If Trump got put under oath and grilled for two hours like Comey, I can only imagine how quickly things would move to impeachment.
that's the thing though, he never has to answer to anyone, not matter how much he lies. What would happen if he were made to prove Obama tapped his phones? He truly is the king of fake news, with zero accountability.
The whole McCain thing is pretty bizarre. I'm not really sure who's side he's trying to be on or whether he's trying to hurt or help them. But his clarification and The Diamonds reply are pretty funny.
The whole McCain thing is pretty bizarre. I'm not really sure who's side he's trying to be on or whether he's trying to hurt or help them. But his clarification and The Diamonds reply are pretty funny.
"What I was trying to get at was whether Mr. Comey believes that any of his interactions with the President rise to the level of obstruction of justice. In the case of Secretary Clinton's emails, Mr. Comey was willing to step beyond his role as an investigator and state his belief about what 'no reasonable prosecutor' would conclude about the evidence. I wanted Mr. Comey to apply the same approach to the key question surrounding his interactions with President Trump—whether or not the President's conduct constitutes obstruction of justice. While I missed an opportunity in today's hearing, I still believe this question is important, and I intend to submit it in writing to Mr. Comey for the record."
Comey literally answered this question from McCain (bolded above) during the hearing...
- Clinton was investigated for her use of a private email server. Investigation was concluded, and Comey was part of the investigation from start to finish. Conclusion: no charges were laid.
- Trump's campaign is being investigated for possible collusion with the Russians. Investigation is still ongoing, and Comey is no longer part of the investigation. Conclusion: there isn't one yet, and even if there was, he's a private citizen now, so it's not up to him to announce it.
Either McCain is too stupid to understand the difference, or he thinks everyone else is too stupid to understand the difference and that this will become the new defence for the GOP.
Comments on Kasowitz statement, which was downright infuriating to read.
Quote:
I am Marc Kasowitz, President Trump's personal lawyer.
Contrary to numerous false press accounts leading up to today's hearing, Mr. Comey has now finally confirmed publicly what he repeatedly told the President privately: The President was not under investigation as part of any probe into Russian interference. This was never disputed. However, he also noted that a senior FBI official expressed concern that this was misleading, because obviously an investigation of the campaign would also involve the candidate himself. Honestly, Comey saying Trump wasn't personally being investigated is too cute by half. He also admitted that there is no evidence that a single vote changed as a result of any Russian interference. Given that Russia's involvement was largely a matter of propaganda and message-driving, it would be impossible to refer to evidence, unless Mr. Kasowitz has developed a mind-reading machine.
Mr Comey's testimony also makes clear that the President never sought to impede the investigation into attempted Russian interference in the 2016 election, and in fact, according to Mr. Comey, the President told Mr. Comey "it would be good to find out" in that investigation if there were "some 'satellite' associates of his who did something wrong." And he did not exclude anyone from that statement. It's not at all surprising that Trump would be willing to throw his advisors or others under the bus if it meant extricating himself from a difficult position, as he does this sort of thing all the time. But it's equally clear that this paragraph is a lie. Comey was very clear that in his view, the President was attempting to impede the investigation by urging him to drop the Flynn matter, and of course the President himself said that his firing of Comey was intended to relieve pressure related to Russia. It never would, but he's not smart enough to know that.
Consistent with that statement, the President never, in form or substance, directed or suggested that Mr. Comey stop investigating anyone, including suggesting that that Mr. Comey "let Flynn go." As he publicly stated the next day, he did say to Mr. Comey, "General Flynn is a good guy, he has been through a lot," and also "asked how is General Flynn is doing." Admiral Rogers testified that the President never "directed to do anything . . . illegal, immoral, unethical or inappropriate" and never "pressured to do so." Director Coates said the same thing. The President likewise never pressured Mr. Comey. The telling analogy was to Henry II and the murder of Thomas of Beckett. It would be obvious to anyone that being invited to a one on one dinner with the President where he repeatedly tells you he wants loyalty, followed by a meeting where he says he "hopes" you'll drop a matter, is pressure. It's pressure in traditional mafioso style, really. This should be obvious to anyone with an ounce of judgment.
The President also never told Mr. Comey, "I need loyalty, I expect loyalty" in form or substance. Of course, the Office of the President is entitled to expect loyalty from those who are serving in an administration, and, from before this President took office to this day, it is overwhelmingly clear that there have been and continue to be those in government who are actively attempting to undermine this administration with selective and illegal leaks of classified information and privileged communications. Mr. Comey has now admitted that he is one of these leakers. This is an obvious lie: Comey did not provide any information to the press while employed as FBI director. His release of information to a Columbia professor on the advice that it should be provided to the NYT took place when he was a private citizen. At that stage he owed no obligations to anyone, much less the President who'd just fired him for doing his damned job. This is top level slimy. It's also a pretty obvious deflection from the demand for loyalty, which is unequivocally inappropriate.
Today, Mr. Comey admitted that he unilaterally and surreptitiously made unauthorized disclosures to the press of privileged communications with the President. The leaks of this privileged information hugely important point: what form of privilege is being alleged here? Executive privilege? Because that requires that the withholding of information be in the public interest, and information about the President urging an FBI director to drop an investigation is the exact opposite: it should be disclosed for public interest reasons. began no later than March 2017 when friends of Mr. Comey have stated he disclosed to them the conversations he had with the President during their January 27, 2017 dinner and February 14, 2017 White House meeting. Who are these "friends"? Are they also employees of the FBI, who he informed in order to ensure that they could corroborate his story by stating that he informed them about the conversation contemporaneously? Because that's just covering your bases. It's certainly not a leak.Today, Mr. Comey admitted that he leaked to friends his purported memos of these privileged conversations, one of which he testified was classified. He also testified that immediately after he was terminated he authorized his friends to leak the contents of these memos to the press in order to "prompt the appointment of a special counsel." Although Mr. Comey testified he only leaked the memos in response to a tweet, I don't believe he made this claim. I'm fairly sure that he said that the tweet about tapes simply made him realize that there might be more than simply a "he said, he said" dynamic here. I think he said that he asked that the memo be leaked shortly before going out of town with his wife. the public record reveals that the New York Times was quoting from these memos the day before the referenced tweet, which belies Mr. Comey's excuse for this unauthorized disclosure of privileged information and appears to entirely retaliatory. We will leave it the appropriate authorities to determine whether this leaks should be investigated along with all those others being investigated. There is no basis whatsoever for "investigating" this. This would likely be an abuse of office, which is probably why this is phrased as it is, i.e. "we will leave it to X to decide if..." Again, fairly slimy.
In sum, it is now established that the President was not being investigated for colluding with the Russians True or attempting to obstruct that investigation. Not at all true. No testimony was provided to that effect and if such an investigation were extant, it would likely have been initiated by Mueller, who was appointed post-Comey firing and he'd know nothing about it. As the Committee pointed out today, these important facts for the country to know are virtually the only facts that have not leaked during the long course of these events.
As he said yesterday, the President feels completely vindicated I'm sure the President feels he's never done a single thing wrong in his entire life, but the testimony today did nothing whatsoever to vindicate him. and is eager to continue moving forward with his agenda with this public cloud removed.
Thank you.
__________________ "The great promise of the Internet was that more information would automatically yield better decisions. The great disappointment is that more information actually yields more possibilities to confirm what you already believed anyway." - Brian Eno
The Following 6 Users Say Thank You to CorsiHockeyLeague For This Useful Post:
"What I was trying to get at was whether Mr. Comey believes that any of his interactions with the President rise to the level of obstruction of justice. In the case of Secretary Clinton's emails, Mr. Comey was willing to step beyond his role as an investigator and state his belief about what 'no reasonable prosecutor' would conclude about the evidence. I wanted Mr. Comey to apply the same approach to the key question surrounding his interactions with President Trump—whether or not the President's conduct constitutes obstruction of justice. While I missed an opportunity in today's hearing, I still believe this question is important, and I intend to submit it in writing to Mr. Comey for the record."
Comey literally answered this question from McCain (bolded above) during the hearing...
- Clinton was investigated for her use of a private email server. Investigation was concluded, and Comey was part of the investigation from start to finish. Conclusion: no charges were laid.
- Trump's campaign is being investigated for possible collusion with the Russians. Investigation is still ongoing, and Comey is no longer part of the investigation. Conclusion: there isn't one yet, and even if there was, he's a private citizen now, so it's not up to him to announce it.
Either McCain is too stupid to understand the difference, or he thinks everyone else is too stupid to understand the difference and that this will become the new defence for the GOP.
I think McCain meant more: If you felt you could abandon protocol and decide whether Clinton was guilty or not, why won't you say Trump was Obstructing Justice? I think he wanted to point out that Comey was clearly capable of making these opinions and felt it would be good to hear his on the Obstruction charge
The Following User Says Thank You to Street Pharmacist For This Useful Post:
Those are fair points, however I do believe that people who serve as senior members of government services sign things like non disclosures for example and are not allowed to leak classified or damaging information to the press even though they left government service.
for example, when I left the military, I couldn't go and leak classified or sensitive information to anyone, if i did I could still be charged.
For senior government officials I believe its in their conditions of employment.
__________________
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Those are fair points, however I do believe that people who serve as senior members of government services sign things like non disclosures for example and are not allowed to leak classified or damaging information to the press even though they left government service.
for example, when I left the military, I couldn't go and leak classified or sensitive information to anyone, if i did I could still be charged.
For senior government officials I believe its in their conditions of employment.
Didn't he mention multiple times that it was not classified information? Even that rube from Missouri kept trying to draw a connection to using a "classified laptop" and the memos being classified.
On Thursday, Capitol Hill was consumed by former FBI Director James Comey’s testimony. But just after the high-profile hearing played out in the Hart Senate Office Building, House Republicans passed a mammoth, 580-page bill that would do more to deregulate the banking industry than any single piece of legislation in a generation.
The Financial CHOICE Act, approved in the House by a 233 to 186 margin, now heads to the Senate. Every House Democrat voted against it, and they were joined by just one Republican defector, Rep. Walter Jones (R-NC).
...
Spearheaded by House Finance Chair Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R-TX), the Choice Act begins by throwing out much of the banking oversight passed under President Obama’s administration, mostly through the Dodd-Frank act signed in 2010. But it goes further than that, rolling back oversight in a way that could dramatically exacerbate the likelihood of another financial crisis, according to experts in financial regulation.
“It’s a little hard to get your mind around everything this bill does, because there’s almost no area of financial regulation it doesn’t touch,” says Marcus Stanley, policy director for Americans for Financial Reform. “There’s a bunch of very radical stuff in this bill, and it goes way beyond repealing Dodd-Frank.”
It could also expose the hollowness of Trump’s campaign promises. Trump ran on slamming Wall Street for “getting away with murder” and arguing that Goldman Sachs had "bled our country dry."
But the bill looks to some like a wish list of what advocates and lobbyists for the banking industry have demanded. Among the provisions that have most alarmed progressives on the Hill is its proposed elimination of the “Volcker Rule,” which prevents commercial banks from making certain kinds of speculative and risky trades.
He may have used words like "I hope" and inferred my job depended on loyalty without saying anything outright, but when Don Trump holds out his pinky ring for a kiss you can read between the lines.
__________________
@PR_NHL
The @NHLFlames are the first team to feature four players each with 50+ points within their first 45 games of a season since the Penguins in 1995-96 (Ron Francis, Mario Lemieux, Jaromir Jagr, Tomas Sandstrom).
On Thursday, Capitol Hill was consumed by former FBI Director James Comey’s testimony. But just after the high-profile hearing played out in the Hart Senate Office Building, House Republicans passed a mammoth, 580-page bill that would do more to deregulate the banking industry than any single piece of legislation in a generation.
The Financial CHOICE Act, approved in the House by a 233 to 186 margin, now heads to the Senate. Every House Democrat voted against it, and they were joined by just one Republican defector, Rep. Walter Jones (R-NC).
...
Spearheaded by House Finance Chair Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R-TX), the Choice Act begins by throwing out much of the banking oversight passed under President Obama’s administration, mostly through the Dodd-Frank act signed in 2010. But it goes further than that, rolling back oversight in a way that could dramatically exacerbate the likelihood of another financial crisis, according to experts in financial regulation.
“It’s a little hard to get your mind around everything this bill does, because there’s almost no area of financial regulation it doesn’t touch,” says Marcus Stanley, policy director for Americans for Financial Reform. “There’s a bunch of very radical stuff in this bill, and it goes way beyond repealing Dodd-Frank.”
It could also expose the hollowness of Trump’s campaign promises. Trump ran on slamming Wall Street for “getting away with murder” and arguing that Goldman Sachs had "bled our country dry."
But the bill looks to some like a wish list of what advocates and lobbyists for the banking industry have demanded. Among the provisions that have most alarmed progressives on the Hill is its proposed elimination of the “Volcker Rule,” which prevents commercial banks from making certain kinds of speculative and risky trades.
This is the type of stuff the Democrats need to tie directly to the Republicans. When things fail, and they will fail hard, the Republicans have to own this. This has to stick to them like stink on an Oiler fan.
Didn't he mention multiple times that it was not classified information? Even that rube from Missouri kept trying to draw a connection to using a "classified laptop" and the memos being classified.
Honestly I don't know I wasn't following it that closely, but the usual non-disclosure for someone like the FBI would probably go beyond just classified materials to materials that could be construed as damaging.
__________________
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
I'm thinking McCain heard from some moderate republicans who questioned his lack of backbone and is now scrambling. Face it John you didn't have the spine to actually ask those things in any sort of direct manner. Post-game you magically had your balls drop....again. It's getting old.
It's easy to see why people think that CNN is left biased. When compared to the extreme partisanship of Fox News, CNN looks like the communist news network. Somehow, being accurate has become left.
Last edited by wireframe; 06-08-2017 at 06:13 PM.
Reason: image in spoiler tags
