democrat theater designed to find some way, any way, to distract from their horrible choice of candidate and idiotic conduct during the election. And the fact that un
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Re: (Score:2)
Re:Well that's all interesting and good... (Score:4, Informative)
But how come no story on Susan Rice having unmasked multiple people in the Trump camp.
Because /. doesn't cover every non-story put out by the Trump camp.
It should be noted that she stated "she didn't do it, and had no knowledge of it." And of course that was proven untrue.
Citation? My hunch is the usage of this quote doesn't match the context.
And now we're seeing the claims making the rounds of "It wasn't political" but why wasn't the FBI involved then?
Because the US has multiple intelligence agencies.
Why did she do something that was outside of the preview of her job(advise the President and consume intelligence summaries)? Why does this appear to have been a case of her setting a new precedent(the unmasking).
That's not only within the realm of her job, it's a great example of actually doing your job.
People affiliated with an incoming administration are having clandestine meetings with agents for foreign powers who helped decide the election? Some unmasking is warranted.
Why were they unmasked by her, when all 3 letter agencies could do this on their own if they're conducting an investigation.
For the same reason the NSA decided to approve her request, because the unmasking was warranted.
And of course, why are so many of the media silent on this. When they were all over other major events similar to this and licking their chops like a dog seeing a steak. Well you can all have fun now.
Because they recognize it's just another attempt by Trump and his defenders to distract from his completely made-up claims that he was wire-tapped. And to distract from the many, many, unsettling ties from his camp to Russia.
Seriously, you think this was political shenanigans? Then why didn't it come out during the election? Tons of these links were being investigated during the election but it was only the media who actually uncovered anything. The closest thing we saw to a leak from the government was Democratic Legislators complaining that there were incriminating things not being released. Meanwhile, we heard non-stop about the investigation into Clinton and her emails, including leaks. One of the reasons Comey apparently announced the temporary re-opening of the investigation just before the election is that he didn't think he could stop his office from leaking!
If the investigations into Trump were politically motivated you would have heard about them in October.
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Indeed, underlying all of this is the fact that the Obama Administration and the three letter agencies were doing their job. If Trump and his proxies didn't want to be outed playing footsie with the Russians, then, well, they shouldn't have been playing footsie with the Russians. This all comes down to the fact that Trump's minions, like Flynn, are not only of dubious loyalty to US interests, but are astonishingly stupid people. Who in their right mind would think that you could communicate with the fucking
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Oh for fuck's sake - Your lord and master Obama already said in November that there was no Russian influence on the campaign.
No Russian interference on the vote itself, ie, they didn't hack into any of the electronic voting machines.
Everybody but Trump acknowledges that Russia influenced the campaign.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm just going to leave [washingtonexaminer.com] this right here. [bloomberg.com] Then when you get to the parts where your arguments fall apart you can let me know.
If the investigations into Trump were politically motivated you would have heard about them in October.
Funny thing, we found out about them about a month ago. And it was started right after Trump became the nominee. It *almost* seems like the previous president was hoping someone else was going to win, and they could simply sweep this egregious abuse of power under the rug.
Kinda strange isn't it? How come you didn't hear about previous administrations doing this...
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Oh please. From your own link:
"White House lawyers last month learned that the former national security adviser Susan Rice requested the identities of U.S. persons in raw intelligence reports on dozens of occasions that connect to the Donald Trump transition and campaign, according to U.S. officials familiar with the matter."
Do you even understand what a "raw intelligence dump" is? It's a raw dump of intelligence traffic without names attached to it. The traffic was suspicious, *which is why* the identit
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I'm just going to leave [washingtonexaminer.com] this right here. [bloomberg.com] Then when you get to the parts where your arguments fall apart you can let me know.
So she seemed to falsely deny Nunes' claim that individuals were unmasked (though Nunes' claim wasn't restated specifically so it hard to know exactly what she denied), she immediately after went into detail how incidental collection of intelligence was legal, so I think a listener would come away with the proper conclusion that transition officials had gotten caught up in the observation of foreign agents.
If the investigations into Trump were politically motivated you would have heard about them in October.
Funny thing, we found out about them about a month ago. And it was started right after Trump became the nominee. It *almost* seems like the previous president was hoping someone else was going to win, and they could simply sweep this egregious abuse of power under the rug.
Kinda strange isn't it? How come you didn't hear about previous administrations doing this...
Started doing what? Spying on foreign diplomats? Welcome to the 19th century.
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Last time I check this was tech site, guess it is left wing sjw bash Trump site?
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But how come no story on Susan Rice having unmasked multiple people in the Trump camp
Probably because no one cares about that.
Seriously, we have possible sarin gas attacks in Syria, problems in N Korea, and we're talking about Susan Rice who is gone and no longer has power, and really didn't do that much bad to begin with. Time to move on.
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There was no bugging of Trump Tower, and Trump's proxies got caught up because they're such arrogant buffoons that somehow it didn't enter the tiny brains that communications with Russian officials are ALWAYS monitored.
The rest of your rant is just a demonstration of your stupidity. The perfect Trump voter; a combination of bluster and low IQ.
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GOP may end up hating T more than the Dems.
It would be ironic of GOP tries to impeach him out of office, but Dems actually prevent or delay it so that T can finish demolishing GOP and their reputation.
Pence could probably get more of GOP's (traditional) agenda passed than T, which the Dems obviously don't want. T is proving to be an ineffective blabber-mouth (which was predictable in my opinion).
Buckle up for Mr. Toad's wild orange ride...
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I predict there will be an avalanche.
Trump's approval rating drops by the day. He has accomplished nothing of significance. He has deliberately made many enemies. He has filled the swamp with banksters and oil executives. Alienates allies. White house staff fighting each other. Ethics violations. Failed travel ban, twice. Failed health care destruction, twice. Voices in his own party are disagreeing with him. Trump-Russia collusion investigatio
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The standard of living in the USA is certainly stagnant, and arguably slowly backsliding, but it's not "broken". We are STILL at or near the top of the heap in terms of national power and wealth. Venezuela is a real example of "broken" (because they put all their eggs in the oil basket).
The "break it to start over" suggestion risks losing everything in a bid to try to improve what mostly works. It reminds me of sports teams who come just shy of a championship, and revamp their ro
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Re: Hitlery will not be running for office (Score:5, Interesting)
Hillary Clinton was barely tolerated by half of the Democrat voters. That's why Hillary lost. Trump was a barely tolerated candidate among Republicans, but not quite weak enough to be defeated by Hillary Clinton. For example, take a look at her first-amendment positions and you'll see someone who is way to the right of center. When you have a choice between a Republican running as a Democrat and a Libertarian running as a Republican, is it any surprise that the latter wins?
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Hillary was so bad of a candidate that she could only be competitive against an idiot like Donald Trump. Trump was so bad of a candidate that he could only be competitive against a corrupt career politician like Hillary Clinton.
The people are so bought into the cycle of voting for the lesser evil that even with historically polarizing, horrible, and unliked candidates, 3rd parties still barely got 2.5% of the vote...
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Hillary Clinton was barely tolerated by half of the Democrat voters. That's why Hillary lost. Trump was a barely tolerated candidate among Republicans, but not quite weak enough to be defeated by Hillary Clinton. For example, take a look at her first-amendment positions and you'll see someone who is way to the right of center.
I'm not sure how you're defining the left/right divide, but at this time in history pro-first-amendment is very much a right-wing position and very much not a left-wing position. The left is doing more against free speech every year right now than the right has done in all of history.
When you have a choice between a Republican running as a Democrat and a Libertarian running as a Republican, is it any surprise that the latter wins?
Uh, are you calling Trump a Libertarian?
LOL.
That ringing sound you keep hearing? It's the cluephone. Might want to answer it.
Re: Hitlery will not be running for office (Score:5, Insightful)
Uh, are you calling Trump a Libertarian?
LOL.
He's apparently a corporatocrat, which makes him just as much of a libertarian as most of the people who call themselves libertarian. Don't like it? Separate yourself from that label to escape the association with all the crypto-corporatocrats hiding among you. Sometimes a label is too tainted and has to be discarded.
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Hillary was a Republican running as a democrat? Huh? Not even close.
Hillary was *all* democrat, lock stock and barrel.. She just hit the general election knowing that radical leftist doesn't win elections so she tried to run as far right as her liberal democratic base would allow w/o howling about it.
You remember the discussions about abortion and the Heller ruling at the last debate? She had no choice but to shore up her base and took the radical liberal leftist positions on these issues at that point
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Hillary was a Republican running as a democrat? Huh? Not even close.
Well, perhaps if social issues are your wedge issues, that's pretty true for Hillary, her husband, and even Obama. however, from the Democrat/left side, if looking at national security, privacy rights, economy, foreign policy, etc. They all appear as Republicans. The main complaint about Obama by those that voted for him was that it was pretty much a continuation of Bush on such policies. He may have gotten through some form of universal healthcare, but pretty much folded on FISA, business, Middle East, etc
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I can't think of any definition of "Libertarian" that matches Trump. What are you thinking there?
He's the "I have more money and therefore I'm right" sort. A lot of people who call themselves libertarian fall into that category, whether their self-applied label is deserved or not.
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I can't think of any definition of "Libertarian" that matches Trump. What are you thinking there?
His instincts lean towards scrapping onerous, pointless regulations. Towards government more in its constitutionally described role, rather than as Nanny. He's no classical libertarian, of course. But on many topics he skews more that direction than most of his primary race counterparts, and certainly wildly more so than his Democrat opponent.
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I disagree with your assessment of why T won. T was basically a roll-the-dice choice. Hillary was more or less a known quantity: mostly competent but bland. T presented a chance of being a true reformer but also a chance of being a dud.
It was the pioneering spirit in Americans that made them gamble at the polls. Voters have Captain Orange taking the USA Enterprise into a Strange New Frontier, full well knowing we might find paradise, Borg, and/or be infested with orange tribbles that double as toupees.
T is
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What does this have to do with computers?
If Trump lasts 8 years civilization will collapse and self-driving cars will need to be work in Mad Max settings.
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No. According to the Federal Register, he is no longer a member of the NSC. And yes, that means he won't be attending meetings. NSC meetings are not open mic night.
And the Trump administration has confirmed Bannon's removal from the NSC.