Re: Trump’s DOJ is targeting anti-tRump internet sites
I think we're too small to attract any attention. The only people I hear from are trying to sell me something: "Hey, we can help build traffic to your site, just send us money."
Yesterday presented us another casualty of American business's efforts to curry favor with the Trump administration when CBS's newly hired executive producer Nick Bilton fired correspondent Scott Pelley. "What qualified you to be in this position?" Pelley reportedly asked Bilton during a Monday staff meeting. The question initiated a heated exchange whose content I haven't seen objectively detailed yet.
Bilton fired Pelley in a letter the next day, and Pelley responded later that night in a statement shared with the Washington Post (see Read the letter firing Scott Pelley from ‘60 Minutes’ — and his response). The WaPo article is behind a paywall, so I quote both letters in their entirety. First Mr. Bilton
60 Minutes executive producer Nick Bilton:Dear Mr. Pelley:
I meant what I said in my letter last week to the 60 Minutes team: joining 60 Minutes is the honor of my career and I am grateful to be working alongside the people who have contributed to the most important television journalism brand this country has ever produced. While I’m new to 60 Minutes, I’ve devoted my career to investigative journalism and storytelling. I started this job excited to collaborate and to benefit from the wisdom and experience of the 60 Minutes veterans, with you among them. For that reason, one of the first things I did in my new role was call you to talk and invite you to dinner. It is a profound disappointment that you rejected that overture and chose ambush instead. Yesterday, you hijacked my first meeting with staff to disparage me, my qualifications, and my intentions with remarkable incivility and contempt. I welcome a diversity of viewpoints and respectful debate among the team, but this was nothing of the sort. Yesterday’s performative display of hostility-enacted in front of the staff instead of in a civil, private conversation-demonstrated that you have no interest in contributing to the future success of the show, or approaching my new tenure with a mind open to collaboration and progress. I am here to deliver first-in-class news programming, not to make headlines about newsroom drama. I am eager to work alongside those who share this goal.
Despite yesterday’s misconduct, I had hoped that in sitting down with you today we could find a path forward together. You made clear that you are not interested in such a path.
Your antipathy to the future of the show has come through loud and clear. And I have heard you.
I therefore write on behalf of CBS News, Inc. (“CBS) to inform you that your employment with CBS is terminated for cause effective immediately. Enclosed is your formal termination letter.
Sincerely,
Nick Bilton
Executive Producer, 60 Minutes
And here is Scott Pelley's response:
60 Minutes correspondent Scott Pelley:There has never been anything in America like 60 Minutes.
The Sunday tradition is the most successful program of any kind in history. For more than a decade, its innovative growth on every major online platform has extended its reach to countless millions around the world. This spring, at the end of our 58th season, 60 Minutes grew rapidly with an unheard-of 9% jump in viewers on CBS.
“60” has been the number-one program in America for decades because our beloved audience finds integrity, quality, and humanity in our stories. When stewardship of the program passed to my colleagues and me, our responsibility was to expand energetically into a new age of media technology while preserving the values our audience expects. Now, the new owner of our network is casting this legend aside, apparently to curry a moment of favor with the Trump administration.
The waste is heartbreaking.
Last month, 60 Minutes lost its DNA when our entire senior leadership and two of our best on-air correspondents were cruelly fired without cause. Good people were silenced because they stood up for our audience. They stood for fairness against the forces of political bias; they stood for professionalism against chaos.
For my part, new management has instructed me to inject falsehoods and bias into a politically sensitive story. I’ve been told to include assertions that are unverified. To date, in every case, I have managed to ignore these instructions or refuse them. Recently, politicians have been invited to choose correspondents for interviews on the broadcast. Giving politicians control over 60 Minutes interviews is not how this is done. Finally, incompetence and unprofessionalism in the new management have wreaked havoc. In a case involving one of my stories, the entire program came within 19 minutes of not getting on the air at all.
At 60 Minutes, we have fought harder than anyone knows to save the program that became an American icon. We owed that to our millions of viewers. I am deeply moved by the thousands of wishes we have received to “keep up the good fight.” Most of the men and women of CBS News are still in that fight. But now the collapse of values at the top has become untenable. The leadership of 60 Minutes is no longer recognizable. The principles I hold dear are gone, and so I must leave as well.
I depart after 37 years at CBS with one emotion—a heart brimming with gratitude for the men and women of CBS News who encouraged and enriched my work, very often at the risk of their own lives. I pray for a day when those people and their ideals are honored again—a day when sanity, competence, and courage return.
Pardon me when I go, what the hell, let ‘em know Make it hard for them to try my evil deeds. Pardon me shake ‘em down all the greed will astound, pay a grand and I shall pardon thee.
I’ve long been in a bind, you know I’d serve a long, long time, I tried to find a way to help me stay out of the pen
The things I do are not new, but there’s something that you can do to be there holding cash in hand when there’s pardons to be found.
Pardon me when I go, what the hell, let ‘em know Make it hard for them to try my evil deeds. Pardon me shake ‘em down all the greed will astound, pay a grand and I shall pardon thee.
You see I’ll never share the truth with you Or tell you where I’ve been, Islands too forbidden now Places where I’ve sinned To leave that all behind me yet never to atone and all the crimes that you can see, are ones I’ll never own
Pardon me when I go, things I did, who will know Make it hard for them to try my evil deeds. Pardon me shake ‘em down, all the greed… Pay a grand and I shall pardon thee.
A big thing is that they also give a summary of some of the pardons done:
quote:High-Profile and Political Pardons January 6 Blanket Pardon: On his first day in office, Trump issued a blanket pardon covering approximately 1,500 individuals charged or convicted in connection with the U.S. Capitol attack.
Election Overturn Allies: In late 2025, Trump issued pardons to prominent political allies facing state-level charges and investigations for their efforts to overturn the 2020 election.
Controversial Figures: Trump’s clemency roster has also featured international figures, such as a former Honduran president convicted of drug trafficking, and figures like former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich.
White-Collar Crime and Fraud Trump has issued pardons and commutations to over 70 individuals convicted of fraud, money laundering, and financial crimes. Notable examples include:Trevor Milton: The founder of Nikola who was convicted of wire fraud; his pardon wiped out over $600 million in court-ordered restitution that he owed investors.
Binance Executives: Cryptocurrency figures, including Binance co-founder Changpeng Zhao, received pardons related to violations of the Bank Secrecy Act.
Restitution and Financial Impact Unlike traditional presidential pardons, Trump’s use of executive clemency has frequently included the remittance of court-ordered fines, asset forfeitures, and restitution. According to watchdog analyses and the U.S. Department of Justice, these cancellations have cost victims and taxpayers well over $1.3 billion.
Official ResourcesFor a complete, searchable breakdown of clemency grants, warrants, and commutations, you can review the U.S. Department of Justice Clemency Grants directory.
One of the odd things I have noticed about politicians hammered by the FBI
I have personally interviewed many politicians who have to perform community service for "crimes". (Often with prison sentences)
The odd thing is that they refuse to admit that they were safe incumbents who were found "guilty" of bullshit crimes.
They say that they have to "work hard" to get elected and simply refuse to point out that they did not need the pitiful amount of campaign $$$ that they were found "guilty" of taking.
I keep telling them how they need to tell the people how stupid they are for thinking the donations - in question - amounted to anything of significance.
They refuse to do so - they often say "I am under FBI orders to not engage in political activities or to speak on my behalf. You sound like my lawyer, " You need to put this in perspective".
Blagojevich was a super-safe liberal Governor who could have won for decades, if he wanted to. Same with so many others. Blago got 14 years! Many former ex-congressmen I talked to simply refused to admit that they were safe incumbents and did not need the pitiful $ amount they were charged with illegally raising. One (right wing) Republican told me that Nancy Pelosi even personally told him, when he was in (political) death status, that "none of us knows all the campaign laws" - meaning it is a bullshit & cryptic legal puzzle nobody can truly follow even if they wanted to.
™ Version 4.2
(1)