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Author | Topic: The Trump Presidency | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
JonF Member (Idle past 196 days) Posts: 6174 Joined: |
But it looks to me like you're saying that "it's all illegal", that is, no foreign help period, when it comes to campaigns. Just like the summary statement that I quoted from the FEC chair. If there's something in your link that is a "yes, BUT", then I have to ask you to c/p it here.
Sheesh, at least try to keep up. I've posted the applicable law twice and the FEC web site once. Message 2939: What the FEC chair says is not law, and she misspoke slightly. The FEC web site is clear:FEC | Candidate | Who can and can't contribute quote:As is the previously posted law itself: 52 U.S. Code § 30121 - Contributions and donations by foreign nationals | U.S. Code | US Law | LII / Legal Information Institute
quote:Note the words "contribution" and "donation". Is understanding that too much for you? Edited by JonF, : No reason given.
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Percy Member Posts: 22502 From: New Hampshire Joined: Member Rating: 4.9 |
This is a reply to Message 2973, Message 2974 and Message 2975.
Replying to Message 2973:
marc9000 writes: Your link in message 2898 is to a Washington Post pay site that I can't access. If you enter [msg=2898] then it will be rendered as Message 2898 instead of just the plaintext "message 2898." Everyone gets 20 free Washington Post articles a month. If you're reading more than 20 a month maybe you should start paying for it. July's here and your count has been reset to 0, so just try again.
But it looks to me like you're saying that "it's all illegal", that is, no foreign help period, when it comes to campaigns. Just like the summary statement that I quoted from the FEC chair. If there's something in your link that is a "yes, BUT", then I have to ask you to c/p it here. It isn't a "yes, but..." Here's the first paragraph from the Washington Post article that makes clear she wasn't talking about help from someone who happened to be a foreigner but about help originating with a foreign *government*. Click on the article, you can read it now. You could also have changed browsers and read it that way. They keep the article count in a cookie, and a different browser wouldn't have set the cookie.
quote: And here's the complete statement from FEC Chairwoman Ellen Weintraub that I quoted in Message 2898 and that what you've written makes it seem as if you didn't read it:
quote: Moving on:
So Clinton ~indirectly~ gets foreign sourced dirt on a political opponent - indirectly because she hired a U.S. firm to do it, and that's okay, but if she'd have directly done it herself, that would have been illegal? No, it wouldn't be illegal no matter which person actually conducted the opposition research.
So in answer to the Stephanopoulos question, if Trump would have said "I'd hire a U.S. research firm to listen to the information offered to me, and let them relay it to me," that would have been okay? No, it would not have been okay. Accepting campaign help from a foreign government is illegal. Involving intermediaries doesn't change that. Replying to Message 2974:
You can't tell the difference between donations to a campaign and donations to a charity? Really? You accept the Clinton foundation as being squeaky clean with no suspicions of corruption and fraud? Do you have evidence of corruption and fraud? The thing I find objectionable about the Clinton Foundation is probably the same thing as everyone else, the potential for a conflict of interest.
Does it truly have to be explained that donations to legitimate charities do not flow to the people running them? The Clinton Foundation is a legitimate charity still in operation. Would you like for me to load you up with links on just how legitimate it is? You mean links to your right-wing conspiracy websites? No thanks. Any actual information you have is fine.
The Trump Foundation was forced to shut its doors when it was discovered that the Trumps were using it as a personal piggy bank. Need links to the Clinton's piggy bank use of the Clinton Foundation? Again, as long as you're linking to legitimate information and not to your right-wing conspiracy websites then that would be fine, though the existence of such information would be surprising given that the Clinton Foundation is still operating and not under any investigation while the Trump Foundation got shut down. Check out Clinton Foundation Controversies and see if anything you find there bothers you.
If that were true, they could end all the mistrust of themselves by announcing that if they can get one more round of background checks, registration, licensing and training, THEN THEY'D STOP with more calls for gun control in the future. It could be in the form of a new Constitutional amendment. "No more calls for gun control". But they'll never do that. Because they advocate incrementalism . Of course improvements in gun control will be incremental. Improvements in most things are incremental. Just as we want better and better pollution controls, car safety, water standards, etc., we also want better and better gun control that will gradually reduce our high gun death rate.
You have it backwards. It is the Republicans who get in bed with big business and vote them massive benefits from the public troughs. Democrats believe businesses should not be the beneficiaries of government largesse and that regulation should serve to rein in unrestrained capitalism with its exploitation of workers and the environment. It's true that that happens. But the question is, will it get better, or worse, with a bigger government? Do you think that preventing monopolies and worker exploitation and environmental abuse and so forth are worth paying for? And isn't government the right entity do be responsible for such things?
The rest of your message is just standard liberal talking points,... I'm not a liberal. I think that government should stay out of people's lives but that keeping the country healthy, wealthy and wise (think college) should be the responsibility of government. The top 1% control 40% of the country's wealth, and that's not right. Wealth disparity is worse today than in the days of the robber barons.
Trump favors lower taxes on businesses and the rich paid for by the government in the form of much higher deficits, nearly a trillion dollars in additional debt since the Trump tax cuts went into effect. The national debt went up nearly $9 trillion under Obama, almost double what it was, I don't think trying something just a little different is completely uncalled for. You're switching topics from the annual deficit to the national debt, but that's okay. Here's a projection of the national debt that includes the Trump tax cuts. Looks just as bad as the Obama years. Traditionally Republicans are for lower deficits and lowering the national debt:
Replying to Message 2975:
You like that Trump is just out for himself? Why? That's only your statement, anyone can be accused of only being out for himself. Trump puts his own interests ahead of the country's. That's why he hasn't released his income taxes, why he didn't put his businesses into a blind trust, why he has a conflict of interest between his businesses and running the country, why everyone who works for him has to sign an NDA binding them to secrecy not just during his time in office but in perpetuity, why he won't let anyone in his administration testify before Congress, why Hope Hicks didn't answer a single question before Congress about the period during which she worked in the White House, why his advisors are the rich friends he chats with at night on his unsecure cell phone, why the tax cuts were mostly for the rich and for corporations, and on and on.
One of the great ironies of the Trump phenomena is that his policies treat his supporters worse than anyone else. This is finally beginning to dawn on some people, farmers suffering due to Trump tariffs, for example. Temporary hardships on farmers, yes that's about the only example you've got. There are countless examples of workers all through the economy who are benefitting from what he's done. I'm sure one of them, that's the reason I have so little time to play here. Everyone is hurt by the higher prices caused by Trump tariffs. People are losing health insurance due to Trump's efforts to kill Obamacare. Trump opposes efforts to raise the minimum wage. Workplace health protections are being rolled back. Banking regulations put in place to prevent a repeat of the 2008 financial collapse are being relaxed. Pollution regulations are being loosened. He cut back funding of our national parks, and is downsizing some national parks to make more land available for commercial exploitation. He ignores climate change. He cut back on heating assistance for low-income families. He's hurt farming (and raised prices for consumers) by making migrant labor less available through his immigration policies. He's weakened gun laws. He's made it more difficult to pay back student debt. He's implemented cutbacks in education. He's split up families by deporting non-citizen parents who have citizen children. He's anti-LBGTQ, anti-black, anti-Muslem, anti-women. He's hurt all of America by making us less safe by weakening our ties to allies and cozying up to dictators who provide him photo ops but no useful agreements. Trump has been shown to be lying or misleading 10,800 times so far according to the Washington Post. If you think there's any errors in that Washington Post database then you let us know.
Wow, he'll then have a major monkey off his back if he wins a second term, won't he? No more campaign, he'll be able to listen to foreign governments all he wants without fear of criticism from the news media. You remain confused. It isn't a crime to listen to foreign governments in the normal course of running the country. What's illegal is accepting campaign help from foreign governments.
The economy began growing way back in 2010. Obama managed to maintain a growing economy for 6 years. The economy soured late in the Bush administration, and early in the Obama administration largely because of one thing, high oil prices,... Are you daft? The 2008 financial collapse was due to abuse of mortgage securities. It had nothing whatsoever to do with the brief spike in oil prices that occurred after the collapse. From the Wikipedia article on the 2008 financial crisis:
quote: Continuing with the rest of your paragraph:
...something practically out of the control of anyone in the U.S. including the president. It began growing in 2010 IN SPITE of Obama, not because of him. He did nothing to incentivize job creation and risk taking, with the possible exception of not completely lowering the boom on business with as crippling of environmental regulations as most of his Democrat allies wanted.
The responsibility for the 2008 financial collapse lies upon Clinton and a Republican Congress that repealed Glass-Steagle, relaxing banking reserve requirements and leaving them unable to withstand (without government intervention provided while Obama was president) the financial stresses introduced by the subprime mortgage crisis.
I wasn't expressing any personal feelings toward Trump. I was merely describing him. He's a scumbag real estate developer from New York City who lied and cheated and exploited and discriminated, sort of the definition of a scumbag. You really don't think people can change over a period of decades? Of course people can change, so let's see if Trump has changed. Back in the 70's Trump was a venal, vengeful, racist, misogynistic, xenophobic, narcissistic liar, and today Trump is still a venal, vengeful, racist, misogynistic, xenophobic, narcissistic liar. No, he hasn't changed.
I think Trump is proving that he has different motives and goals in mind than he did 30 years ago. What makes you say that?
During the election and at the beginning of his presidency, there was a lot of mistrust of just what Trump was going to do, among many conservatives. Prominent ones, like Mark Levin, or Glenn Beck, and countless voters. Levin and Beck are Trump backers now, and I've seen a change of heart from many of my social media friends. He's proven to be much more than just an arrogant reality tv guy. Support from conspiracy theorists like Levin and Beck is a negative.
Trump's actions indicate he does not care about the country. His family effectively lives in a different country, insulated and isolated from the problems everyone else has to deal with, from salaries too low to afford the rents near where they work, to decaying infrastructure, to poor water quality, to poor air quality, to rising sea levels, to changing and more unpredictable and more violent climatic events. Yes, things Obama came up a little short on. How so?
But we saw in the debate a few nights ago what the Democrats all agreed they do to get these problems solved, they'd give free health care to illegal immigrants! So what's your answer? Let illegal immigrants who have no money suffer or even die? You know what this guy was going to do had he made it safely into our country:
He was going to take a job raking lawns or hauling stones or working on farms, jobs that most Americans don't want. And he'd do it for his little girl to give her a better life than she would have had back home in El Salvador. Who knows what she might have accomplished here? --Percy
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Percy Member Posts: 22502 From: New Hampshire Joined: Member Rating: 4.9
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marc9000 writes: I agree about Marc jumping around.
If you'll forgive me for jumping around, I'll forgive you for answering my messages to JonF, as if you are him. If you'd like to have a private conversation then please use the private messaging facility. See Messaging link at top of page. --Percy
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JonF Member (Idle past 196 days) Posts: 6174 Joined: |
No President before wanted to meet Kim, and now the President grovels at his feet. I think he's panicking trying for some significant achievement, any significant achievement, before the election.
One Small Step For Trump, One Giant Step On A Rake For All Mankind (Trigger: extreme liberal snark):
quote:I'm suspicious of that NYT story. Of course it's been denied. Edited by JonF, : Found embeddable version
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Taq Member Posts: 10084 Joined: Member Rating: 5.1
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JonF writes: No President before wanted to meet Kim, and now the President grovels at his feet. I think he's panicking trying for some significant achievement, any significant achievement, before the election. Can you imagine what Fox News would be saying right now if it was Obama/Clinton in that video instead of Trump? Edited by Taq, : No reason given.
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Chiroptera Inactive Member |
I was thinking exactly the same thing.
I will say, though, I always did think trying to influence North Korea by trying to bully them isn't very productive. I am at least glad that a direct dialogue between leaders has begun, even if it is for the wrong reasons. If this creates an oppurtunity that the next President uses to fashion a workable agreement between the parties in east asia that results in better security in the region, I will give Trump at least grudging credit for starting the ball rolling.It says something about the qualities of our current president that the best argument anyone has made in his defense is that he didn’t know what he was talking about. -- Paul Krugman
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JonF Member (Idle past 196 days) Posts: 6174 Joined:
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Direct dialog only works with months of preparation.
Trump explicitly says his refusal to prepare is an advantage.
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JonF Member (Idle past 196 days) Posts: 6174 Joined: |
Missed this earlier.
So in answer to the Stephanopoulos question, if Trump would have said "I'd hire a U.S. research firm to listen to the information offered to me, and let them relay it to me, that would have been okay? It depends. If the firm did not pay the source, that's definitely illegal. If the source doesn't offer anything but the firm seeks him out and contracts him to supply information in exchange for something of value, that's OK. If the source offered freeinformation and Trump hired a firm to accept the information for free that's certainly a deplorable attempt to evade the law and almost certainly illegal. The fundamental issue is whether or not the transaction is completed after the transfer of information. As in normal contract law, if both parties complete their side of the transaction and something of value is exchanged, that's just normal commerce. But if the information-supplying party receives no previously established thing of value, that can create a debt that the information-supplying party could call in some day (no matter how many intermediaries are between the two parties). That's the situation the law is designed to protect against. Edited by JonF, : No reason given. Edited by JonF, : No reason given.
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Taq Member Posts: 10084 Joined: Member Rating: 5.1
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Chiroptera writes: I will say, though, I always did think trying to influence North Korea by trying to bully them isn't very productive. I am at least glad that a direct dialogue between leaders has begun, even if it is for the wrong reasons. Most reasoned people already know that NK is never going to give up their nukes or missile program because it deters others from invading them. Their entire existence rests on the threat they pose to others. Invoking Godwin's Law, I heard someone describe it as a US President being proud to meet Hitler in Auschwitz. We do have to keep in mind the massive humanitarian crisis in NK, and how a visit like this one can legitimize those abuses.
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JonF Member (Idle past 196 days) Posts: 6174 Joined:
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quote: Tucker Carlson backs Trump's praise of Kim Jong Un despite atrocities Edited by JonF, : No reason given.
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JonF Member (Idle past 196 days) Posts: 6174 Joined: |
These Pictures Show The "Dangerous" Overcrowding At Border Patrol Facilities
quote: Worker threw exception | www.rawstory.com | Cloudflare
quote: Standing room only in a cell:
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Chiroptera Inactive Member |
From The Guardian:
Ocasio-Cortez details 'horrifying' conditions at migrant detention facility The article describes a visit to a detention facility by a Congressional delegation.It says something about the qualities of our current president that the best argument anyone has made in his defense is that he didn’t know what he was talking about. -- Paul Krugman
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JonF Member (Idle past 196 days) Posts: 6174 Joined: |
Trump using overseas foreign actors to portray real Americans in his MAGA campaign ads
Guess he can't find any presentable real supporters.
quote: Edited by JonF, : No reason given.
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JonF Member (Idle past 196 days) Posts: 6174 Joined: |
Republicans are the party of law and order and strict adherence to the Constitution.
Unless, of course, it's inconvenient.
REPUBLICAN CONGRESSMAN TELLS TRUMP TO IGNORE SUPREME COURT AND ADD CITIZENSHIP QUESTION TO CENSUS quote: |
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JonF Member (Idle past 196 days) Posts: 6174 Joined: |
"These drawings show children’s views of their time in detention at the U.S. Southern Border. AAP believes no time in detention is healthy or safe for children."
Drawings by recently released children. Note how The bars dominate.
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