Random Political comments...

Absolutely. It's the mantra of liberals and the MSM.

Agreed.

I'm aware of his disappearing act, having noted it in my post you responded to. He's been MIA since 2017.

It's funny how you feel that Russia hijacked our elections. When you have no proof that is what occurred. Show me the evidence that they hijacked our elections, AB? Was it at the rallies? during the debates? At the voter polls?

You're so gullible to think that the Russian Govt and their operatives would choose a low-level greenhorn (he said he spoke to Trump one time in a meeting during his employment) with such pertinent secretive information on how they had damaging evidence about Hillary and then facilitate a meeting with a "Maltese" "Russian spy" who would feed him this information. Don't you see he was set up to be the Fall Guy as an excuse to justify an FBI investigation, just like the fake Dossier created at the same time was used to falsely snare FISA warrants in order to spy on Trump's campaign.

It's imperative that you understsnd Russia DID NOT PROVIDE WIKILEAKS with Hillary's and the DNC's emails.

https://www.cnn.com/2017/01/04/politics/assange-wikileaks-hannity-intv/index.html

I can't stop laughing at this ludrious attempt of bullshit by you. More-like it's an absolute description of you. Hilarious projection by you, AB.

First, Downer was not an iIntelligence Officer, he was an Australian Diplomat.

Second, he did NOT report to the US Embassy the next day, he reported to the Australian Consulate.
In fact, the U.S "didn't know" about it until months later after the wiki dump. Australia let the US intelligence know of the conversation because they speculated that that's what George was talking about.
However, if you listen to G.Pap, he's always said he wasn't speaking about any Wiki dump and Downey confirms that - he said 'emails', referring to what he thought were the missing 33,000 emails, that Midsud had fed him. Remember also, Papadopoulos said he never shared that with anyone in the Trump Administration. In fact, if you read excerpts of his book that's due out Thursday, he actually told a Greek politician who told him to never repeat anything like that.

Noot only that , but Papadopoulos wants full disclosure of the investigation into him to be released because he said Downer is being protected and he wants to know why.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news...-aim-at-alexander-downer-after-mueller-report


Here is a fascinating excerpt from his book..Worth a look.

http://www.ekathimerini.com/238885/...ge-papadopoulos-trump-hillarys-e-mails-and-me

 

'I suspected there was more': Former CIA chief John Brennan says he may have had 'received bad information' about Russia collusion – and insists he's 'relieved' to be wrong


"I don't know if I received bad information but I suspected there was more than there actually was. I am relieved that it's been determined there was not a criminal conspiracy with the Russian government over our election,' Brennan said on MSNBC's 'Morning Joe.' 'I think that is good news for the country.'

Mueller concluded that Trump and his campaign did not collude with Russians in order to improve his chances of beating Democrat Hilary Clinton.
*********

What a seditious joker he is.

Comey and Brennan: Leaders of the Coup
https://spectator.org/comey-and-brennan-leaders-of-the-coup/

 

Brennan knows the underlying intelligence collected that's behind the suspicion Trump had been compromised by the Russians. Anything Brennan says in public is meaningless.


Again, the media and public cannot make any definitive conclusions about whether there was collusion until the full report is released. There are big questions about why Mueller didn't charge Don Jr. with collusion after agreeing to a meeting with Russian agents in Trump Tower to get dirt on HRC, in exchange for lifting sanctions.

Trump and his WH are trying to spin the conclusions in the Mueller report and they haven't seen it either.

Even Trump supporters don't have a good explanation as to why there were so many Russian contacts with the Trump campaign prior to the 2016 election, or why Trump seems so deferential to Putin.

For instance, Mueller may not have been able to prove a criminal conspiracy with Russia, but Mueller may have uncovered criminal activity on the part of Trump before he ran for office, such as money laundering for Russian oligarchs, that made him a national security risk and unfit to serve.

There's a reason Mueller said his report didn't exonerate Trump and why AG Barr so far has refused to release the full report to Congress.

End of the day, I don't think Trump is going to like what's in that report, or hearing Mueller's final conclusions were.

 

LOL. You still don't believe the Russians hacked the DNC. You should read Mueller's indictment of the 12 Russians who were behind it.

Assange is not credible. Exactly how did those emails arrive at wikileaks and why did so many Trump aides know about them before they were going to be released, Roger Stone among them??

Papadopoulos got pinched because he simply talked too much to the wrong person. But I totally believe the Russians were trying to gain an access point to the Trump camapaign though him.

The Russians were talking to almost everyone in the Trump campaign. And don't say Papadopoulos was some low level coffee boy, he was in the UK on the behalf of the Trump campaign.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/30/...-investigation-began-george-papadopoulos.html

Papadopoulos is still lying, if he thinks anyone believes he was talking about HRC's missing 33K emails. Because if he admits he was talking about the DNC emails, he's admitting to a criminal conspiracy.

No one forced him to plead guilty, just like no one forced Manafort to plead guilty.

 

...and then plan to send to the WH for them to redact info before it goes to the public. Do you see the transparency?

 

It would be hilarious if it wasn't so damn sad, wouldn't it?

 

If there's something congress really need can't they get Mueller to testify before them?

 

I'm sure they could although I'm far from an expert on all that. Hell they could probably subpoena Barr, too. If they keep being cagey and secretive with the report then that's probably exactly what's going to happen.

 

I don't think there is an expertise to be had in this. It's just a overly flawed broken system. The flaws of which are too often projected to capitalism. It's the political system that barley has any type of rhyme or reason and doesn't work for the people. It's about time we fixed the real problem.

It's ok not to like capitalism, but let's stop blaming it for issues that its not responsible for. Not you specifically but you get what I'm saying.

 

Buttigieg is really surging, up from <1% just a month ago to third/fourth place in Iowa now, beating known commodities like Booker, Klobuchar, and O'Rourke.

https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/435520-buttigieg-surges-to-third-place-in-new-iowa-poll

I will say again that I'm not asking you to suddenly love him, but I do think the perception that he can't possibly win is misplaced. Just consider him, is all!

 

I also want to say that I'll almost surely be supporting whoever wins the Democratic nomination. Warren is still my personal favorite in terms of policy; O'Rourke has had some excellent speeches and I'm glad he's been able to shrug off comparatively frivolous criticism very effectively; Kamala Harris has done a lot of good and I like the sound of "first female black indian president" a whole heck of a lot. I also really like Klobuchar's pragmatism, as she's managed to create more policy than basically anyone else.

 

Since they are trying to #MeToo Biden out of the race, I'm leaning a lot more towards Bernie, because the name of the game is to defeat Trump, and at this point he is the only candidate (who polls high) whose baggage won't slow him down that much, which will leave him enough momentum to cross the finish line in front of Trump.

 

Kamala made a career out of targeting black men and she's neither Indian or black. Indians will not embrace her notice not a single person from that community sees her as one of them (but if she had a kid with her white husband that kid would be Indian) and she deals with black people because she has to not because she genuinely wants to. South Asian, well Asians in general have a deeper disdain for black people even more than it appears white people do (actually I think the amount of white people who actually hate minorities is very small just insanely vocal).

 

And yet Kamala is 1000x superior to the idea of a 2nd Trump term.

Progressives must stay focused. If Kamala wins the Dem primaries no matter how distasteful she may be, there is no other choice.

 

You're right, and I echo what @bodhesatva said about supporting the Democratic nominee whoever it may be. However, I'm going to take every opportunity between now and the primaries to remind everybody that the candidate we choose has to be able to defeat Trump, so getting excited for an outside-of-the-box candidate that can't win is a sure fired way to get that 2nd Trump term.

 

I don't like lackeys and phony people. Keep Kamala, I rather have 45. Don't need a pacifier, either there is milk in the bottle or keep it. One thing I like about 45 is he keeps everything in the open. He doesn't hide his racism. We been under the illusion of inclusion for a while now and negroes just skin and grin like everything is cool. Nah bruh hard pass.

 

I guess my point was that I see upsides to every candidate and I wasn't trying to "force" my preferences on you guys! Here is my list of most obvious upsides/downsides for each major candidate:

Warren

Upside: Incredibly policy savvy. Very strong liberal credentials. Strong woman.
Downside: policy-heavy candidates tend to do worse than personality-heavy candidates. Her strong woman credentials are good to me, but some people find strong women off putting (not that it's a good thing, just true)

Sanders

Upside: been extremely important in to the return of the progressive movement in the US. Has been central to making terms like "Democratic socialist" socially acceptable again. Very focused on the the needs of the poor and needy.
Downside: Often comes off as self righteous and preachy. Can seem like a one trick pony, as (for instance) his foreign policy credentials are non-existent. *Very* old. While he's been great at getting the liberal message out, has been very bad historically at actually turning liberal ideas in to real policy.

Buttigieg:
Upside: Young, charismatic, strong grasp of policy, progressive, avoids "insider" label, very calm and thus avoids the "shrill/preachy progressive" problem of the above two candidates
Downside: Almost entirely unknown up until now, perhaps *too* young, being openly gay may turn off some voters, has no federal-level government experience

O'Rourke:
Upside: Young, charismatic, and like Butiggieg, avoids the "insider" label. His showing in Texas not only gives him a national profile but gets Democrats excited about the potential of winning a state rapidly turning purple. I also like his ability to shrug off silly controversies.
Downside: relatively weak on policy specifics, has a more centrist voting history than I think a lot of voters realize (note: I don't mind a centrist, but in the Democratic primary its definitely a benefit to be more progressive). Zero executive governmental experience.

Biden:
Upside: very well known, well loved figure in the Democratic party, has shown a passion that Democratic voters are looking for right now. Obama remains the most beloved figure in the modern Democratic party, so being so closely associated with him is a huge benefit.
Downside: not actually in the race at the moment, and *really* vulnerable to both age and metoo concerns. These are blowing up as we speak.

Klobuchar:

Upside: very pragmatic and policy oriented, is sort of the anti-sanders in this regard in that she has passed a *ton* of laws and policy. In fact, Klobuchar has written more than 30 laws herself since coming to the senate 10 years ago, while Sanders has written just 7 in his nearly 30 years. Has extremely credibility as a get-things-done candidate.
Downside: centrist who will not excite progressives, has been hit hard for her treatment of her aides, is very much an "Establishment" politician.

Kamala Harris:

Upside: dream candidate demographically. An Indian-African American woman has a lot going for her right away. Has done very well at fundraising given limited exposure so far.
Downside: has a very unliberal history as a prosecutor in California. Has not handled policy related questioning well so far.

I might be missing someone but these are the people currently polling at 4% or more that I know of!

 

Damn it shows where Booker is lol

 

Yes Booker is just below my threshold, and Castro and Gillibrand aren't that far off either!