And it Begins:Special Prosecutor To Investigate Trump And Russia

[Steelworth]

 

[deljzc]

Look, I'm glad they busted Manafort. If he did what he is being charged with he should go to jail for a long time.

But this exemplifies EXACTLY why I've been against this open-ended "independent" investigation since the begging. This has ABSOLUTELY nothing to do with our election. Nothing.

Maybe this is a shakedown to hopefully find something else, but if that's the case, this is a pretty big fish to start with. In fact it might be the only fish because I'm not sure how Manafort implicates Trump based on all the bad stuff he was doing from 2006-2015. I mean Christ, he only worked on the Trump campaign for 4 months. He also worked for Ford, Reagan, Bush and Dole so it's not like he was hired by Trump BECAUSE of his Russian dealings. He was hired because of his experience. I doubt Trump even knew about the FBI's open investigation on him starting in 2014.

I just don't know where Tibs and Elfie think this is going to go.

And Tibs has already admitted (like I predicted he would a million years ago) that this investigation will have NOTHING to do Russia-US collusion in our election but will likely try to stick something on Trump, Inc. for tax evasion or money laundering WAY before the election cycle. But Manafort doesn't lead to that. There is very little evidence Manafort and Trump, Inc. ever did business together.

I've also said from the beginning, if you give a federal investigation team unlimited resources and time you can find something to charge every billionaire in this country for something. Again, nothing about collusion. Nothing about crimes and misdemeanors against the country during Trump's run for President. Nothing about his ability to govern.

To me, this is much ado about nothing. Manafort looks like a political insider that is also about as financially corrupt as they come. I bet his illegality started WAY before 2006. Way before anything to do with Trump.

 

[Sarge]

Look, I'm glad they busted Manafort. If he did what he is being charged with he should go to jail for a long time.

But this exemplifies EXACTLY why I've been against this open-ended "independent" investigation since the begging. This has ABSOLUTELY nothing to do with our election. Nothing.

Maybe this is a shakedown to hopefully find something else, but if that's the case, this is a pretty big fish to start with. In fact it might be the only fish because I'm not sure how Manafort implicates Trump based on all the bad stuff he was doing from 2006-2015. I mean Christ, he only worked on the Trump campaign for 4 months. He also worked for Ford, Reagan, Bush and Dole so it's not like he was hired by Trump BECAUSE of his Russian dealings. He was hired because of his experience. I doubt Trump even knew about the FBI's open investigation on him starting in 2014.

I just don't know where Tibs and Elfie think this is going to go.

And Tibs has already admitted (like I predicted he would a million years ago) that this investigation will have NOTHING to do Russia-US collusion in our election but will likely try to stick something on Trump, Inc. for tax evasion or money laundering WAY before the election cycle. But Manafort doesn't lead to that. There is very little evidence Manafort and Trump, Inc. ever did business together.

I've also said from the beginning, if you give a federal investigation team unlimited resources and time you can find something to charge every billionaire in this country for something. Again, nothing about collusion. Nothing about crimes and misdemeanors against the country during Trump's run for President. Nothing about his ability to govern.

To me, this is much ado about nothing. Manafort looks like a political insider that is also about as financially corrupt as they come. I bet his illegality started WAY before 2006. Way before anything to do with Trump.

Who didn't know it was gonna turn into this? They are going to do their best to hang Trump. They will find something, but it won't be collusion. I don't care for Trump as president or a person. But there is something very wrong about what is happening here. A soft coup is probably the closest comparison. Every American alive, liberal or conservative should be worried right now. Your government is undermining the very democracy it claims to be, mainly because Trump is a big fat meany.

 

[Superman]

Who didn't know it was gonna turn into this? They are going to do their best to hang Trump. They will find something, but it won't be collusion. I don't care for Trump as president or a person. But there is something very wrong about what is happening here. A soft coup is probably the closest comparison. Every American alive, liberal or conservative should be worried right now. Your government is undermining the very democracy it claims to be, mainly because Trump is a big fat meany.

words hurt, Sarge.

 

[Steelworth]

Who didn't know it was gonna turn into this? They are going to do their best to hang Trump. They will find something, but it won't be collusion. I don't care for Trump as president or a person. But there is something very wrong about what is happening here. A soft coup is probably the closest comparison. Every American alive, liberal or conservative should be worried right now. Your government is undermining the very democracy it claims to be, mainly because Trump is a big fat meany.

Spot on.

 

[IndySteel]

http://katrinapierson.com/report-obamas-campaign-funneled-972000-firm-behind-trump-dossier/

Last week, we found out the discredited Trump Dossier was funded by Team Hillary and the DNC.

Now, according to a bombshell report from TheFederalist, it turns out that none other than ex-President Obama himself was also involved with payments of just under a million dollars to a law firm that then funneled the money to Fusion GPS, the firm behind the dossier.

When will the REAL investigation of the DNC, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama finally take place?

Originally published in TheFederalist
Since April of 2016, Obama’s campaign organization has paid nearly a million dollars to the law firm that funneled money to Fusion GPS to compile a dossier of unverified allegations against Donald Trump.

Former president Barack Obama’s official campaign organization has directed nearly a million dollars to the same law firm that funneled money to Fusion GPS, the firm behind the infamous Steele dossier. Since April of 2016, Obama For America (OFA) has paid over $972,000 to Perkins Coie, records filed with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) show.

The Washington Post reported last week that Perkins Coie, an international law firm, was directed by both the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and Hillary Clinton’s campaign to retain Fusion GPS in April of 2016 to dig up dirt on then-candidate Donald Trump. Fusion GPS then hired Christopher Steele, a former British spy, to compile a dossier of allegations that Trump and his campaign actively colluded with the Russian government during the 2016 election. Though many of the claims in the dossier have been directly refuted, none of the dossier’s allegations of collusion have been independently verified. Lawyers for Steele admitted in court filings last April that his work was not verified and was never meant to be made public.

OFA, Obama’s official campaign arm in 2016, paid nearly $800,000 to Perkins Coie in 2016 alone, according to FEC records. The first 2016 payments to Perkins Coie, classified only as “Legal Services,” were made April 25-26, 2016, and totaled $98,047. A second batch of payments, also classified as “Legal Services,” were disbursed to the law firm on September 29, 2016, and totaled exactly $700,000. Payments from OFA to Perkins Coie in 2017 totaled $174,725 through August 22, 2017.

FEC records as well as federal court records show that Marc Elias, the Perkins Coie lawyer whom the Washington Post reported was responsible for the payments to Fusion GPS on behalf of Clinton’s campaign and the DNC, also previously served as a counsel for OFA. In Shamblin v. Obama for America, a 2013 case in federal court in Florida, federal court records list Elias as simultaneously serving as lead attorney for both OFA and the DNC.

OFA, which managed Obama’s successful re-election campaign in 2012, retooled after that campaign to focus on enacting the president’s agenda during his final term in office. The group reorganized again after the 2016 election and planned to use its staff and resources to oppose President Donald Trump. During the entire 2016 campaign cycle, the group spent only $4.5 million, according to FEC records.

Federal records show that Hillary Clinton’s official campaign organization, Hillary For America, paid just under $5.1 million to Perkins Coie in 2016. The DNC paid nearly $5.4 million to the law firm in 2016.

The timing and nature of the payments to Perkins Coie by Obama’s official campaign arm raise significant questions about whether OFA was funding Fusion GPS, how much Obama and his team knew about the contents and provenance of the dossier long before its contents were made public, and whether the president or his government lieutenants knowingly used a partisan political document to justify official government actions targeting the president’s political opponents named in the dossier. According to the Washington Post, Fusion GPS was first retained by Perkins Coie on behalf of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign in April of 2016.

And we won't hear a word about it from the fake news MSM. Hopefully Trump will slam Obama about it in tweet soon.

 

[deljzc]

I will say this now. If there is ONLY an indictment on Manafort and NOT Tony Podesta, then I'm calling bullshit on this whole shenanigans.

That basically tells me Mueller is only going down one rabbit hole and ignoring another.

When you read up on the history of Manafort vs. Podesta, they are pretty much two sides of the same coin.

 

[IndySteel]

I will say this now. If there is ONLY an indictment on Manafort and NOT Tony Podesta, then I'm calling bullshit on this whole shenanigans.
.

The whole thing was bullshit from day 1.

 

[Sarge]

words hurt, Sarge.

Think about it. Usually the first few people to go down in a scandal are the easiest ones to nail, low hanging fruit. Sure, they are charged with crimes, but nothing dealing with collusion. It is only going to be harder, the higher up they go. If you couldn't get Manafort, Papadopolous or the other guy for collusion, what makes you think you are gonna nail anyone else? Like I said before, I think Meuller has already moved on from collusion because he knows nothing is there. Now, with unlimited resources and time, he is going fishing. They will find something from 1986 or some **** and try and hang him. So long America.

 

[Superman]

 

[Troglodyte]

Think about it. Usually the first few people to go down in a scandal are the easiest ones to nail, low hanging fruit. Sure, they are charged with crimes, but nothing dealing with collusion. It is only going to be harder, the higher up they go. If you couldn't get Manafort, Papadopolous or the other guy for collusion, what makes you think you are gonna nail anyone else?

The people aren’t the low hanging fruit, the crimes are. And the crimes are now leverage for Mueller. If Manafort wants to avoid the clink, he can give Trump up.

 

[oneforthebus]

The people aren’t the low hanging fruit, the crimes are. And the crimes are now leverage for Mueller. If Manafort wants to avoid the clink, he can give Trump up.

Give him up for what? Seriously, I'd like to know what you think Trump did exactly.

Really, the best we can make out right now is Papadapoulos met some Russians who claimed to have dirt on Hillary and wanted to meet with the campaign and Trump. and the campaign said no.

Where is this crime of the century we've been promised?

 

[Tibs]

I wonder what the number was here at SN? Since much of this muck showed up primarily on alt right sites, then pushed forward on FB and elsewhere, hard to say a lot of the content here wasn't coming from similar, nefarious sources. Oh well, it is what it is. Just another nothingburger.


Facebook Says Russian-Backed Election Content Reached 126 Million Americans
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-new...d-126-million-americans-facebook-says-n815791

WASHINGTON — An estimated 126 million Americans, roughly one-third of the nation’s population, received Russian-backed content on Facebook during the 2016 campaign, according to prepared testimony the company submitted Monday to the Senate Judiciary Committee and obtained by NBC News.

Underscoring how widely content on the social media platform can spread, Facebook says in the testimony that while some 29 million Americans directly received material from 80,000 posts by 120 fake Russian-backed pages in their own news feeds, those posts were “shared, liked and followed by people on Facebook, and, as a result, three times more people may have been exposed to a story that originated from the Russian operation.”

The testimony by Facebook's general counsel, Colin Stretch, was submitted to the Judiciary Committee ahead of a hearing on Tuesday with executives from Facebook, Google and Twitter. The hearing is part of the congressional inquiry into Russia’s use of these platforms to try to influence last year’s U.S. presidential election.

Posts from Russian-backed Facebook accounts from January 2015 to August 2017, by Facebook’s estimation, reached potentially half of the 250 million Americans who are eligible to vote. None of the 80,000 posts generated by fake Russian-backed pages includes the 3,000 Facebook advertisements purchased by Russian entities, according to a person familiar with the issue.

The shared content that Facebook estimates reached 126 million Americans was likely hard, if not impossible, for users of the social media platform to identify as originating from Russia.

 

[Supersteeler]

Give him up for what? Seriously, I'd like to know what you think Trump did exactly.

You could ask any Lib citizen or media member that same question. The answer is, they'll know when they find it.

 

[hamster]

I am still waiting for the evidence that Trump colluded with Russians. I don't care about Manaforts dodgy finances. Lock him up. Who cares. If there is none at this point, you shut down the special counsel.


Sent from my SCH-I605 using Steeler Nation mobile app

 

[oneforthebus]

I wonder what the number was here at SN? Since much of this muck showed up primarily on alt right sites, then pushed forward on FB and elsewhere, hard to say a lot of the content here wasn't coming from similar, nefarious sources. Oh well, it is what it is. Just another nothingburger.


Facebook Says Russian-Backed Election Content Reached 126 Million Americans
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-new...d-126-million-americans-facebook-says-n815791

The number of what here on SN? The number of people who saw it or the number of people who actually let obviously bogus Facebook ads influence their election decisions? Pretty insulting of you to imply we're that gullible.

 

[Supersteeler]

The number of what here on SN?

Nefarious undercover Alt Right agents who helped Putin rig the election for Trump of course. We have all been named.

 

[Tibs]

You could ask any Lib citizen or media member that same question. The answer is, they'll know when they find it.

I understand I'll be ridiculed for it, but here is my take. Strictly my opinion based on what's gone down over the past year or so.

From what I can tell, Trump's business dealings over the decades have involved numerous dark money sources, be they Russian or others. Since he was shut off from financing from US banks, he had to find money elsewhere. This network of illicit money and illegal business dealings created numerous contacts and relationships, some of which included entities close to Putin. These are the skeletons in his closet. There are probably a handful of deals that, if exposed, would allow authorities to charge him for money laundering and tax evasion, among other charges. Out of this background he rose to become the GOP nominee.

Putin was eager to have a more Russian-friendly administration in the WH, one that would look the other way when it came to Ukraine, Syria and Russia exerting its influence in Eastern Europe and elsewhere. In general, a weaker US - with as much internal turmoil as possible - and a weaker NATO in particular were the desired result. The Richard Steele dossier - some of it already collaborated - shows the Russians collected dirt on Trump during his visit to Moscow, plus the info on his ties to Russian dark money, mobsters and the like. The key player here is a dude named Felix Sater, who was Trump's partner in investment deals.

Through various channels, they put in motion a two-prong effort to do what they could to help get Trump elected. The Russians created massive amounts of falsified, misleading content and flooded the net with it. They hacked the DNC emails then published them through wikileaks, undermining Hillary Clinton's candidacy. All this with the understanding Trump would stay out of Putin's hair if and when he got elected, otherwise they'd reveal the blackmail info.

Behind in the polls, Trump and his advisors may have been desperate enough to seek out this help being offered, though they tried to do this through intermediaries to keep their noses clean. The myriad of Trump advisors with clear connections to Russia and Russian interests like Manafort, Gates, Paige, Flynn, Papadopoulos,Tillerson, Sessions and Stone are omnious. The fact Trump fired Comey, in the middle of an FBI investigation into Trump and his campaign just added another layer to possible criminal wrongdoing.

So my view is this wasn't some massive conspiracy that Trump was the mastermind of. He didn't come up with the blueprint. He simply knew about it, and went along with it. Then began denying any of it happened, and thus came the invention of the term 'fake news' that dominated the election cycle.

Ironically enough, he very well could have been elected president without all this horseshit, by folks like many here on this board, who simply wanted to see change in Washington and voted for him.

Unfortunately, wishing all this away does not clear Trump from any wrongdoing, only Mueller's investigation can do that at this point.

Some info on Trump-Russian ties:
https://www.politico.com/magazine/s...ies-chart-flynn-page-manafort-sessions-214868

 

[Booted]

Nefarious undercover Alt Right agents who helped Putin rig the election for Trump of course. We have all been named.

Hurry, grab your Go bag and get out of there!

 

[Troglodyte]

The number of what here on SN? The number of people who saw it or the number of people who actually let obviously bogus Facebook ads influence their election decisions? Pretty insulting of you to imply we're that gullible.

Have you completely ignored some of the articles, conspiracy theories and sources that get posted here?

 

[oneforthebus]

Have you completely ignored some of the articles, conspiracy theories and sources that get posted here?

You mean by Elfie? Yes, I ignore all of them. Except for occasionally arguing their absurdity for fun.

 

[oneforthebus]

Nefarious undercover Alt Right agents who helped Putin rig the election for Trump of course. We have all been named.

I think he meant dumb rubes who fall for fake Facebook ads.

 

[oneforthebus]

While I didn't vote for Trump myself. I don't know anyone who voted for im due to anything they read in a facebook ad. There is decades of information about what a terrible person Hillary is, dating back to before social media even existed. Then there is her incredibly unlikeable persona and horrid debating skills. It's why she lost the nomination to Barry and also why she lost to Trump.

 

[Tibs]

I think he meant dumb rubes who fall for fake Facebook ads.

No I'm speaking of some of the content that was posted to this board over the past year and a half that may have - inadvertantly - come from these Russian fake news plants. Since these were overwhelmingly anti-Hillary and pro-Trump in nature, they were widely disseminated on various right wing blogs, news sites, twitter and FB feeds and eventually passed on by the pro-Trump faction here on the board.


The Fake Americans Russia Created to Influence the Election
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/07/us/politics/russia-facebook-twitter-election.html

Russia hired 1,000 people to create anti-Clinton 'fake news' in key US states during election, Trump-Russia hearings leader reveals
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...k-warner-intelligence-committee-a7657641.html

How Russian Twitter Bots Pumped Out Fake News During The 2016 Election
http://www.npr.org/sections/alltech...pumped-out-fake-news-during-the-2016-election

 

[Troglodyte]

You mean by Elfie? Yes, I ignore all of them. Except for occasionally arguing their absurdity for fun.

Trump, among other things, has referenced the “5 million illegal votes” and praised Alex Jones and you seriously question Tibs for thinking his voters are gullible?