Liberal Forum

larryc12 » 01 Apr 2017 8:47 am » wrote:Well, what DID they do, Miss T? Apparently you're convinced they cost Whorilly the election, so what was it aside from exposing truths of the DNC's corrupt doings, if they indeed actually were the ones who did that? Good! Corruption in all forms and all personnel needs to be exposed. You want your party to win despite corruption; I don't.

Misty » 02 Apr 2017 8:16 pm » wrote: So you don't believe that Russia did anything to mess with the election?
I would tell you to watch Clint Watt's testimony, but it would be a waste of time.

I have no use for people who don't deal in reality

(VIDEO)
Jim Hoft Apr 1st, 2017 7:37 am 77 Comments
Mary Anne Marsh, a principal of the Dewey Square Group, a Democratic public affairs consulting firm, revealed the Obama administration had been investigating Donald Trump since the spring of 2015.

Donald Trump announced his candidacy for president in June 2015.
Mary Ann Marsh: Fact, the investigation of Trump, his associates and their relationship with Russia started in the spring of 2015.
That is a fact. That is widely known.

http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2017/04 ... 015-video/

Misty » 02 Apr 2017 8:16 pm » wrote:I am not a member of the Democratic party, and I do NOT want anyone to win despite corruption.:

Misty » 02 Apr 2017 8:16 pm » wrote:I have no use for people who don't deal in reality:

What Devin Nunes Knows
Team Obama was spying broadly on the incoming administration.
By KIMBERLEY A. STRASSELMarch 30, 2017 6:53 p.m. ET
California Rep. Adam Schiff may not offer much by way of substance, but give him marks
for political flimflam

. The ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee was so successful at ginning up fake outrage over his Republican counterpart
that he successfully buried this week’s only real (and bombshell) news.

Mr. Schiff and fellow Democrats spent this week accusing Chairman Devin Nunes of carrying water for President Trump, undermining the committee’s Russia investigation, and hiding information. The press dutifully regurgitated the outrage, as well as Mr. Schiff’s calls for Mr. Nunes to recuse himself from the investigation into possible Russian electoral meddling.
All this engineered drama served
to deep-six the important information Americans urgently deserve to know. Mr. Nunes has said he has seen proof that the Obama White House surveilled the incoming administration—on subjects that had nothing to do with Russia—and that it further unmasked (identified by name) transition officials. This goes far beyond a mere scandal.

It’s a potential crime.

We’ve known since early February that a call by former national security adviser Mike Flynn to the Russian ambassador was monitored by U.S. intelligence. There’s nothing improper in tapping foreign officials. But it was improper that Mr. Flynn’s name was revealed and leaked to the press, along with the substance of his conversation. The media nonetheless excused all this by claiming one piece of Mr. Flynn’s conversation (sanctions) was relevant to the continuing investigation into Trump-Russia ties.

Around the same time, Mr. Nunes’s own intelligence sources informed him that documents showed further collection of information about, and unmasking of, Trump transition officials. These documents aren’t easily obtainable, since they aren’t the “finished” intelligence products that Congress gets to see.

Nonetheless, for weeks Mr. Nunes has been demanding intelligence agencies turn over said documents—with no luck, so far.

Mr. Nunes earlier this week got his own source to show him a treasure trove of documents at a secure facility. Here are the relevant details:

First, there were dozens of documents with information about Trump officials. Second, the information these documents contained was not related to Russia. Third, while many reports did “mask” identities (referring, for instance, to “U.S. Person 1 or 2”) they were written in ways that made clear which Trump officials were being discussed. Fourth, in at least one instance, a Trump official other than Mr. Flynn was outright unmasked. Finally, these documents were circulated at the highest levels of government.
To sum up,

Team Obama was spying broadly on the incoming administration.

...Hint to the press corps: If Mr. Nunes wanted to tip off the White House about his Russia probe, it’d be a lot easier to speed-dial Steve Bannon secretly from his office.
If Mr. Schiff wants to be trusted with important information, he might start by proving he is trustworthy—rather than rumor-mongering that there is “more than circumstantial evidence” of Trump-Russia collusion. He might voice some concern that a prior White House was monitoring its political opponents. He might ask whether Obama officials had been “reverse monitoring”—tracking foreign officials solely so they could spy on the Trump team.

Mr. Nunes has zero reason to recuse himself from this probe, because he is doing his job.


It’s Mr. Schiff who ought to be considering recusal, for failing to do his own.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/what-devin ... 1490914396

Misty » 02 Apr 2017 8:16 pm » wrote:I have no use for people who don't deal in reality

FAIL: Top Democrat Schiff Backs Away from Russia-Trump Collusion
...Schiff backed off claims he made last month on MSNBC that there was “more than circumstantial” evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russian government. When Tapper asked him point-blank whether there was “collusion,” Schiff said: “I don’t think we can say anything definitively at this point.”
http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2017/04 ... ims-video/

Michael Flynn Failed to Disclose Payments From Russian Propaganda Network

Former National Security Advisor Mike Flynn initially failed to inform federal ethics officials of payments from a state-sponsored Russian propaganda outfit, according to newly released documents.

Flynn, who left his White House post after less than a month, submitted a financial disclosure form in February that made no mention of a reported $45,000 payment from Russia Today, or RT, for a speech that Flynn gave at the network’s 10th anniversary gala.

In an amended disclosure statement filed with the White House counsel’s office on Friday, Flynn disclosed receiving more than $5,000 (the threshold for reporting) from RT.

RT is a key component of Russia’s foreign propaganda apparatus.

It advances the Kremlin position on international affairs through affiliate broadcasters in the United States and Europe.

In addition to RT, Flynn’s amended disclosure statement reveals payments for speeches to two additional Russian companies, cybersecurity firm Kaspersky and Volga Dnepr Airlines.

Neither of those payments was disclosed in Flynn’s initial ethics filing.

Misty » 02 Apr 2017 10:43 pm » wrote:

Misty » 02 Apr 2017 8:16 pm » wrote:I have no use for people who don't deal in reality

The Russiagate Scam Will Blow Up In The Democrats’ Smug Faces

....Regardless, it’s safe to say that there was absolutely no collusion of any kind between Team Trump and anyone Russian. None. How do I know this to a near certainty? Because we haven't seen anybody leak any evidence of any in the six-plus months that they've been pushing this nonsense.

...The only crime we know about for sure – the only one – is that some senior member of Obama’s intelligence community committed a felony by leaking classified information regarding Mike Flynn's intercepted communications. That's it. And that’s why the Democrats would rather talk about anything else. Understand that everything the Democrats say is a lie. Every single word, plus the punctuation.

They’re dumb, but they're not so stupid as not to realize that this Putin nonsense, manufactured as a pathetic excuse for their utter humiliation in November, is falling apart. With the help of their media minions, they hope if they keep shouting “Look, Russians!” we’ll grow so bored we’ll just tune out. It’s their only hope for keeping Obama’s buddies off the chopping block. They all thought Hillary was going to win and that there would be no accountability, so they were safe using the government systems they had been entrusted to manage to spy on their incoming boss’s political opponents. .
https://townhall.com/columnists/kurtsch ... s-n2307707

Misty » 31 Mar 2017 4:57 pm » wrote: [/size]That's exactly what you just did when you offered me an opinion piece as 'PROOF' that the Obama administration has committed multiple felonies.

Top Obama Adviser Sought Names of Trump Associates in Intel
1793APRIL 3, 2017 10:13 AM EDT
By Eli Lake
White House lawyers last month learned that the former national security adviser Susan Rice requested the identities of U.S. persons in raw intelligence reports on dozens of occasions that connect to the Donald Trump transition and campaign, according to U.S. officials familiar with the matter.

....The National Security Council's senior director for intelligence, Ezra Cohen-Watnick, was conducting the review, according to two U.S. officials who spoke with Bloomberg View on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss it publicly. In February Cohen-Watnick discovered Rice's multiple requests to unmask U.S. persons in intelligence reports that related to Trump transition activities. He brought this to the attention of the White House General Counsel's office, who reviewed more of Rice's requests and instructed him to end his own research into the unmasking policy....

Rice herself has not spoken directly on the issue of unmasking. Last month when she was asked on the "PBS NewsHour" about reports that Trump transition officials, including Trump himself, were swept up in incidental intelligence collection, Rice said: "I know nothing about this," adding, "I was surprised to see reports from Chairman Nunes on that account today."
https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles ... s-in-intel

Misty » 31 Mar 2017 4:57 pm » wrote: [/size]That's exactly what you just did when you offered me an opinion piece as 'PROOF' that the Obama administration has committed multiple felonies.

Oregon farmers scrambling as labor shortage collides with Trump immigration crackdown.

Oregon's long winter has given way to a springtime of fear in farm country, with farmers and orchardists bracing for a widespread immigration crackdown that could worsen an already chronic labor shortage in the state's $5.4 billion agricultural economy.

Providers of fruits and vegetables, nursery stock, produce, and meat products say the skilled workers who put food on our tables and plants in our yards can't be easily be replaced.

Their speed, dexterity, and crop knowledge of crops, as well as their willingness to work long hours and unpredictable schedules in isolated areas makes them vital to the industry.

The Trump administration's vows of aggressive enforcement against undocumented workers -- many of whom are longtime residents of the state -- and the companies that employ them could create chaos from farm to market and all points in between, industry leaders say.

"It's a big deal for us," said Bill Sweat, co-owner of Winderlea Vineyard & Winery in Dundee who has served on the Oregon Wine Board and as board president of the Oregon Winegrowers Association.

On a 1 to 10 scale, he said, he'd put worry about an enforcement-induced labor shortage "at about an 8."
[....]
Growers say that even the fear of immigration raids could keep workers away during the narrow harvest window of such weather-sensitive crops as marionberries, pears, and wine grapes.

Some who have tried to hire non-immigrant workers say they've had little success in attracting and keeping those employees.

Termin8tor » 03 Apr 2017 11:45 am » wrote:She's off in some liberal Safe Place to protect her from reality.

Human rights no big deal as Donald Trump meets Egypt leader Abdel Fattah el-Sisi

After years of being kept at arm's length by Washington, this White House is signalling that Egyptian leader Abdel Fattah el-Sisi is being brought in from the cold.

Sisi is a human rights abuser to whom Trump pledged during last year's election campaign that the US would be "a loyal friend, not simply an ally, that Egypt can count on in the days and years ahead".

Despite harsh global criticism of how Sisi took and holds power, Trump considers the Egyptian leader to be a "fantastic guy".

Blackwater founder held secret Seychelles meeting to establish Trump-Putin back channel

The United Arab Emirates arranged a secret meeting in January between Blackwater founder Erik Prince and a Russian close to President Vladi­mir Putin as part of an apparent effort to establish a back-channel line of communication between Moscow and President-elect Donald Trump, according to U.S., European and Arab officials.

The meeting took place around Jan. 11 — nine days before Trump’s inauguration — in the Seychelles islands in the Indian Ocean, officials said.

Though the full agenda remains unclear, the UAE agreed to broker the meeting in part to explore whether Russia could be persuaded to curtail its relationship with Iran, including in Syria, a Trump administration objective that would be likely to require major concessions to Moscow on U.S. sanctions.

Donald Trump Jr. pal and another US businessman asked security council to lift Venezuela sanctions.

Five days before the resignation of National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, a pair of American businessmen with ties to President Donald Trump's family attended a series of previously unreported meetings at the White House with the aim of convincing the United States to lift sanctions against Venezuela, according to two sources with knowledge of the matter.

Mic reviewed documents indicating the businessmen were Gentry Beach, a billionaire Dallas financier, and Wadie Habboush, an international investor.

Both men have ties to Donald Trump Jr., but Beach is particularly close: He is a longtime friend of the president's son and was a major Trump campaign fundraiser.

Government ethics lawyers and policymakers who served in recent Democratic and Republican administrations say meetings between White House national security officials and campaign fundraisers over foreign policy violate NSC protocol and raise serious ethical concerns.

"If this account is true, it raises serious questions about the conduct of foreign policy by the Trump administration," said Mark Feierstein, who served on the National Security Council during the Obama administration as senior director for Western Hemisphere Affairs.

"Those meetings never should have taken place at any level, let alone with senior officials in the West Wing."

Misty » 03 Apr 2017 5:00 pm » wrote: Speaking of sanctions.......
Has anybody explained the rules to these people?

Tom Price Intervened on Rule That Would Hurt Drug Profits, the Same Day He Acquired Drug Stock


While in Congress, HHS Secretary Tom Price acted to help kill a rule that would hurt drug company profits shortly after his broker bought him up to $90,000 worth of pharmaceutical stock.

On the same day the stockbroker for then-Georgia Congressman Tom Price bought him up to $90,000 of stock in six pharmaceutical companies last year, Price arranged to call a top U.S. health official, seeking to scuttle a controversial rule that could have hurt the firms’ profits and driven down their share prices, records obtained by ProPublica show.

Stock trades made by Price while he served in Congress came under scrutiny at his confirmation hearings to become President Trump’s secretary of health and human services.

The lawmaker, a physician, traded hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of shares in health-related companies while he voted on and sponsored legislation affecting the industry, but Price has said his broker acted on his behalf without his involvement or knowledge.

ProPublica previously reported that his trading is said to have been under investigation by federal prosecutors.

Ex-Fox News CFO offered immunity from prosecution.

Government lawyers probe payments to women who alleged Ailes harassment.

The former chief financial officer of Rupert Murdoch’s Fox News Channel has been offered immunity from prosecution by government lawyers investigating payments to women allegedly harassed by Roger Ailes, the network’s former chairman, according to people briefed on the case.

Mark Kranz was CFO of Fox News from 2004 until last year, leaving the channel shortly after Mr Ailes was pushed out by its parent company, 21st Century Fox.

Mr Ailes, a former aide to Richard Nixon who turned Fox News into a force in political media, was fired following an internal investigation into claims that he had sexually harassed Gretchen Carlson, a former presenter.

During that investigation several other female employees, including the network’s former star Megyn Kelly, came forward with similar allegations.

The full scope of the government probe is unclear but authorities are looking into whether Fox News allegedly misled investors by concealing multiple financial settlements with former employees.

One of them was Laurie Luhn, a former Fox News guest booker, who revealed last year that she had received a $3.1m settlement in 2011 related to allegations that Mr Ailes had sexually harassed her.

As CFO, Mr Kranz was closely involved in preparing the company’s financial statements, so his co-operation will be key for prosecutors trying to understand how the Luhn payment and other alleged settlements were accounted for.

The Luhn payment was not disclosed to 21st Century Fox investors, and federal prosecutors have offered Mr Kranz and at least one other former executive immunity from prosecution in return for their co-operation, people briefed on the case said.

Mr Kranz did not respond to calls seeking comment. His lawyer declined to comment.

Mr Kranz is among multiple witnesses who have been subpoenaed by federal prosecutors investigating whether other alleged financial settlements with former Fox News employees were disclosed or accounted for properly.

Under US securities law, such payments must be disclosed to investors if they are deemed material or important.

Fox News generates annual profits of more than $1.5bn and is among 21st Century Fox’s most profitable businesses.

21st Century Fox has previously said that it had not received a subpoena but had “been in communication with the US attorney’s office for months”.

The US attorney’s office, which is conducting the investigation, declined to comment.

What It Means to Be 'Unmasked,' and Why People Are Talking About It

The complex and far-reaching investigation into Russia's involvement in the 2016 U.S. election has brought with it a number of unfamiliar terms. ATTN: wrote about one, "active measures," last week — but the latest is "unmasking."

What is unmasking?

The U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) can collect the names of U.S. citizens communicating with foreign entities under Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).

As CNN explains, "If the NSA picks up communications from a U.S. citizen in the course of monitoring a foreign national, it is practice to 'mask' the identity of the U.S. person.

Additionally, the identification of a U.S. citizen mentioned in discussions between two foreign nationals is supposed to be masked."

However, officials with proper clearance can ask that those names be made known in intelligence reports.

This is known as unmasking, and is a normal and legal part of the duties of national security staffers.

It is not the same as leaking information to the media, which can be illegal under some circumstances.

What does it have to do with the Trump/Russia investigation?

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) said March 22 that Trump staffers had been incidentally caught up in Russia-related intelligence gathering. That same day, Nunes held a press conference where he alleged he'd been given documents that contained "details about people associated with the incoming administration… with little apparent foreign intelligence value."

While he re-stated that no evidence supported Trump's allegations of wiretapping, Nunes did ominously state: "I have confirmed that additional names of Trump transition team members were unmasked." These names have not been revealed.

Who was responsible for the unmasking?

On Sunday night, far-right blogger and conspiracy theorist Mike Cernovich published a post claiming (without citing sources) that former Obama administration National Security Advisor Susan Rice had requested the names of the Trump staffers caught in NSA surveillance of Russian figures.

The next day, Bloomberg's Eli Lake published a story alleging that Rice's request for unmasking was discovered in NSA logs by a Trump staffer.

According to Lake, it was likely these reports were given to Nunes, sparking his briefing to the press on March 22.

The story was quickly picked up by a slew of right-wing media sites as "proof" that Trump was right about the wiretapping — and that the Obama administration had been conspiring to spy on Trump and gather damaging intelligence on his campaign.

Hasn't Susan Rice been a right-wing punching bag before?

Rice was already a familiar figure to readers of far-right news outlets as the Obama administration official who went on the Sunday talk shows after the Benghazi attack and blamed the incident on rage sparked by a YouTube video.

Later analysis showed Rice was simply disseminating the administration's understanding of the situation at the time, which turned out to be incorrect, but she became a target for those who believed there was cover-up related to the 2012 attack in Libya, which resulted in the death of U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens.

Did she do anything illegal?

According to multiple analysts, what Rice did in asking for the names to be revealed was well within the scope of her duties as National Security Advisor, particularly one investigating ties between Russians and entities in the United States.

Susan Hennessy, a national security expert at the Brookings Institution, said "nothing in this story indicates anything improper" on the part of Rice.

As CNN explained, it's common for the names of U.S. citizens to be used by foreign entities who routinely come under NSA surveillance.

Even Lake's story for Bloomberg, which is the most mainstream exposure the story has received, maintains that "Rice's requests to unmask the names of Trump transition officials do not vindicate" Trump's accusations of wiretapping.

What Happens Next?

Trump will likely try to tie Rice to a larger conspiracy by Obama officials to stop his election through wiretapping, while the House and Senate will continue their investigations.

Experts Say Susan Rice Had Every Right To Request ‘Unmasking’ In Intel Reports

A Monday Bloomberg report alleging that a former top Obama administration official requested the unmasking of U.S. persons tied to the Trump campaign who were swept up in foreign surveillance is not the “smoking gun” that the President’s backers are making it out to be.

According to surveillance and national security experts, former Obama national security adviser Susan Rice would be within her rights to make such requests if she was trying to determine the extent of Russia’s interference in the presidential election.

“Part of her job as national security adviser is to pay attention to what foreign governments are doing,” Rebecca Lonergan, a former federal prosecutor who handled foreign surveillance cases, told TPM.

“If she’s asking for specific names to be unmasked in order to understand what Russia may be doing to influence the U.S. political system and influence our elections, presumably in a way they thought would benefit them, she’s doing her job.”

Nada Bakos, a former CIA analyst, noted on Twitter that it was not “odd or wrong” for the national security adviser to read “a report of foreign officials discussing US persons coming into” the White House.

And Susan Hennessey, a fellow in national security governance studies at the Brookings Institution, wrote of the Bloomberg article that “nothing in this story indicates anything improper whatsoever.”

Eli Lake, the Bloomberg View columnist who wrote the report, noted in his piece that “some intelligence value” is required for senior officials to request that U.S. persons’ names be unmasked, and that as a result, Rice’s alleged requests were “likely within the law.”

The intelligence reports in question were primarily summaries of conversations between foreign officials discussing the Trump transition, as well as communications between Trump staffers and foreign officials being monitored by the U.S. government, according to Lake’s reporting.

Lonergan said that given the FBI’s investigation into Russia’s interference in the U.S. election, which Director James Comey recently confirmed has been ongoing since July 2016, the discovery of such conversations would “naturally and appropriately” prompt top-level national security officials to ask that U.S. persons’ names be unmasked “to see if any inappropriate action is taking place.”

That was not how Trump’s allies viewed the Bloomberg report and other reports alleging Rice asked to have Trump staffers’ identities unmasked, however.

“Smoking gun found!” Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) charged on Twitter. “Obama pal and noted dissembler Susan Rice said to have been spying on Trump campaign.”

“Unmasker Unmasked: Susan Rice Named As Intel Boss Who Exposed Team Trump Surveillance,” read the headline on Fox News’ homepage.

That reaction was familiar: A similar chorus erupted when House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes (R-CA) first went public last month with claims that Trump staffers’ names were unmasked in intercepts unrelated to the FBI’s Russia probe.

Conservative pundits and politicians seized on the purported unmasking as proof of Trump’s oft-repeated and baseless claim that he was surveilled by the Obama administration.

That interpretation is a fundamental misreading of who the target of the surveillance was and why U.S. persons swept up in that surveillance would be unmasked, according to Lonergan.

The Trump team was not being “spied on” by the Obama administration, she explained, but individuals associated with his campaign were being discussed by or in communication with foreign nationals who were being surveilled.

She said the staffers’ names would only be unmasked to help U.S. national security officials understand the national security threat posed by Russia’s involvement in the election.

“If we just heard Susan Rice as national security adviser is trying to keep track of Russia’s interference in the election, we’d all cheer,” Lonergan said.

“But then we hear the word surveillance and people start talking about it in very inexact ways that make it seem like something wrong was done.”

The opaque nature in which U.S. intelligence is classified makes it easy for politicians and pundits to spin that intelligence in ways that read differently to the press, said Jack Lerner, an expert on technology law at the University of California Irvine School of Law.

“There are lots of minimization procedures, some of which are classified, that the NSA follows.

There are various levels of intelligence information in terms of sensitivity, in terms of classification that various people in Congress and the White House are given exposure to,” Lerner told TPM.

“And it’s difficult for someone who doesn’t work for that agency to figure it out.”

Lonergan charged that Nunes was himself “leaking classified information” when he went to the press with his initial claims that Trump staffers’ identities had been unmasked and widely circulated within the intelligence community.

She said intelligence and national security officials who are required to remain mum about the information they receive are now “clashing” with politicians accustomed to speaking to the public about what they know.

“A lot of people who know what’s actually going on don’t talk about it because they’re not supposed to talk about it,” she said.

“And then you get the politicians out talking about it in very broad, accusatory terms so it gets very distorted in the media.”

Misty » 03 Apr 2017 10:54 pm » wrote:
Is that the same CNN that covered up Clinton's felonies and impeachable acts? Bingo.
That is exactly what is happening.

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