The Russian Connection 2

[GreyhoundFan]

This is a good roundup from the WaPo: "The Daily 202: 10 takeaways from Mueller’s shock-and-awe gambit"

Spoiler

THE BIG IDEA: The ghost of Paul Manafort haunts the White House this Halloween.

Since President Trump likes alliterative nicknames, maybe the special counsel’s should be Methodical Mueller.

Unveiling the first batch of criminal allegations to come from probes into possible Russian influence in the American political system, Robert S. Mueller III proved Monday that he is not messing around. The former FBI director has played his cards carefully since his appointment in May. He’s clearly turning over every rock to see what crawls out from underneath. Unafraid to play hardball, he’s being strategic in showing his hand.

You surely know the news by now: Manafort, the former Trump campaign chairman, and his longtime business partner, Rick Gates, were charged in a 12-count indictment with conspiracy to launder money, making false statements and other charges in connection with their work advising a Russia-friendly political party in Ukraine.

But the biggest bombshell of Monday — the real October Surprise — is that former Trump foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos agreed to a plea deal and admitted to making a false statement to FBI investigators about his contacts with foreigners claiming to have high-level Russian connections.

“The charges are striking for their breadth, touching all levels of the Trump campaign and exploring the possible personal, financial wrongdoing of those involved, as well as what appeared to be a concerted effort by one campaign official to arrange a meeting with Russian officials,” Matt Zapotosky, Rosalind S. Helderman, Carol D. Leonnig and Spencer S. Hsu write in our lead story.

“[Mueller’s] opening bid is a remarkable show of strength,” Susan Hennessey and Benjamin Wittes explain on their Lawfare blog. “He has a cooperating witness from inside the campaign’s interactions with the Russians. And he is alleging not mere technical infractions of law but astonishing criminality on the part of Trump’s campaign manager, a man who also attended the Trump Tower meeting. Any hope the White House may have had that the Mueller investigation might be fading away vanished . . . Things are only going to get worse from here.”

-- Here are 10 takeaways from Mueller’s opening gambit:

1. We now know that multiple members of the Trump campaign at least entertained the idea of getting help from the Russians.

The DNC email system was hacked in March 2016. In April, Papadopoulos began communicating with someone he believed to be linked to the Russian government. By July, Trump was publicly encouraging the Kremlin to release Hillary Clinton’s emails. “The White House can no longer claim honestly (if it ever could) that the investigation into Russian collusion is nonexistent,” Jennifer Rubin notes.

This comes against the backdrop of the June 2016 meeting at Trump Tower that we already knew about, which came after Donald Trump Jr. emailed that he loved the idea of getting dirt from Russia about Hillary Clinton.

“At this point, it would be a truly remarkable coincidence if two entities that had so many ties to each other, that had so much information about what the other was doing, and that were working so hard toward the same goal never found a way to coordinate,” Vox’s Ezra Klein writes.

2. Sam Clovis is about to be in the hot seat.

The former Iowa radio host and social conservative activist is awaiting Senate confirmation to serve in the Agriculture Department’s top scientific post. His confirmation hearing is expected next month.

Victoria Toensing, an attorney for Clovis, confirmed to our Rosalind Helderman that several references in court filings to “the campaign supervisor” refer to the former radio host from Iowa, who served as Trump’s national campaign co-chairman.

“At one point, Papadopoulos emailed Clovis and other campaign officials about a March 24, 2016, meeting he had in London with a professor, who had introduced him to the Russian ambassador and a Russian woman he described as ‘Putin’s niece,’” Helderman reports. “The group had talked about arranging a meeting ‘between us and the Russian leadership to discuss U.S.-Russia ties under President Trump,’ Papadopoulos wrote. (Papadopoulos later learned that the woman was not Putin’s niece, and while he expected to meet the ambassador, he never did, according to filings.) Clovis responded that he would ‘work it through the campaign,’ adding, ‘great work,’ according to court documents.

“In August 2016, Clovis responded to efforts by Papadopoulos to organize an ‘off the record’ meeting with Russian officials. ‘I would encourage you’ and another foreign policy adviser to the campaign to ‘make the trip, if it is feasible,’ Clovis wrote. Toensing said Clovis ‘always vigorously opposed any Russian trip for Donald Trump and/or the campaign.’ She said his responses to Papadopoulos were courtesy by ‘a polite gentleman from Iowa.’”

Will Trump stand by him?

3. Papadopoulos is helping the government, but we still don’t know how much.

Papadopoulos has been working with Mueller’s team for three months now, and he is described in court documents as a “proactive cooperator.”

Former public defender and professor Seth Abramson explains why that term is probably bad news for others in Trump’s orbit: “Prosecutors often require a defendant to perform cooperative services for the government well in *advance* of his or her formal plea,” he tweeted. “The reason for this is that — via both ‘proffer’ and sometimes actual performance — a defendant must show they're of value to the government. So there is *every* reason to think that Papadopoulos was wired for sound not long after his arrest on July 27th, 2017 at Dulles airport. For Papadopoulos to get his October 5th plea, one of two things had to be true: (a) the feds had already got good sound from him; or... ..(b) he'd made a sufficient proffer establishing that he *could* get good sound for them — valuable evidence — shortly after October 5th.”

Former U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara, who Trump fired earlier this year, told Politico Magazine: “Hard to tell, but the George Papadopoulos guilty plea tells us (a) Mueller is moving fast (b) the Mueller team keeps secrets well (c) more charges should be expected and (d) this team takes obstruction and lying very, very seriously. That should be of concern to some people.”

From the Toronto Star's Washington reporter:

,,, < tweet about Papdopoulos possibly wearing a wire >

4. The updated timeline raises a host of new questions about what Trump knew and when he knew it.

First, was Trump present when Papadopoulos said that he could set up a Trump-Putin meeting? “The indictment says Papadopoulos attended a ‘national security meeting’ about March 31 with ‘Trump and other foreign policy advisers for the campaign,” Aaron Blake notes. “It says Papadopoulos told ‘the group’ that he had connections and could arrange a Trump-Putin meeting. The text doesn’t technically say whether Trump was present when this claim was made. But if he was, it would render Trump’s own denials of his campaign’s contact with Russia pretty dishonest.”

Second, did Trump know Papadopoulos had been interviewed by the FBI when he called James Comey in January to allegedly ask for the FBI director’s loyalty? 

From an alumnus of Obama’s Justice Department:

,,, < interesting tweet about timeline >

5. Mueller is playing hardball as he tries to flip Manafort and Gates.

Manafort and Gates pleaded not guilty in D.C. federal court. A judge set a $10 million unsecured bond for Manafort and a $5 million unsecured bond for Gates. They will be on home confinement.

“The criminal charge of being an unregistered foreign agent — a so-called ‘FARA violation’ — against Paul Manafort is a rare crime, used just four times (all successfully) in the last decade. Normally, it’s allowed to be just a civil penalty, so the fact that Mueller has deployed it as a criminal one means he’s going for maximum leverage,” Garrett M. Graff explains on Wired.

A former Watergate assistant special prosecutor, Nick Akerman, said the court filings “all spell bad news for Trump” because he cannot see any strong defense to the Manafort indictment. “The only defense that you’ve got is to go in there and start singing like a canary to avoid jail time,” he told our colleagues. “And once he starts singing, one of the tunes is bound to be Donald Trump.”

“Manafort may now be facing the prospect of years in prison, and the indictment seems meticulously rooted in facts and evidence that Robert Mueller accumulated; if I were Manafort, I’d be very worried,” adds New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof. “Presumably that was the intention, and one purpose of the indictment is to gain leverage to persuade Manafort to testify against others in exchange for leniency. If Manafort pursues his self-interest, my bet is that he’ll sing. That then can become a cascade: He testifies against others, who in turn are pressured to testify against still others. And all this makes it more difficult to protect the man at the center if indeed he has violated the law.”

6. Mueller’s moves are designed to send a message to everyone else entangled in the probe that he's not messing around.

Devlin Barrett, Sari Horwitz and Ellen Nakashima explain why in a story that quotes several legal experts: “This is the way you kick off a big case,” said white-collar defense lawyer Patrick Cotter, who formerly worked alongside the man spearheading the prosecution of Manafort and Gates. “Oh, man, they couldn’t have sent a message any clearer if they’d rented a revolving neon sign in Times Square. And the message isn’t just about Manafort. It’s a message to the next five guys they talk to. And the message is: ‘We are coming, and we are not playing, and we are not bluffing.’”

“Mueller's team controlled the selection of facts in the Papadoupolous plea. Three messages, at least, shaped their choice,” author and former Post reporter Barton Gellman‏ explained in a series of tweets: “One: Mueller knows things, some of them about Russia, and has proof. He's warning other campaign witnesses against perjury. Two: He's not saying exactly what he knows or how. Uncertainty there inspires dread, may flush out evidence he doesn't even know about. Three: Early cooperation will save you from the worst. Mueller could have taken a lot harsher approach to the Papadopoulos facts. Classic leverage … He may know what you're hiding. He'll scorch you & yours if you lie. Spill and he'll go easier. Don't wait too long.”

7. Unsealing the guilty plea was an insurance policy that makes it politically untenable for Trump to fire Mueller.

Most congressional Republicans stayed silent in the face of the news (more on that below), but a handful of key lawmakers on the right telegraphed that firing Mueller would cross an unacceptable red line. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said in a statement said “it's important to let our legal system run its course”: “It’s good to see the Justice Department taking seriously its responsibility to enforce [FARA].”

“He’s not going to be fired by the president,” Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) said of Mueller. “Because I know him. He knows that’d be a stupid move.”

Trump lawyers Ty Cobb, John Dowd and Jay Sekulow, who have each advised the president to use caution in his public response to the mounting investigation, all sought on Monday to tamp speculation that Trump is even considering firing Mueller. “Nothing about today’s events alters anything related to our engagement with the special counsel, with whom we continue to cooperate,” Cobb, the White House lawyer overseeing Russia matters, told reporters. “There are no discussions and there is no consideration being given to terminating Mueller.” Sekulow, one of Trump’s outside lawyers, also echoed that response: “There’s no firing-Robert-Mueller discussions,” he said. Asked whether Trump is considering pardons for Manafort or Gates, Cobb said: “No, no, no. That’s never come up and won’t come up.”

To be sure, that does not mean he won’t be tempted. Former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon “is pushing Trump to take action against Mueller, urging him in particular to defund the investigation … a move that would defang Mueller without the president formally firing him,” Politico’s Eliana Johnson reports. “Longtime Trump confidant Roger Stone told the Daily Caller that for the president appointing another special counsel — this one to investigate [the Obama-era uranium deal] — was his ‘only chance for survival.’”

8. Yesterday’s indictments will contribute to a climate of fear in the White House that makes it harder for Trump and his staff to be effective.

“Away from the podium, Trump staffers fretted privately over whether Manafort or Gates might share with Mueller’s team damaging information about other colleagues,” Robert Costa, Philip Rucker, and Ashley Parker report. “They expressed concern in particular about Gates because he has a young family, may be more stretched financially than Manafort and continued to be involved in Trump’s political operation and had access to the White House, including attending West Wing meetings after Trump was sworn in. ‘The walls are closing in,’ said one senior Republican in close contact with top staffers … ‘Everyone is freaking out.’”

9. Mueller has proven that his investigation is not partisan.

Democratic uber-lobbyist Tony Podesta abruptly quit his post atop the Podesta Group, the capital’s eighth highest-grossing lobbying firm, just hours after the first indictments were unsealed. The indictments of Manafort and Gates raised questions about the work Podesta’s firm did with Manafort to improve the image of the Ukrainian government.

“Tony’s Podesta Group is one of two firms described in Monday’s indictment as having been recruited by Manafort and Gates to lobby on behalf of Viktor Yanukovych, the former president of Ukraine who fled to Moscow in 2014,” Marc Fisher and Carol Leonnig report. “Federal prosecutors have accused Manafort of creating a scheme to mislead the government about his secret work for a Ukrainian political leader. Both the Podesta Group and the other firm, Mercury Public Affairs, have said they were hired to lobby for a European nonprofit based in Brussels trying to polish Ukraine’s image in the West. But behind the scenes, prosecutors allege, the real client was a political party led by the former Ukraine president, who was friendly with Russia.”

10. The indictments cast fresh doubts on Trump’s judgment and his discernment in surrounding himself with good people.

It was widely and publicly known that Manafort was one sketchy hombre when Trump hired him to run his campaign last year. BuzzFeed’s Ben Smith has a good primer on “the open secrets of the Russia story,” detailing the long and well-known history of Manafort and Gates’s work abroad.

Manafort joined the campaign with his own reasons to help the Russians, separate from Trump’s agenda. While the current charges against Manafort do not focus on attempts to collude with the Russian government, his interests and Russian interests overlapped on several occasions while serving on the campaign. (Philip Bump lists some.)  

Finally, and perhaps most significantly, Mike Pence is only vice president today because Manafort persuaded Trump to pick him. It was very clear last summer that the then-Indiana governor would not have gotten tapped for the ticket if Manafort hadn’t prodded the GOP nominee.

,,, < the roundup continues >

There are lots of links in the article. Methinks the TT needs to stock up on Immodium and Xanax, because the shit is getting real.

[Howl]

From a CNN post titled "Who is Rick Gates?"

Quote

Away from the podium, Trump staffers fretted privately over whether Manafort or Gates might share with Mueller’s team damaging information about other colleagues. They expressed concern in particular about Gates because he has a young family, may be more stretched financially than Manafort

I guess because even though you've been involved in laundering millions of dollars, you could be bankrupted by legal bills?  

and more from the same post: 

Quote

Later, Gates was involved with a failed business venture with Manafort and Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska, who is a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, according to legal filings. The plan was for Deripaska to invest $100 million in a private equity company that Manafort and Gates would manage.

The project fell apart, and Deripaska sued Manafort and Gates in the Cayman Islands for mishandling his money.

But hey, I guess they patched things up because

Quote

During the Trump campaign, Manafort had offered Deripaska a private briefing on the campaign two weeks before Trump accepted the nomination, The Washington Post reported.

Deripaska, a Russian citizen, has offered to cooperate with Capitol Hill investigations in exchange for immunity.

Really, things are getting more insanely delicious by the second! 

[GreyhoundFan]

"‘This is a nothing burger’: How conservative media reacted to the Mueller indictments"

Spoiler

The revelation Monday of charges against three former Trump campaign officials in special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s probe into possible Russian influence in American politics delivered a sharp jolt to the news cycle.

Anticipation over the arrests had been high for days after news that the first charges in Mueller's investigation were imminent had seeped out over the weekend. And the documents outlining allegations against former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, business partner Rick Gates and former Trump foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos, laid out what investigators had found in unvarnished detail.

For most national media outlets, the news that three campaign officials had been charged headlined websites and front pages and were the focus of most of the day's coverage, including in the traditionally conservative Wall Street Journal.

... < screenshots of newspapers >

But in the highly politicized media environment, where news is increasingly targeted to partisan audiences, the indictment story played out very differently on conservative sites, such as Fox News, Breitbart and the Daily Caller.

Here is a look at the news as seen through a conservative media lens.

The most notable conservative reaction came quickly, from the man who looms large over the investigation: President Trump.

“Sorry, but this is years ago, before Paul Manafort was part of the Trump campaign,” the president wrote on Twitter soon after the indictments were made public Monday morning. “But why aren’t Crooked Hillary & the Dems the focus?????”

He added: “Also, there is NO COLLUSION!”

Subsequent narratives echoed the president, downplaying the significance of the arrests.

“These transactions predate Paul Manafort’s involvement with the campaign,” conservative talk radio host Laura Ingraham said on her show. “The idea that this is a bad day for Trump because it in any way alludes to a collusion with Russia — you’ve got to be living on another planet if you think that.”

She added: “This is a nothing burger.”

Some reports seemed to hew closely to White House talking points.

Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the president's press secretary, said the arrests had “nothing to do with the president … Most of them took place well before the campaign ever even existed.”

Fox News' chief Washington correspondent, James Rosen, noted during an evening report that “Donald Trump is far removed from the allegations.”

“If there was collusion, any evidence or even an allegation has yet to be revealed by the special counsel,” the network's chief White House correspondent John Roberts noted. 

The New York Post — which, along with Fox News and the Wall Street Journal, is also owned by Rupert Murdoch — had nearly dropped the story of the indictments from its homepage by the end of the day, focusing instead on sexual harassment scandals related to Kevin Spacey, Peyton Manning and Harvey Weinstein.

Many viewers noticed how the story was covered differently by various television networks.

“CNN: Manafort indicted. MSNBC: Manafort indicted. Fox News: Is it mongooses or mongeese? We talk to experts,” comedian Kumail Nanjiani joked about the disparity in coverage.

Earlier, viewers pointed out that Fox News ran a segment on a hamburger emoji while CNN and MSNBC covered the indictments. Of course, other mainstream outlets covered the hamburger emoji story, too.

Some news outlets played up coverage casting doubt on the integrity of the investigation, a long-running narrative that heated up on conservative media last week before the arrests.

Rush Limbaugh opened his show on Monday talking about the Clinton campaign's connection to the dossier compiled by Fusion GPS on Donald Trump, a point the president has recently been tweeting about. The Washington Post reported last week that the campaign and the Democratic National Committee helped fund the research that lead to the dossier.

“Ergo the leak on Friday that Mueller had an indictment,” Limbaugh said. “That totally changed the narrative, it changed the direction, and its purpose was to basically cover up and shift away to the side the Clinton involvement in the Trump dossier. It was a classic case of distraction.”

He added: “And none of it, I can tell you, with ontological certitude, none of the Manafort indictment as we sit here today has a single thing to do with Donald Trump, with the Trump campaign or with Russian collusion.”

Alex Jones’s Infowars, a popular site and radio show that frequently promotes misinformation and conspiracy theories, led its website with three stories about Spacey, who had been accused of making sexual advances on a 14-year-old actor. 

“This is more sour grapes and it’s not going well,” Jones said of Mueller probe, between advertisements for colloidal silver, anti-fascist Infowars T-shirts and a bizarre aside that Hitler was photographed in 1955 alive in Argentina, 10 years after his death.

Speaking on Jones's show, informal Trump adviser Roger J. Stone Jr. called for the president to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate a 2010 uranium deal that has become the center of a controversy gaining steam in conservative media — with allegations that the Clintons benefited despite little evidence indicating as much.

“That investigation would have to focus on Mr. Mueller, Mr. Comey, Mr. McCabe, the associate director of the FBI and [Deputy Attorney General] Rod Rosenstein,” Stone said. “Those gentlemen would have to step down if they were the target of a federal investigation.”

... < tweet from Ann Coulter >

On Fox News, contributor Michael Goodwin argued that Mueller should resign. “I think he has to be purer than Caesar’s wife here,” Goodwin said. “I think these conflicts will muddy the waters.”

The Gateway Pundit, a site with a wide following known for trafficking in falsehoods, echoed previous statements the president has made in calling the investigation the “Mueller Witch Hunt.”

RT, a Russian state-sponsored media network, ran an opinion piece on its homepage that asked, “Is Russiagate dead?” The headline continued: “Paul Manafort & Kiev caught up in FBI dragnet, Kremlin not mentioned.”

Other sites focused on the announcement that Tony Podesta — a prominent lobbyist, Democrat and brother of Hillary Clinton’s campaign chief — planned to resign after his firm was indirectly referenced in the charges against Manafort and Gates.

By evening, Breitbart’s lead story was about Podesta — illustrated with a photo of him with a drink in his hand — though he had not been charged with a crime or named in the court filings. 

The most prominent story Breitbart ran about the charges highlighted remarks from Sarah Huckabee Sanders: “WH: Manafort arrest ‘has nothing to do with the president.’” By the end of the day, the site's lead story was about Spacey.

The influential aggregator the Drudge Report appeared to lead with a story about the arrests. “MUELLER'S HALLOWEEN,” the site's lead headline blared. “WASHINGTON SPOOKED.” But the headlines linked to The Washington Post's story about Tony Podesta. Other stories linked on the site seemed to cast doubt on the investigation: “JUDGE AN OBAMA APPOINTEE, CLINTON DONOR”; “Manafort's Constitutional Rights Violated?” “FORMER PROSECUTOR: SHAKY, OVERCHARGED CASE.”

The Daily Caller also chose to go big with the Podesta news, with two stories. The most prominent stories about the probe were about how Trump was never mentioned in the indictment, and about an error — blamed on Mueller (“Mueller Makes Key Error,” the headline read) — in the Manafort indictment that misidentified former Ukraine prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko as the country’s former president.

Fox News host Sean Hannity opened his show with a monologue about the Clinton connections to the uranium deal and the Trump dossier.

“The very thing they are accusing President Trump of doing, they did it themselves,” he said.

... < Hannity tweet >

During his show, Hannity mistakenly referred to the former Democratic nominee as “President Clinton.”

Clinton, speaking in Chicago, was asked Monday night what she would be for Halloween.

“I think I will maybe come as the president,” she joked

According to Alex Seitz-Wald of NBC News, Clinton offered a brief bit of media criticism, focused on Fox.

“All the networks except Fox are reporting what’s really going on, Clinton said, adding, “It appears they don’t know I’m not president.”

So now Alex Jones is saying Hitler was alive in the 1950s? Good grief?

[onekidanddone]

19 minutes ago, GreyhoundFan said:

So now Alex Jones is saying Hitler was alive in the 1950s? Good grief?

He should know. Alex is a vampire, and he hung with Hitler.

[AmazonGrace]

I can't imagine why Carter Page is giving interviews. 

 

[onekidanddone]

11 minutes ago, AmazonGrace said:

I can't imagine why Carter Page is giving interviews. 

A few reasons come to mind:

• totally amoral
• attention hog
• pathological lair
• part of Trump's inner circle of psychos 
• paid by Trump to do his bidding
• scared like hell he is going to be next
• he spends too much time with Alex Jones and Steve Bannon.

[formergothardite]

22 minutes ago, AmazonGrace said:

I can't imagine why Carter Page is giving interviews. 

Trump only gets the best and smartest people! Clearly the wisest path to take when you might be one of the next people arrested is to go on television and lie some more! 

[Howl]

From @GreyhoundFan's WaPo link: 

Quote

Speaking on Jones's show, informal Trump adviser Roger J. Stone Jr. called for the president to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate a 2010 uranium deal that has become the center of a controversy gaining steam in conservative media — with allegations that the Clintons benefited despite little evidence indicating as much.

I can't even contemplate those two (Alex Jones and Stone) in the same room (even connected electronically) without experiencing a bad acid flashback combined with visceral revulsion. 

And yes, Carter Page is just one more face in the grotesque rogue's gallery of Trump's alt-right unhinged leg-humping fanbois.  Plus, there's something about Carter that's just not right. 

[GreyhoundFan]

A good snarky piece from Dana Milbank: "Mueller finally proves it: Hillary Clinton is guilty!"

Spoiler

Robert Mueller’s conviction of a former Trump campaign adviser and his indictment of two more finally prove it: Hillary is guilty!

Technically, President Trump’s standard line of defense in the Russia probe — we did not collude — suffered a bit of a blow Monday. In a plea deal with the special counsel unsealed Monday (at about the time Trump was tweeting the phrase “there is NO COLLUSION!”), Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos admitted the Trump adviser had contacts with Russians offering the Trump campaign Hillary Clinton’s emails and other “dirt,” and he tried to arrange meetings with Russian officials. That’s pretty much the dictionary definition of “collusion.”

But Trump’s deficit of honesty is offset by a surplus of dexterity. Though not abandoning the there-is-no-collusion defense, the White House is already elevating a secondary position — the okay-maybe-we-colluded-but-Clinton-colluded-more defense.

“There’s clear evidence of the Clinton campaign colluding with Russian intelligence,” White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders proclaimed at Monday afternoon’s briefing, after the indictment by Mueller of former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort and a colleague.

Trump, who often accuses others of the exact thing he stands accused of, reacted to the indictments with abundant punctuation: “But why aren’t Crooked Hillary & the Dems the focus?????” he tweeted.

Trump has been complaining about “the lack of investigation on Clinton made Fake Dossier,” and “GUILT by Democrats/Clinton.” He tweeted a Hill article with an exculpatory quote from Fox News’s Chris Wallace (Headline: “More evidence of Dem collusion with Russia than GOP”) and a New York Post column arguing that perhaps Clinton “came closer to colluding with the Russians” than Trump.

The evidence of Clinton’s alleged “collusion” with Russia? She and the Democrats hired an opposition-research firm that wrote a dossier on, um, Trump’s collusion with Russia. She also colluded with Russia by being secretary of state at a time when another arm of the U.S. government approved a uranium deal with a Russian-owned company that had given money to her husband and his foundation.

Both of these are about as compelling as saying the guilty plea entered by Papadopoulos is further evidence of Clinton’s collusion with Russia because “George Papadopoulos” sounds like “George Stephanopoulos,” who once worked for Bill Clinton, who is married to Hillary Clinton.

By Trump’s new standard, “collusion” now covers not just Russia’s election interference but anything that has to do with Russia done by anybody at any time for any reason. If that’s the rule, there is indeed plenty of evidence that Clinton colluded with Russia. She has visited Russia often, spoken with Russians and even tried to reset relations with Russia. I’d bet she has also watched Russian ballet and read Russian novels.

But by that standard there’s also evidence most everybody else colludes with Russia, too. Therefore, the Mueller investigation will need to expand significantly. The following people should present themselves at the earliest opportunity to the special counsel’s office for interviews:

●All persons who now consume or in the past have consumed vodka. This includes but is not limited to Black Russians, White Russians and Moscow Mules.

●All persons who now consume or in the past have consumed beluga or osetra caviar.

●All persons who now play, or previously have played, with nesting dolls.

●All persons who watch or have watched the FX drama “The Americans.”

●All persons who have viewed “The Nutcracker” (including children’s performances) or “Swan Lake,” or hummed the “1812 Overture.”

●All persons who have dined at the Russian Tea Room in New York.

●All persons who have traveled to, or consumed wine from, the Russian River Valley in Sonoma County, Calif.

●All persons who have read, or have caused to be read, “Anna Karenina,” “War and Peace,” “Crime and Punishment,” “The Brothers Karamazov” or any play by Anton Chekhov.

●All persons who have heard, or have caused to be heard, the work of Rachmaninoff, Shostakovich, Stravinsky or Mussorgsky.

●All persons who have played against, or watched a match involving, Anna Kournikova, Maria Sharapova or Garry Kasparov.

●All persons who have experienced the work of Wassily Kandinsky, Groucho Marx or John Lennon.

●All persons who have played Russian roulette or flown in a Sikorsky helicopter.

●All persons who own Siberian huskies, or any dogs exhibiting Pavlovian responses.

●All members of the Russian Orthodox Church or any other Eastern Orthodox churches, Orthodox Jews and anybody who does anything in an orthodox manner.

●All persons of Russian ancestry, including but not limited to those with the following endings: -ov, -sky, -ski, -ic, -vic, -in, -enko and -uk.

●And all persons whose ancestors may have once occupied Russian territory, including but not limited to all those of French, German, Swedish or Mongol ancestry.

Hmm. Mueller: Is that a German name?

Collusion! Looks as if we’re going to need a special counsel to probe the special counsel.

I guess I should be investigated, since I went to see Swan Lake last year.

[GrumpyGran]

16 minutes ago, GreyhoundFan said:

A good snarky piece from Dana Milbank: "Mueller finally proves it: Hillary Clinton is guilty!"

  Reveal hidden contents

Robert Mueller’s conviction of a former Trump campaign adviser and his indictment of two more finally prove it: Hillary is guilty!

Technically, President Trump’s standard line of defense in the Russia probe — we did not collude — suffered a bit of a blow Monday. In a plea deal with the special counsel unsealed Monday (at about the time Trump was tweeting the phrase “there is NO COLLUSION!”), Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos admitted the Trump adviser had contacts with Russians offering the Trump campaign Hillary Clinton’s emails and other “dirt,” and he tried to arrange meetings with Russian officials. That’s pretty much the dictionary definition of “collusion.”

But Trump’s deficit of honesty is offset by a surplus of dexterity. Though not abandoning the there-is-no-collusion defense, the White House is already elevating a secondary position — the okay-maybe-we-colluded-but-Clinton-colluded-more defense.

“There’s clear evidence of the Clinton campaign colluding with Russian intelligence,” White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders proclaimed at Monday afternoon’s briefing, after the indictment by Mueller of former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort and a colleague.

Trump, who often accuses others of the exact thing he stands accused of, reacted to the indictments with abundant punctuation: “But why aren’t Crooked Hillary & the Dems the focus?????” he tweeted.

Trump has been complaining about “the lack of investigation on Clinton made Fake Dossier,” and “GUILT by Democrats/Clinton.” He tweeted a Hill article with an exculpatory quote from Fox News’s Chris Wallace (Headline: “More evidence of Dem collusion with Russia than GOP”) and a New York Post column arguing that perhaps Clinton “came closer to colluding with the Russians” than Trump.

The evidence of Clinton’s alleged “collusion” with Russia? She and the Democrats hired an opposition-research firm that wrote a dossier on, um, Trump’s collusion with Russia. She also colluded with Russia by being secretary of state at a time when another arm of the U.S. government approved a uranium deal with a Russian-owned company that had given money to her husband and his foundation.

Both of these are about as compelling as saying the guilty plea entered by Papadopoulos is further evidence of Clinton’s collusion with Russia because “George Papadopoulos” sounds like “George Stephanopoulos,” who once worked for Bill Clinton, who is married to Hillary Clinton.

By Trump’s new standard, “collusion” now covers not just Russia’s election interference but anything that has to do with Russia done by anybody at any time for any reason. If that’s the rule, there is indeed plenty of evidence that Clinton colluded with Russia. She has visited Russia often, spoken with Russians and even tried to reset relations with Russia. I’d bet she has also watched Russian ballet and read Russian novels.

But by that standard there’s also evidence most everybody else colludes with Russia, too. Therefore, the Mueller investigation will need to expand significantly. The following people should present themselves at the earliest opportunity to the special counsel’s office for interviews:

●All persons who now consume or in the past have consumed vodka. This includes but is not limited to Black Russians, White Russians and Moscow Mules.

●All persons who now consume or in the past have consumed beluga or osetra caviar.

●All persons who now play, or previously have played, with nesting dolls.

●All persons who watch or have watched the FX drama “The Americans.”

●All persons who have viewed “The Nutcracker” (including children’s performances) or “Swan Lake,” or hummed the “1812 Overture.”

●All persons who have dined at the Russian Tea Room in New York.

●All persons who have traveled to, or consumed wine from, the Russian River Valley in Sonoma County, Calif.

●All persons who have read, or have caused to be read, “Anna Karenina,” “War and Peace,” “Crime and Punishment,” “The Brothers Karamazov” or any play by Anton Chekhov.

●All persons who have heard, or have caused to be heard, the work of Rachmaninoff, Shostakovich, Stravinsky or Mussorgsky.

●All persons who have played against, or watched a match involving, Anna Kournikova, Maria Sharapova or Garry Kasparov.

●All persons who have experienced the work of Wassily Kandinsky, Groucho Marx or John Lennon.

●All persons who have played Russian roulette or flown in a Sikorsky helicopter.

●All persons who own Siberian huskies, or any dogs exhibiting Pavlovian responses.

●All members of the Russian Orthodox Church or any other Eastern Orthodox churches, Orthodox Jews and anybody who does anything in an orthodox manner.

●All persons of Russian ancestry, including but not limited to those with the following endings: -ov, -sky, -ski, -ic, -vic, -in, -enko and -uk.

●And all persons whose ancestors may have once occupied Russian territory, including but not limited to all those of French, German, Swedish or Mongol ancestry.

Hmm. Mueller: Is that a German name?

Collusion! Looks as if we’re going to need a special counsel to probe the special counsel.

I guess I should be investigated, since I went to see Swan Lake last year.

OMG! I had my Moscow Money Mule last night! With vodka! And I've owned those nesting dolls. I'm guilty.

Off to Halloween now!

[onekidanddone]

22 minutes ago, GrumpyGran said:

OMG! I had my Moscow Money Mule last night! With vodka! And I've owned those nesting dolls. I'm guilty.

Off to Halloween now!

We are going to OneKid's friend's house for Halloween. We have done this ever since the girls were four. This time I'm really not looking forward to it. They are conservative Republicans, and though I've always been able to put that aside for my kid's sake, this year I might have to down half a bottle of vodka to get through the evening.

[apple1]

1 hour ago, onekidanddone said:

We are going to OneKid's friend's house for Halloween. We have done this ever since the girls were four. This time I'm really not looking forward to it. They are conservative Republicans, and though I've always been able to put that aside for my kid's sake, this year I might have to down half a bottle of vodka to get through the evening.

There are some events that I just have to make a hard and fast rule, no discussion of news, politics, or current events. I have been known to say, I am not going to have this conversation.  All else fails, I have been known to take a walk outside (even in cold weather...)

If you have to, you have to.

I do draw the line at being told that he's my president, too. That one gets a response even when I intended not to discuss.

[Flossie]

1 hour ago, onekidanddone said:

We are going to OneKid's friend's house for Halloween. We have done this ever since the girls were four. This time I'm really not looking forward to it. They are conservative Republicans, and though I've always been able to put that aside for my kid's sake, this year I might have to down half a bottle of vodka to get through the evening.

If you partake of the vodka, please present yourself to the special counsel’s office for interviews ASAP.  Putting up with conservative Republicans for an evening for the sake of a children's party may not excuse you.

I'll see you there.  I am definitely guilty of 9 of the above items of the list of possible Russian collusion, with a possibility of a 10th when my ancestry is checked out because my maiden name ends in one of the dreaded affixes.

[GreyhoundFan]

"The anti-Trump projection artist’s latest D.C. target: The IRS building and Manafort"

Spoiler

A virtual cascade of money seemed to fall from the facade of the IRS building Monday night in Washington. The faces of President Trump and Paul Manafort — the president’s former campaign adviser who was indicted on federal charges earlier in the day — were swapped in and out in the background.

“Follow the money,” the 15-second video, which was played in a loop, stated in capital letters. “Release Trump’s tax returns.”

The protest art is the work of Robin Bell, the go-to anti-Trump projection artist in the nation’s capital. He said he had planned to stage the protest at the IRS even before Manafort was indicted.

He teamed up with the organizers of the Tax March — the April 15 demonstration where protesters called on the president to release his tax returns — for Monday’s projection. When he learned of Manafort’s indictment Monday morning, Bell scrambled to add his face to the video.

Bell and his team have also projected anti-Trump protest art onto the Trump International Hotel, the Justice Department, the Newseum and on a Confederate statue near D.C.’s Judiciary Square.

“We hadn’t done the IRS yet, and with all this Manafort stuff, the clearest way we are going to find out stuff is through these records. It all made sense,” Bell said. “It was cool to do this projection last night and tie it together with the news.”

Bell uses a truck with a projector in it to pull off the displays. He said he pulled up to IRS on the 1100 block of Constitution Avenue NW about 7:30 p.m. and stayed for about 40 minutes. He said no police or security officers asked him to leave.

I'm sure the TT hasn't seen it, or he'd lose it on twitter.

[GreyhoundFan]

WTAF? "White House wants credit for Papadopoulos arrest"

Spoiler

The White House on Tuesday sought to take credit for the arrest of a former Trump campaign aide who had repeated contacts with Russia-linked officials offering “dirt” on Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton — marking the latest damage control move as the Russia probe intensifies.

President Donald Trump and other White House allies had so far sought to downplay the role of George Papadopoulos, a campaign foreign policy adviser, whose plea deal was made public by special counsel Robert Mueller on Monday, the same day that two top Trump campaign officials were indicted on charges unrelated to the campaign.

Trump derided Papadopoulos on Tuesday morning as a “liar,” while former campaign aide Michael Caputo dismissed him as “the coffee boy.”

Press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders went further Tuesday afternoon, claiming the White House and the campaign deserved credit for helping Mueller’s team build its case that Papadopoulos had lied to the FBI about his contacts.

“Papadopoulos is an example of actually somebody doing the wrong thing while the president's campaign did the right thing,” Sanders said. “All of his emails were voluntarily provided to the special counsel by the campaign, and that is what led to the process and the place that we’re in right now is the campaign fully cooperating and helping with that. What Papadopoulos did was lie, and that’s on him and not on the campaign, and we can’t speak to that.”

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment about when the documents in question had been turned over. Papadopoulos was initially interviewed as part of the FBI’s probe into Russian election meddling on Jan. 27. He was arrested in July.

The Washington Post reported that Trump’s campaign handed over emails implicating Papadopoulos to the special counsel in August — after he had already been arrested.

Court documents indicate that Papadopoulos has been a cooperative witness as part of the special counsel’s probe.

Sanders on Tuesday also defended other campaign officials who interacted with Papadopoulos, including by claiming that one official — who has been identified in news reports as campaign aide Sam Clovis — did not encourage Papadopoulos to travel to Russia.

“My understanding is there wasn’t encouragement,” Sanders said.

But according to the plea deal, the official who has been identified as Clovis wrote, “I would encourage you … [to] make the trip … if it is feasible.”

The obfuscation was part of a broader push on Tuesday against new questions raised by Mueller’s revelation on Monday of charges against former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort and Rick Gates, another campaign aide, including money laundering and other crimes related to the pair’s relationship with pro-Russian politicians in Ukraine.

Trump on Tuesday morning cast the Manafort charges as a vindication, of sorts, for the campaign. He also belittled Papadopoulos, despite having called him “an excellent guy” to The Washington Post editorial board in March 2016.

“The Fake News is working overtime. As Paul Manaforts [sic] lawyer said, there was 'no collusion' and events mentioned took place long before he came to the campaign,” Trump wrote on Twitter. “Few people knew the young, low level volunteer named George, who has already proven to be a liar. Check the DEMS!”

Trump continued trying to redirect the heat toward Democrats.

"The biggest story yesterday, the one that has the Dems in a dither, is Podesta running from his firm. What he know [sic] about Crooked Dems is earth shattering," Trump wrote on Twitter later Tuesday, alluding to the departure of Tony Podesta, the brother of former Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta, from his eponymously named lobbying firm. "He and his brother could Drain The Swamp, which would be yet another campaign promise fulfilled. Fake News weak!"

Shortly after Trump tweeted, John Podesta, whose emails were taken by suspected Kremlin-backed hackers and released by WikiLeaks, responded online to the president.

"Not bad enough that I was the victim of a massive cyber crime directed by the Russian President, now I’m the victim of a big lie campaign by the American President," Podesta tweeted Tuesday.

Former Trump campaign officials and other allies also worked the morning TV news shows to downplay Papadopoulos' role on the campaign and draw a line between the crimes allegedly committed by Manafort and Gates and their work on the campaign.

Caputo, a former Trump campaign aide, told CNN's "New Day" that he was unaware of Manafort's alleged crimes and did not know Papadopoulos at all.

"The leaders of the Washington office of the campaign didn’t even know who he was until his name appeared in the press,” Caputo said. "I mean, you might’ve called him a foreign policy analyst, but, in fact, you know, if he was going to wear a wire, all we’d know now is whether he prefers a caramel macchiato over a regular American coffee in conversations with his barista. He had nothing to do with the campaign."

In an appearance on NBC's "Today" show, former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski said he did not know whether he was the "high-ranking campaign official" whom Papadopoulos said he emailed regarding his interactions with Russia-linked contacts.

Lewandowski told NBC anchor Savannah Guthrie that in his role as campaign manager, he received thousands of emails per day and could not recall whether he had been included on the emails Papadopoulos sent.

Still, Lewandowski dismissed Papadopoulos as a "low-level volunteer" who was "never a person who was interacting with the senior management on a regular basis."

And Trump's personal attorney, Jay Sekulow, noted Tuesday on ABC's "Good Morning America" that Papadopoulos never traveled for the meeting with his Russia-connected contacts that he had emailed others in the campaign about. He said that nothing about Manafort's or Gates' charges was related to the Trump 2016 campaign and that Papadopoulos had pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI, not to anything involving his interactions with individuals tied to Russia.

"Remember this: Collusion, in and of itself — there's no crime of collusion," Sekulow told ABC anchor George Stephanopoulos. "What is a violation of law here, I go back to that, for George Papadopoulos, the violation of the law, George, was that he lied to FBI agents, which is clearly not condoned by the administration."

Democrats were not eager to let Trump and his aides off the hook, especially when it comes to the central question of whether the campaign colluded with Russian officials trying to tip the election Trump’s way.

Rep. Adam Schiff, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, hit back at Trump’s Tuesday morning tweet that there was “no collusion.”

“With respect, Mr. President, not sure we can rely on Mr. Manafort’s lawyer to tell us whether there was collusion, as unbiased as he may be,” Schiff tweeted.

SHS is getting more delusional every single day.

[WiseGirl]

"Second, .... because they involve not reporting bank accounts on tax forms for multiple years. "

Hmmmm would this cause someone in a public office to not release their taxes to the American Public? WiseGirl asks herself ever so innocently and hypothetically. 

Seriously yesterday was my birthday, what an interesting gift! Still waiting for and wanting more. 

[GreyhoundFan]

Interesting: "Mueller got Manafort’s attorney to speak against him once. He may try the tactic again."

Spoiler

A little-noticed court filing unsealed this week as part of special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s ongoing probe could have big consequences for his other targets — showing he’s willing to use suspects’ lawyers to provide evidence against them.

After unsealing a 12-count indictment against President Trump’s former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, the U.S. District Court also unsealed an opinion from Chief Judge Beryl A. Howell saying one of Manafort’s former lawyers could be compelled to testify to the grand jury.

Typically, such information is protected by attorney-client privilege — a bedrock principle of U.S. legal practice that says a lawyer must keep confidential what they are told by their clients.

There are some exceptions to that confidentiality, including in instances where a suspect may have lied to his or her lawyer, causing that lawyer to unwittingly lie to the government. Howell ruled that in Manafort’s case, the exception applied and the attorney could be called to testify before the grand jury.

“The opinion is troubling, because people make representations to the government all the time through their lawyers, and I think there’s a general expectation of confidentiality behind the conversations that go into those representations,’’ said Peter D. Hardy, a partner at the Ballard Spahr law firm. “It’s widening a door that’s not often used. And the wider the door gets, maybe the more people will use it.’’

Hardy said the use of what lawyers call the “crime-fraud exception’’ indicates “the special counsel team is highly intelligent, highly aggressive, and they’re going to pursue legal theories that your average prosecutor will not use. Will they use the specific theory again? It’s certainly possible.’’

Manafort is hardly the only person under scrutiny who used lawyers to make government filings. One of Mueller’s other key targets, Michael Flynn, has also filed government papers regarding his work on behalf of another government.

No public charges have been filed against Flynn, former national security adviser in the Trump administration, but he remains under investigation, according to officials familiar with the matter who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation.

In the Manafort case, the judge began her ruling by declaring, “This is a matter of national importance.’’ The ruling does not identify Manafort’s lawyer — it refers to the attorney simply as “the Witness,’’ but people familiar with the case said it was Melissa Laurenza who was willing to testify if her clients consented, which they did not. Neither Laurenza nor her lawyer responded to a request for comment Tuesday.

A Manafort spokesman also declined to comment.

After several hearings on the subject, the judge decided prosecutors could ask the lawyer seven out of eight proposed questions, ruling one went too far. The judge said investigators had gathered enough evidence from other sources to justify questioning the lawyer, though the details of that evidence were redacted from the court filing.

That legal fight took place under seal in September, but the opinion was unsealed Monday, the same day charges were announced against Manafort and his deputy Rick Gates.

Prosecutors also revealed Monday that a former Trump campaign adviser, George Papadopoulos, had pleaded guilty and been cooperating with investigators for months.

In Manafort’s case, prosecutors used information from his former lawyer to charge him with lying to the government about his work for a foreign government — Ukraine. While most of the indictment focuses on issues of alleged money laundering, conspiracy and failure to file reports to tax authorities, the last two counts of the indictment say that Manafort and Gates “knowingly and willfully caused to be made a false statement’’ in a government filing required under the Foreign Agents Registration Act, or FARA.

Court filings suggest those two charges stem in part from information provided by Manafort’s former lawyer.

In the FARA filing, Manafort and Gates denied that their work on the part of Ukraine’s Party of Regions constituted lobbying on behalf of a foreign government.

Jacob Frenkel, a white-collar attorney at Dickinson Wright who previously worked in the Office of the Independent Counsel, said Howell’s ruling was likely a critical one for prosecutors — who otherwise “would need to jump over and avoid altogether the communications with counsel.”

“It is invaluable to the FARA counts, and to the issue of Manafort’s state of mind more broadly in the indictment, because an experienced, credible lawyer is going to have instant credibility with a jury,” Frenkel said.

Frenkel said that the ruling was written in such a way that Howell seemed to believe it would be appealed.

“The attorneys’ testimony will be central to an actual case, if this case ever gets there,” Frenkel said.

 

[JordynDarby5]

10 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

A good snarky piece from Dana Milbank: "Mueller finally proves it: Hillary Clinton is guilty!"

  Hide contents

Robert Mueller’s conviction of a former Trump campaign adviser and his indictment of two more finally prove it: Hillary is guilty!

Technically, President Trump’s standard line of defense in the Russia probe — we did not collude — suffered a bit of a blow Monday. In a plea deal with the special counsel unsealed Monday (at about the time Trump was tweeting the phrase “there is NO COLLUSION!”), Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos admitted the Trump adviser had contacts with Russians offering the Trump campaign Hillary Clinton’s emails and other “dirt,” and he tried to arrange meetings with Russian officials. That’s pretty much the dictionary definition of “collusion.”

But Trump’s deficit of honesty is offset by a surplus of dexterity. Though not abandoning the there-is-no-collusion defense, the White House is already elevating a secondary position — the okay-maybe-we-colluded-but-Clinton-colluded-more defense.

“There’s clear evidence of the Clinton campaign colluding with Russian intelligence,” White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders proclaimed at Monday afternoon’s briefing, after the indictment by Mueller of former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort and a colleague.

Trump, who often accuses others of the exact thing he stands accused of, reacted to the indictments with abundant punctuation: “But why aren’t Crooked Hillary & the Dems the focus?????” he tweeted.

Trump has been complaining about “the lack of investigation on Clinton made Fake Dossier,” and “GUILT by Democrats/Clinton.” He tweeted a Hill article with an exculpatory quote from Fox News’s Chris Wallace (Headline: “More evidence of Dem collusion with Russia than GOP”) and a New York Post column arguing that perhaps Clinton “came closer to colluding with the Russians” than Trump.

The evidence of Clinton’s alleged “collusion” with Russia? She and the Democrats hired an opposition-research firm that wrote a dossier on, um, Trump’s collusion with Russia. She also colluded with Russia by being secretary of state at a time when another arm of the U.S. government approved a uranium deal with a Russian-owned company that had given money to her husband and his foundation.

Both of these are about as compelling as saying the guilty plea entered by Papadopoulos is further evidence of Clinton’s collusion with Russia because “George Papadopoulos” sounds like “George Stephanopoulos,” who once worked for Bill Clinton, who is married to Hillary Clinton.

By Trump’s new standard, “collusion” now covers not just Russia’s election interference but anything that has to do with Russia done by anybody at any time for any reason. If that’s the rule, there is indeed plenty of evidence that Clinton colluded with Russia. She has visited Russia often, spoken with Russians and even tried to reset relations with Russia. I’d bet she has also watched Russian ballet and read Russian novels.

But by that standard there’s also evidence most everybody else colludes with Russia, too. Therefore, the Mueller investigation will need to expand significantly. The following people should present themselves at the earliest opportunity to the special counsel’s office for interviews:

●All persons who now consume or in the past have consumed vodka. This includes but is not limited to Black Russians, White Russians and Moscow Mules.

●All persons who now consume or in the past have consumed beluga or osetra caviar.

●All persons who now play, or previously have played, with nesting dolls.

●All persons who watch or have watched the FX drama “The Americans.”

●All persons who have viewed “The Nutcracker” (including children’s performances) or “Swan Lake,” or hummed the “1812 Overture.”

●All persons who have dined at the Russian Tea Room in New York.

●All persons who have traveled to, or consumed wine from, the Russian River Valley in Sonoma County, Calif.

●All persons who have read, or have caused to be read, “Anna Karenina,” “War and Peace,” “Crime and Punishment,” “The Brothers Karamazov” or any play by Anton Chekhov.

●All persons who have heard, or have caused to be heard, the work of Rachmaninoff, Shostakovich, Stravinsky or Mussorgsky.

●All persons who have played against, or watched a match involving, Anna Kournikova, Maria Sharapova or Garry Kasparov.

●All persons who have experienced the work of Wassily Kandinsky, Groucho Marx or John Lennon.

●All persons who have played Russian roulette or flown in a Sikorsky helicopter.

●All persons who own Siberian huskies, or any dogs exhibiting Pavlovian responses.

●All members of the Russian Orthodox Church or any other Eastern Orthodox churches, Orthodox Jews and anybody who does anything in an orthodox manner.

●All persons of Russian ancestry, including but not limited to those with the following endings: -ov, -sky, -ski, -ic, -vic, -in, -enko and -uk.

●And all persons whose ancestors may have once occupied Russian territory, including but not limited to all those of French, German, Swedish or Mongol ancestry.

Hmm. Mueller: Is that a German name?

Collusion! Looks as if we’re going to need a special counsel to probe the special counsel.

I guess I should be investigated, since I went to see Swan Lake last year.

Does it count if you didn't finish any of those books? Cause I only made it through the first chapter of Anna Karenina. I guess it doesn't matter I'm screwed because of the French, German and Swedish. Oh, and I watched Russian athletes sure it was during the Olympics but they were still there. I never once cheered for them always the home team. Well, most of the time. Okay, so maybe I might have cheered for some of their figure skaters and male gymnasts but only when they were really good. I may need a lawyer. 

[fraurosena]

In this mini 10-tweet thread Seth Abramson is weighing in on the 'next phase' of Mueller's investigation.

If what he surmises is true (and many of his previous suppositions have been correct) Mueller's investigation is incredibly thorough and pacing along on track and things will start to fall apart for the presidunce in phase 4.

Just like me, I know you all can't wait for that to happen.

 

Seth also has tiny thread completely obliterating the 'coffee boy' defense. 

And even more 'covfefe boy" stuff...

 

[Howl]

3 hours ago, fraurosena said:

'covfefe boy'

I'm so considering this my early morning gift for the day! Thank you.  Love your updated avatar, too. 

[fraurosena]

I was unaware that an amendment has already been introduced to defund Mueller's investigation and limit what he can investigate. Does anyone know who filed it?

GOP Senators Pour Cold Water On Bannon Push To Defund Mueller Probe

Quote

Three Republican senators told TPM on Tuesday that they oppose calls from former White House adviser Steve Bannon to defund Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into connections between the Trump campaign and administration and the Russian government. Because Republicans only have a 52-seat majority in the Senate, those three would be enough to block such a bill from passage if it ever came to the Senate floor.

An amendment has already been introduced in the House that would completely defund Mueller’s work after six months, and limit the scope of what he can investigate, but several senators said they would vote against such a measure if it made its way to the upper chamber.

“I would oppose, and so would the American people,” Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) said Tuesday. “The American people want a complete and thorough investigation. That’s one thing I know.”

Stepping into the Senate elevators, he repeated his usual metaphor for Mueller’s investigation and the crimes it may uncover going forward. “It’s a centipede,” he quipped. “More shoes are going to drop.”

McCain’s fellow Arizonan, Sen. Jeff Flake, agreed that Congress should not strip the special counsel of his funding: “I would not support it,” he said. ‘He needs to continue to investigate. I have confidence in Bob Mueller.”

McCain and Flake are two of the Senate GOP’s most outspoken members with little to lose—the former struggling with terminal cancer and the latter having already announced he’ll retire in 2019. But at least one newly-elected Republican senator is also openly opposed to any effort to defund Mueller’s probe.

“I don’t want to deny the DOJ and special counsel the resources they need,” Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) told reporters Tuesday. “Now, I don’t want to see them go hog wild and waste money either, but I don’t want to do anything to try to hurt their effort.”

In the wake of Monday’s news that Mueller had secured the indictments of two former Trump campaign officials and struck a plea deal with a third, other Republican senators offered that they are generally opposed to any effort to shut down the investigation, but wouldn’t completely close the door on defunding down the road.

“If the counsel is doing his job, and they’ve followed the facts and done what they’re supposed to do, and they’re looking for justice and truth, I think the people ought to support them,” Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL) told TPM. “But if you have misconduct by the special counsel, then they ought to fire him or they ought to cut his money off. We’ll see what happens.”

I wonder if the presidunce is regretting making enemies of McCain and Flake.

[GreyhoundFan]

Three passports and ten applications? "Special counsel: Manafort’s stated wealth fluctuated wildly; he keeps 3 passports"

Spoiler

Onetime Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort keeps three U.S. passports with different identification numbers and submitted 10 passport applications in as many years, the office of special counsel Robert S. Mueller III disclosed in a new court filing Tuesday arguing that Manafort poses a significant flight risk.

The 17-page filing came one day after Manafort and longtime business partner Rick Gates pleaded not guilty to an unsealed 12-count indictment alleging conspiracy to launder money, making false statements and other charges in connection with their work advising a Russia-friendly political party in Ukraine.

In the first criminal allegations to come from probes into possible Russian influence in U.S. political affairs, prosecutors pressed their case against the two defendants, who face a hearing Thursday to set bail terms. A U.S. magistrate on Monday put the men on home confinement pending that hearing after Manafort, 68, pledged to pay a $10 million penalty and Gates a $5 million one if they failed to appear.

Prosecutors argued in the new filing that they “pose a risk of flight” based on a “history of deceptive and misleading conduct,” the evidence against them, and their wealth and foreign connections.

The incentive to flee is even stronger “for a defendant such as Manafort, who is in his late 60s,” the government observed, noting that he faces a recommended sentence of about 12 to 15 years in prison if convicted, and Gates 10 to 12 years, not counting “related frauds.”

In addition to noting Manafort’s unusual acquisition of numerous U.S. passports, “indicative of his travel schedule,” prosecutors Andrew Weissmann, Greg D. Andres and Kyle R. Freeny expanded on their argument Monday, citing the government’s difficulty in ascertaining Manafort’s wealth.

“Manafort’s financial holdings are substantial, if difficult to quantify precisely because of his varying representations. . . . The full extent of [his assets] is unclear,” they said. Manafort, for instance, reported $42 million in assets in March 2016; $136 million that May; and $28 million and $63 million that August, in two separate financial applications, the government said.

Gates listed his and his wife’s net worth as $30 million in a February 2016 application for a line of credit, but just $2.6 million in a March 2016 residential loan application.

Prosecutors also said that Manafort registered a phone and an email account under an alias in May and traveled with it to Mexico in June, to China on May 23 and to Ecuador on May 9.

Manafort attorney Kevin Downing did not immediately respond to a request for comment Tuesday evening, but told the court Monday that his client “definitely disagree[d]” with prosecutors using the “ valuation of assets that fluctuate greatly in different countries” to argue against his release.

Separately, outside the courthouse, Downing said, “There is no evidence that Mr. Manafort and the Trump campaign colluded with the Russian government.” Downing called “ridiculous” the charges, which he characterized as interpreting Manafort’s maintaining of offshore accounts as a means to bring his funds into the United States as a scheme to conceal assets.

Gates’s temporary attorney, Assistant Federal Defender David Bos, declined to comment, saying Gates is arranging for new private counsel.

The new court filing was disclosed after business hours after prosecutors asked — and the court ordered — that portions of the case be unsealed Tuesday.

U.S. Magistrate Deborah A. Robinson had granted prosecutors’ motion Friday to seal the entire case including the indictment and any warrants, and any other related matters, citing concern that disclosure could cause Manafort or Gates to flee or “to destroy (or tamper with) evidence.”

 

[fraurosena]

Facebook, Google and Twitter are on Capitol Hill again on Wednesday, this time to face questions from the Senate and House intelligence committees.

Quote

Republican defense: Russians didn’t elect Trump.

Senator Richard Burr of North Carolina, the Senate Intelligence Committee’s Republican chairman, began the social media hearing with what amounted to an extraordinary defense of the legitimacy of President Trump’s election, pushing back on a narrative he said had been propagated by the media that Russia’s efforts had delivered victory.

“A lot of folks, including many in the media, have tried to reduce this entire conversation down to one premise: foreign actors conducted a surgically executed covert operation to help elect a United States president,” Mr. Burr said. “I’m here to tell you this story does not simplify that easily.”

Mr. Burr noted that five times more ads were targeted to Maryland, a safely Democratic state, than Wisconsin, a swing state that Mr. Trump narrowly carried. He said that more ads were targeted to Washington, D.C., an overwhelmingly Democratic area, than Pennsylvania. And he said that of the $1,979 spent ads in Wisconsin, all but $54 was spent before the primary.

He went on, but the message was clear.

“This isn’t about relitigating the 2016 presidential election. This isn’t about who one and who lost,” Mr. Burr said. “This is about national security. This is about corporate responsibility. And this is about the deliberate and multifaceted manipulation of the American people by agents of a hostile foreign power.”

Senator Jim Risch, Republican of Idaho, picked up the line of questioning, as he pressed social media executives on the content of Russian advertising.

“My view of this is this is a whole lot broader than simply the 2016 election,” he said.

The executives agreed that Russian efforts were geared more toward sowing social discord that advocating directly for Mr. Trump or against Hillary Clinton.

But as Democrats noted, discord helped Mr. Trump’s grievance-based campaign. The Russian effort was to “sow conflict and discontent all over this country,” said Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California.

Facebook defends reasons for taking down ads.

As senators pressed Facebook’s general counsel, Colin Stretch, on Facebook’s role in the election, one of the hallmarks of Facebook’s explanation has been the issue of “authentic accounts.”

Since Facebook went public with its findings, the company’s reasoning for taking down more than 80,000 fake, Russian-linked ads, was not the type of content they posted, but because those responsible for them had misrepresented who they were when creating the accounts.

That distinction is key for Facebook. Outside of some parameters like nudity or incitement to violence, executives at the company are wary of becoming the arbiters of what content is or is not allowed on Facebook, fearing accusations of censorship.

“We don’t take for granted that each one of you uses Facebook to connect with your constituents, and that the people you represent expect authentic experiences when they come to our platform to share,” Mr. Stretch said in his opening remarks on Tuesday.

Mr. Burr asked if Facebook would have shut down the 470 Russian-linked accounts if they weren’t fake.

“Does it trouble you it took this committee to look at the authentic nature of the users and the content?” Mr. Burr asked Facebook’s general counsel.

Mr. Stretch didn’t directly answer. “The authenticity issue is the key,” Mr. Stretch said, noting that many of those accounts would have been shut down anyway because they violated other terms of service.

Ads were only one way Russia influenced the election

Political ads are just part of the problem, Senator Mark Warner of Virginia, the top Democrat on the Senate intelligence committee, said at Wednesday’s first hearing.

Russian agents spread nonpaid content through the creation of pages on Facebook dedicated to hot-button issues like race. On Twitter, the Kremlin-connected internet Research Agency used automatic messaging tools known as bots that could quickly spread tweets through multiple accounts.

“For Facebook, much of the attention has been focused on the paid ads Russian trolls targeted to Americans. However, these ads are just the tip of a very large iceberg,” Mr. Warner said. “The real story is the amount of misinformation and divisive content that was pushed for free on Russian-backed pages, which then spread widely on the news feeds of tens of millions of Americans.”

Twitter is still lowballing Russian intrusion.

Earlier this week, Twitter, Facebook and Google revealed new information and numbers showing that foreign interference on their site was worse than they first reported. But the companies all stressed that the amount of Russian propaganda that reached users was just a sliver of the total amount of content their platforms produce every day.

But some lawmakers think the companies are holding back information.

Twitter said it identified 2,752 accounts controlled by Russian operatives and more than 36,000 “bots” that tweeted 1.4 million times during the election. The company had previously told lawmakers it found only 201 accounts linked to Russia.

The new numbers still seem low, according to Senator Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Senate intelligence committee.

“I’m concerned that Twitter seems to be vastly underestimating the number of fake accounts and bots pushing disinformation. Independent researchers have estimated that up to 15 percent of Twitter accounts – or potentially 48 million accounts – are fake or automated,” Mr. Warner said in his opening statement.

Senator Richard Burr of North Carolina, the Republican chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, also noted the slow reaction by internet companies.

With Facebook’s acknowledgment that 126 million people were exposed to Russia-linked content instead of the 10 million people they originally estimated, “tells me that your companies are just beginning to come grips with the scale and the depth of the problem,” Mr. Burr said.

“Your actions need to catch up to your responsibilities,” he added.

The executives left a judiciary subcommittee wanting.

Top executives for the three companies appeared before a judiciary subcommittee on Tuesday armed with regrets and pledges to do better. The lawmakers appeared to be unimpressed.

Facebook came under particularly heavy fire, as senators from both parties pressed the companies on their sluggish responses.

“Why has it taken Facebook 11 months to come forward and help us understand the scope of this problem, see it clearly for the problem it is, and begin to work in a responsible way to address it?” Senator Chris Coons, Democrat of Delaware, asked in one pointed exchange.

The senators also raised doubts that efforts outlined by the companies — Facebook, for instance, said that it would hire more than 1,000 people to review political ad purchases — would protect the United States from outside influence.

“I’m trying to get us down from La-La Land here,” said Senator John Kennedy, Republican of Louisiana. “The truth of the matter is, you have five million advertisers that change every month. Every minute. Probably every second. You don’t have the ability to know who every one of those advertisers is, do you?”

Senator Amy Klobuchar, Democrat of Minnesota, pushed the executives to weigh in on legislation that would require the companies to report who funds political ads online. In response, they suggested voluntary efforts already underway but said they hoped to work with lawmakers on such requirements.

The House committee will release copies of the Russian ads.

The House intelligence committee is expected on Wednesday to publicly release much-anticipated copies of Facebook ads purchased by Russian-linked accounts.

The top Republican and Democrat leading the investigation, Representatives Mike Conaway of Texas and Adam Schiff of California, pledged to do so this month after a meeting with Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook’s chief operating officer.

A few of the ads have leaked out, and others have been described by people who have viewed them, but the release should help cast new light on the Russian efforts.

Facebook’s bullish posture to Wall Street.

Wednesday will be a particularly busy day for Facebook, which will also report its third-quarter earnings at 4 p.m. Eastern, around the middle of the day’s second hearing.

The company, which is used by more than 2 billion people worldwide, is expected to post stellar results, with revenues from advertising jumping 41 percent from the same quarter last year to $9.88 billion.

With its stock trading at a record high and the company’s market capitalization over $500 billion — more than the gross domestic product of countries like Columbia and Taiwan — Facebook’s business success clashes with the posture it will present to lawmakers.

To members of Congress, Facebook will be contrite and stress the challenges of fixing its technology to prevent abuse of its site by foreign governments. But to investors, the message this afternoon will be decidedly bullish.

That contradiction is at the heart of the problem Facebook is confronting. Its business model, all based on advertising, is largely automated and reward the most viral content, even at the sake of the public interest.

The problem is worse than originally thought.

Facebook, Twitter and Google said on Monday, before their testimony, that the problems on the platforms were much worse than initially disclosed, illustrating the breadth and complexity of Russian efforts.

According to testimony by the companies, Russian agents spread inflammatory posts that reached 126 million Facebook users, published more than 131,000 messages on Twitter and uploaded more than 1,000 videos to Google’s YouTube service.

The latest disclosure will most likely serve to underline complaints among lawmakers that the tech giants have been slow to recognize and react to the significance of the Russian campaign.

Senator Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the intelligence committee, has been sharply critical of Twitter, in particular, telling reporters in September that the company’s initial efforts “showed an enormous lack of understanding from the Twitter team of how serious this issue is.”

On Wednesday, Mr. Warner and others are likely to bore into the details of the companies’ internal investigations, questioning their rigor, as well remedies the companies have already volunteered.

They will also want to hear about solutions to issues beyond the disclosure of paid political advertising, like the influence of bots and “organic posts” harnessed by foreign powers.

“Transparency in advertising alone, however, is not a solution to the deployment of bots that amplify fake or misleading content or to the successful efforts of online trolls to promote divisive messages,” Mr. Schiff said recently.

 

[GreyhoundFan]

A wonderful piece by the NYT Editorial Board: "That Crazy Talk About Robert Mueller"

Spoiler

And then they came for Robert Mueller.

If there were any remaining hope that Republicans would accept the precise, methodical work of this veteran, highly respected, Republican-appointed law enforcement official — the man Newt Gingrich once called a “superb choice to be special counsel” — it has evaporated in a fog of propaganda and delirious conspiracy theories.

In the real world, Mr. Mueller, appointed as special counsel after President Trump fired the F.B.I. director, James Comey, in May, is doing the job he was hired to do — smoke out any and all links between the Trump campaign and the Russian government officials who assaulted American sovereignty in 2016 in an effort to get Mr. Trump elected. These days, the most serious attacks on American governance are coming not from abroad, but from Mr. Trump’s aides and his allies in the right-wing media and Congress. As ludicrous as these attacks seem, they could yet lead to a constitutional crisis.

Reading the increasingly outlandish theories cooked up by Mr. Trump’s defenders and apologists is like entering an alternate, upside-down universe where Hillary Clinton remains Public Enemy No. 1.

In these irrelevant tales, Mrs. Clinton (or, as Sean Hannity called her on Monday, “President Clinton”) is the real colluder, working stealthily with the Russians to — stay with us here — destroy her own candidacy. Also, she and Bill Clinton once sold American uranium to the Russians. Also, Robert Mueller failed to fully investigate that sale when he led the F.B.I., so he’s complicit in it, too, not to mention he has ties to Mr. Comey, who also led the F.B.I. Also, some of his investigators donated to Democratic candidates.

There’s no bottom to the delusion on display. At this point, investigators could release videotapes of Vladimir Putin personally handing Mr. Trump a uranium-lined briefcase filled with stolen emails, and the right-wing armada would find a way to blame Mrs. Clinton. (This would be followed, of course, by a congressional investigation to identify who leaked the tapes.)

These efforts at obfuscation and misdirection would be laughable, but they are linked to a very real and dangerous move by Trump allies throughout right-wing media and the government to shut down the Russia investigation for good.

It’s no secret that Mr. Trump has been itching to get rid of Mr. Mueller since soon after his appointment as special counsel in May. Mr. Trump’s advisers have told him that would be a terrible idea and have reportedly talked him out of it more than once. But the calls for such a move are now coming from some of the most influential voices in conservative media, as are other equally bad proposals, like urging that Mr. Mueller resign and that Mr. Trump pardon anyone and everyone caught up in the Russia investigation — including himself.

Mr. Trump would be wise to continue to ignore these loony ideas and restrain his own authoritarian reflexes. The president of the United States, no less than any citizen, lives under the law, not above it; Mr. Mueller’s investigation is the embodiment of that fact. Removing him now, after he has already secured two indictments, including one for Mr. Trump’s former campaign chief, and a guilty plea by a foreign-policy adviser, would send the message that Mr. Trump and his aides are accountable to no one.

Over the last several weeks, a few top Republicans have found the courage to say out loud what a majority of Americans have known for a long time: With his erratic behavior and antidemocratic eruptions, Donald Trump is presenting a profound danger to security of the nation and the stability of the world order. So far, these dissidents have beat their chests in a safe space, giving eloquent speeches on their way out the door.

But it will not be hard for them to turn their words into actions if Mr. Trump gives in to an impulse to fire Mr. Mueller. Do the math: Three Republican senators (looking at you, Mr. McCain, Mr. Corker and Mr. Flake), joining with 48 Democrats, could bring the Senate to a halt until Mr. Mueller was reinstated — no tax cuts, no more judges confirmed.

The scenario in which Mr. Mueller loses his job, or Mr. Trump further abuses his pardon power, is hypothetical — and may it remain so — but if it materializes, it will fall to Congress to defend the foundations of American democracy, the separation of powers and the rule of law.

This is my favorite passage: "There’s no bottom to the delusion on display. At this point, investigators could release videotapes of Vladimir Putin personally handing Mr. Trump a uranium-lined briefcase filled with stolen emails, and the right-wing armada would find a way to blame Mrs. Clinton. (This would be followed, of course, by a congressional investigation to identify who leaked the tapes.)" I think that's the truest thing I've read all year.

[GrumpyGran]

17 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

SHS is getting more delusional every single day.

It's the eyeshadow. She really needs to give her eyelids a break.

I see DarkIvanka must now go to talk to Mr. Mueller. What will she do? I'm betting she will lie, lie, lie. She must know just about everything. My suspicions about her have grown dark, just like her.