Trump II

[Alan Klein]

Trump dictated misleading statement on son's meeting with Russian: Washington Post
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-russia-meeting-idUSKBN1AH2QE

QUOTE  August 1, 2017 / 3:09 AM  "August 1, 2017 / 3:09 AM / 10 hours ago
Trump dictated misleading statement on son's meeting with Russian: Washington Post

3 Min Read

FILE PHOTO: Then U.S. Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump (R) welcomes his son Donald Trump Jr. to the stage at one of the New England Council's "Politics and Eggs' breakfasts in Manchester, New Hampshire November 11, 2015.Brian Snyder/Files - RTX3BSRG

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump dictated a statement, later shown to be misleading, in which his son Donald Trump Jr. said a meeting he had with a Russian lawyer in June 2016 was not related to his father's presidential campaign, the Washington Post reported on Monday.

Trump Jr. released emails earlier in July that showed he eagerly agreed last year to meet a woman he was told was a Russian government lawyer who might have damaging information about Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton as part of Moscow's official support for his father. The New York Times was first to report the meeting.

The Washington Post said Trump advisers discussed the new disclosure and agreed that Trump Jr. should issue a truthful account of the episode so that it "couldn’t be repudiated later if the full details emerged."

The president, who was flying home from Germany on July 8, changed the plan and "personally dictated a statement in which Trump Jr. said he and the Russian lawyer had 'primarily discussed a program about the adoption of Russian children,'" the Post said, citing unnamed people with knowledge of the deliberations.

[...]

David Sklansky, a professor of criminal law at Stanford Law School, said that if Trump, as reported by the Post, helped craft a misleading public statement about the meeting, he may have bolstered a potential obstruction of justice case against himself.

To build a criminal obstruction of justice case, federal law requires prosecutors to show that a person acted with "corrupt" intent. A misleading public statement could be used as evidence of corrupt intent, Sklansky said.

"Lying usually isn't a crime," he said. But "it could be relevant in determining whether something else the president did, like firing (former FBI Director James) Comey, was done corruptly." "


And so the saga continues ...

Cheers,
Bart

If I understand the article,  Trump first came up with the adoption issue to hide the fact they met with the Russians to get  information that would make Hillary look bad.  That in itself isn't illegal. Sort of what the anti-Trump republicans and democrats did with the dossier.  The lie and the act itself would only be illegal if they colluded with the Russians and knew that the Russians were breaking into Hillary's server to get the information.  Breaking into a server would be the illegal part. 

[Alan Klein]

Soviet Union, Red China, NK, Cuba and now Venezuela.  Socialism at work. We'd be that much closer to it if Trump wasn't elected. 
https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2017-08-01/maduro-says-he-will-radically-overhaul-venezuelas-system

[Robert Roaldi]

Soviet Union, Red China, NK, Cuba and now Venezuela.  Socialism at work. We'd be that much closer to it if Trump wasn't elected. 
https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2017-08-01/maduro-says-he-will-radically-overhaul-venezuelas-system

Yup, the dominoes are falling.

[Peter McLennan]

Yup, the dominoes are falling.

 

[Alan Klein]

Yup, the dominoes are falling.

So you and Peter think what's happening in Venezuela is good?

[Otto Phocus]

So you and Peter think what's happening in Venezuela is good?

I think it is none of our business and if we try to make it our business it won't help the situation and will probably make it worse.

[scyth]

So you and Peter think what's happening in Venezuela is good?

second the point - how is that your business ?

[scyth]

One thing I kept on coming back to is why are they not fighting back? 

so you approve Taliban fighting back against the foreign aggressor and their minions in Kabul, don't you ?

[scyth]

but if my freedom was being threatened directly in my own country 

so do feel IRA of various flavors, ETA, ISIS and so many others  ... does not look like you recognize their choice freedom because it does not suit u, does it ? you don't have a monopoly on what freedom is, you just have the United Fruit States army to impose your view about it ...

[Peter McLennan]

So you and Peter think what's happening in Venezuela is good?

Irrelevant and intentionally inflammatory. 

[Alan Klein]

Irrelevant and intentionally inflammatory. 

So you do think what's happening in Venezuela is good.  Very interesting.  It says a lot about you.  And it isn't irrelevant or inflammatory if that's what you believe.  Why are you running from your beliefs? 

[scyth]

according to google

google, really ? why not Koran  ? try for a moment to consider that people might have totally different mindset at all ...

[Robert Roaldi]

So you do think what's happening in Venezuela is good.  Very interesting.  It says a lot about you.  And it isn't irrelevant or inflammatory if that's what you believe.  Why are you running from your beliefs?

Why do you keep trying to change the subject and also deliberately misinterpret what people say?

[Alan Klein]

Why do you keep trying to change the subject and also deliberately misinterpret what people say?

So tell us how you really feel about what's going on in Venezuela instead of dodging it. 

[Schewe]

So, Jared's defense on collusion charges is that they were too incompetent to be able to collude successfully? That's almost real enough to believe except incompetence didn't keep them from TRYING to collude when meeting with that Russian lawyer.

Kushner to Interns: Trump Team Too Disorganized to Collude With Russia

In off-the-record remarks, the president’s son-in-law offers a unique defense.

Donald Trump’s election team could not have colluded with Russia because they were barely talking to each other, according to Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law and top White House advisor.

“They thought we colluded, but we couldn’t even collude with our local offices,” Kushner told congressional interns during a private talk at the Capitol Visitor Center in Washington on Monday afternoon.

Kushner’s meeting with the interns had been rescheduled from two weeks ago, shortly after which he had to appear before Congress to give testimony about the Russia investigation.

A source provided a copy of written notes on Kushner’s talk and question-and-answer session to Foreign Policy.

For investigators attempting to determine whether Trump’s associates knowingly worked with Russia to interfere with the 2016 U.S. presidential election, a defense claiming chaos and confusion might be the key difference between criminal behavior and incompetence.

The last line is, I think the motivation for claiming incompetence and confusion in the event, like with the Donny Jr. meeting and the Russians. "We didn't know what we were doing" would be the claim rather than conspiracy...

We'll see about that, huh? But between you and me, it doesn't fill me with confidence that the Trump campaign is claiming incompetence. The problem is that the incompetence is ongoing and continuous.

#BigOrangeDummy

[Peter McLennan]

So you do think what's happening in Venezuela is good.  Very interesting.  It says a lot about you.  And it isn't irrelevant or inflammatory if that's what you believe.  Why are you running from your beliefs?

And how exactly have you drawn that conclusion?

In fact, your erronious conclusion says a lot more about YOU than it does about me. You have precisely zero idea what I know or think about "whats happening in Venezuela".

[Alan Klein]

And how exactly have you drawn that conclusion?

In fact, your erronious conclusion says a lot more about YOU than it does about me. You have precisely zero idea what I know or think about "whats happening in Venezuela".

I ask how you felt about what's happening in Venezuela. You still haven't answered.

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

Trump 'weighed in' on son's Russia attorney statement: White House
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-russia-statement-idUSKBN1AH533

QUOTE  August 1, 2017 / 8:58 PM  "WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The White House said on Tuesday that U.S. President Donald Trump had a role in producing a statement in which his son denied that a meeting he had with a Russian lawyer was related to the 2016 presidential campaign, comments later shown to be misleading.

White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders told a briefing that Trump "certainly didn't dictate (the statement), but ... he weighed in, offered suggestion like any father would do."

"The statement that was issued was true and there were no inaccuracies in the statement," Sanders said, even though emails later released by Donald Trump Jr. showed that the subject of the meeting was to be possible damaging information about Republican Trump's rival for the presidency, Democrat Hillary Clinton.

The Washington Post reported on Monday that Trump's advisers discussed the statement about the meeting and agreed that Trump Jr. should issue a truthful account of the episode so that it "couldn’t be repudiated later if the full details emerged."

But the president, who was flying home from Germany on July 8, changed the plan and "personally dictated a statement in which Trump Jr. said he and the Russian lawyer had 'primarily discussed a program about the adoption of Russian children,'" the Post said, citing unnamed people with knowledge of the deliberations. "



So now we have it from the horse's mouth, against the advice from Trump Jr's advisers, Senior made sure (the President "weighed in") that part of the truth (which inevitably would come out anyway) was kept hidden. Why???? What was he thinking, if anything?

The result was again worse than it needed to be, and it was not good to begin with.

What was his Twitter comment again? No chaos at the WH? Maybe in his alternate universe ...

Cheers,
Bart

[Peter McLennan]

I ask how you felt about what's happening in Venezuela. You still haven't answered.

And I won't.  For several reasons.

1) It's none of your business, as others have pointed out.
2) It's got nothing to do with the topic of this thread, namely Trump.
3) You have already concluded "how I feel about what's happening in Venezuela" and, given your record here, nothing will change that opinion.

[Alan Klein]

And I won't.  For several reasons.

1) It's none of your business, as others have pointed out.
2) It's got nothing to do with the topic of this thread, namely Trump.
3) You have already concluded "how I feel about what's happening in Venezuela" and, given your record here, nothing will change that opinion.

It does have to do with Trump.  He's imposed sanctions on Venezuela's officials and is contemplating sanctions on the country.  So how you feel about that is related to this thread.  I would change my opinion if you provided an actual response.  Otherwise, we have to assume you're in favor of Maduro and Venezuela's Socialism and opposed to Trump's sanctions.