StrangeSox Posted February 20, 2018 Share Posted February 20, 2018 Another indictment and plea deal from Mueller. WASHINGTON (AP) — The special counsel investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election charged an attorney Tuesday with lying to federal investigators about his interactions with a former Trump campaign official. A charging document filed in federal court in Washington accuses Alex van der Zwaan of lying to investigators about his interactions with Rick Gates, a longtime business associate of President Donald Trump’s former campaign chair Paul Manafort. Both Gates and Manafort were indicted last year on charges of conspiracy to launder money and acting as unregistered foreign agents. The plea hearing comes on the heels of an extraordinary indictment from Special Counsel Robert Mueller last week that charged 13 Russian nationals and three Russian companies in a hidden social media effort to meddle in the 2016 presidential election by denigrating Democrat Hillary Clinton and boosting the chances of Trump. The single-count information against van der Zwaan was filed ahead of a plea hearing scheduled for later Tuesday. The charge stems from a part of the special counsel’s investigation into Manafort and Gates, who are accused of directing a covert Washington lobbying campaign on behalf of pro-Russian Ukrainian interests. According to the court filing, prosecutors say van der Zwaan lied to federal investigators about his role in the production of a report on the trial of former Ukrainian prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko. She is a political foe of former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, whose political party was a client of Gates and Manafort. In the charging document, van der Zwaan is accused of lying during an interview with prosecutors and FBI agents on Nov. 3, 2017. The charging document accuses him of lying about the timing of his last communication with Gates and an unidentified person described as “Person A.” It also accuses him of deleting emails sought by the special counsel’s office and lying about a phone call he surreptitiously recorded in September 2016 with Gates and Person A regarding the Tymoshenko report. The report was cited in the 12-count indictment against Manafort and Gates. It accuses the two men of acting as unregistered lobbyists in connection with the rollout of the report, which was commissioned by the Ukrainian government. According to the indictment, Manafort and Gates “used one of their offshore accounts to funnel $4 million to pay secretly for the report.” His father in law also happens to be a Russian oligarch Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pants Rowland Posted February 20, 2018 Share Posted February 20, 2018 QUOTE (raBBit @ Feb 20, 2018 -> 10:09 AM) http://freebeacon.com/politics/michael-moo...nized-russians/ Michael Moore colluding with the Russians. Your assessment of that story might be a tad premature and presumptuous. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pants Rowland Posted February 20, 2018 Share Posted February 20, 2018 QUOTE (raBBit @ Feb 20, 2018 -> 10:50 AM) That was the intent. It was pretty obvious what your intent was. To act as if this story is similar to the level of entanglements of Trump and the Russian oligarchy is preposterous. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reddy Posted February 20, 2018 Share Posted February 20, 2018 QUOTE (raBBit @ Feb 20, 2018 -> 02:32 PM) To act as if Russian meddling in the '16 election is a primary concern for the country is laughable. 1) You're right that voters don't care about Russia. It's not a good campaign issue. 2) That's not at ALL the same thing as whether or not it's a very, very important issue for the country. It is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reddy Posted February 20, 2018 Share Posted February 20, 2018 QUOTE (raBBit @ Feb 20, 2018 -> 03:16 PM) I just don't get how America can piss all over the world and ruin countries based on their preferred leadership and it's "for a good cause" but when some Russians buy some facebook ads to support every candidate that isn't HRC all of a sudden it's a 24 hour news cycle for a year plus. Because that's literally how foreign policy works. All countries try and influence others while making sure they're not influenced themselves. Whoever decided that foreign relations needed to be "fair" doesn't know how any of this works. Do you think America shouldn't try and protect itself from foreign interference? Or are you just annoyed we're talking about it because it helped Republicans? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dick Allen Posted February 20, 2018 Share Posted February 20, 2018 QUOTE (raBBit @ Feb 20, 2018 -> 02:40 PM) It's amazing whatever topic you're talking about the other party doesn't know what they're talking about. I think the Russian interference is a bunch of bulls*** and there's plenty of evidence for that. I don't believe in American exceptionalism. Isn't that your whole shtick in this thread? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
caulfield12 Posted February 20, 2018 Share Posted February 20, 2018 (edited) https://theintercept.com/2017/04/19/a-sande...rov-speaks-out/ A Bernie Sanders campaign advisor was Russian! Uranium One. Benghazi. E-mails. Lock her up!! The Russians allegedly paid one American in Florida to dress up as Hillary Clinton in a prison uniform and hired another to build a cage to "imprison" the Clinton impersonator at a Florida rally. https://www.politico.com/story/2018/02/16/t...tigation-415667 Loretta Lynch meeting Clinton on the tarmac. FBI Deep State. Russians benefitting from Keystone/Dakota pipeline deals. Oops, wrong conspiracy theory. Hard to keep them all straight. Ben Shapiro is selling Trump condos in New Delhi with Donald Jr. and Modi while the Indian government snubs Trudeau!! Chaos ensues!!! Edited February 20, 2018 by caulfield12 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jenksismyhero Posted February 20, 2018 Share Posted February 20, 2018 Sounds like the master negotiator is coming to his senses. Allegedly he's told Sessions that he wants bump stocks outlawed and age limits are now on the table. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RockRaines Posted February 20, 2018 Share Posted February 20, 2018 QUOTE (JenksIsMyHero @ Feb 20, 2018 -> 04:22 PM) Sounds like the master negotiator is coming to his senses. Allegedly he's told Sessions that he wants bump stocks outlawed and age limits are now on the table. his statement was very carefully worded to actually produce nothing. He said turn into "machine guns," which is a huge point of debate on why these were legal in the first place. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dick Allen Posted February 20, 2018 Share Posted February 20, 2018 QUOTE (RockRaines @ Feb 20, 2018 -> 04:29 PM) his statement was very carefully worded to actually produce nothing. He said turn into "machine guns," which is a huge point of debate on why these were legal in the first place. Weren’t they going to be outlawed after Las Vegas? I guess the deal was at least one more massacre then the bump stock will be the sacrificial lamb. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RockRaines Posted February 20, 2018 Share Posted February 20, 2018 QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Feb 20, 2018 -> 04:35 PM) Weren’t they going to be outlawed after Las Vegas? I guess the deal was at least one more massacre then the bump stock will be the sacrificial lamb. They were considered borderline for years since automatic machine guns are "banned", but they argued this doesnt turn them into "machine guns." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
caulfield12 Posted February 21, 2018 Share Posted February 21, 2018 (edited) Why best-selling author/columnist Thomas Friedman issued a 'code red' warning to America http://money.cnn.com/2018/02/20/media/thom...lumn/index.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/18/opinion/...setType=opinion Response from Fox News One, that the Obama administration refused to do anything but tell the Russians to stop their hacking endeavors. The Washington Post says the Russians have tried to influence American elections since 1960, so what they did here isn't news to anyone inside the Beltway,” Gainor told Fox News. The word “Obama” does not appear once in Friedman’s piece. Even MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough said it’s a “very legitimate question to ask” why Obama didn’t do more on the Russian threat. The second thing that Friedman overlooked is that the U.S. just killed “dozens of Russians” in a battle in Syria. “That is according to The New York Times, where Friedman works. That's hardly the act of a president who is bowing to Russia's every wish,” Gainor said. The media elite has devoured the meat cooked up by Friedman, as CNN interviewed him about how the “column came about,” MSNBC told viewers the piece is "worth your time” and a variety of left-leaning pundits have tweeted out their favorite quotes from the op-ed. “It's #1 on the N.Y. Times' ‘Most Emailed,’ ‘Most Viewed’ and ‘Most Shared on Facebook,’” Axios touted. While the column has been widely shared and praised by liberals, not everyone agrees with the attack on the White House. Radio host Mark Simone called Friedman “completely insane” for writing a “hysterical column claiming Trump not just colluding, but is owned by the Russians.” Conservative Action News published a rebuttal to Friedman’s piece that disputed particular statements from the column and claimed “no intellectually honest person” can say Trump is compromised by Russia. “No, our ‘democracy’ is not in serious danger. But I’m pretty sure Thomas Friedman’s sanity is in serious danger,” the Conservative Action News wrote. Perhaps the column was on Trump’s mind when he took to Twitter on Tuesday morning. “I have been much tougher on Russia than Obama, just look at the facts,” Trump tweeted. http://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/2018/...berals.amp.html Edited February 21, 2018 by caulfield12 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
caulfield12 Posted February 21, 2018 Share Posted February 21, 2018 (edited) Of course...there’s the three obvious points Trump doesn’t want to acknowledge. 1) Nobody thought he had a chance of winning until the final ten days (Comey announcement) 2) Any extensive involvement would have been spun as helping Clinton and hurting Trump 3) Presidents always defer to successors to set new foreign policies when coming so close to a change of power...they can’t even name a SC member their final year https://www.yahoo.com/news/trump-inexplicab...-153936234.html Trump inexplicably says he’s been much tougher on Russia than Obama Before the election, the Obama administration issued several warnings to Moscow about its activities, including one delivered by the President to Putin in September, the Post reported. Ultimately, Obama approved only modest punitive measures: the expulsion of a few dozen diplomats, the closure of two Russian compounds, and narrowly targeted economic sanctions that some who designed them described as largely symbolic, the Post said. Another measure, the planting of cyberweapons in Russia's infrastructure, was still in the planning stages when Obama left office. While some closest to Obama defend the response, saying that by late summer it was already too late to prevent troves of hacked emails from transferring to WikiLeaks and other groups, others expressed regret, the newspaper said. Tony Blinken, Obama's former deputy national security adviser, said Friday that the administration took significant action to prevent Russia from interfering with the electoral system itself. "We made massive efforts so they couldn't do that," Blinken, who is now a CNN global affairs analyst, told the network's Kate Bolduan on "At This Hour." "This led to two things: President Obama issued a very stark warning to President Putin in September at the G-20 conference in China. What we saw, or thought we saw, after that, it looked like the Russians stopped their efforts. But the damage was already done." https://www.cnn.com/2017/06/23/politics/vla...tion/index.html Edited February 21, 2018 by caulfield12 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dick Allen Posted February 21, 2018 Share Posted February 21, 2018 QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Feb 21, 2018 -> 02:28 AM) Of course...there’s the three obvious points Trump doesn’t want to acknowledge. 1) Nobody thought he had a chance of winning until the final ten days (Comey announcement) 2) Any extensive involvement would have been spun as helping Clinton and hurting Trump 3) Presidents always defer to successors to set new foreign policies when coming so close to a change of power...they can’t even name a SC member their final year https://www.yahoo.com/news/trump-inexplicab...-153936234.html Trump inexplicably says he’s been much tougher on Russia than Obama Before the election, the Obama administration issued several warnings to Moscow about its activities, including one delivered by the President to Putin in September, the Post reported. Ultimately, Obama approved only modest punitive measures: the expulsion of a few dozen diplomats, the closure of two Russian compounds, and narrowly targeted economic sanctions that some who designed them described as largely symbolic, the Post said. Another measure, the planting of cyberweapons in Russia's infrastructure, was still in the planning stages when Obama left office. While some closest to Obama defend the response, saying that by late summer it was already too late to prevent troves of hacked emails from transferring to WikiLeaks and other groups, others expressed regret, the newspaper said. Tony Blinken, Obama's former deputy national security adviser, said Friday that the administration took significant action to prevent Russia from interfering with the electoral system itself. "We made massive efforts so they couldn't do that," Blinken, who is now a CNN global affairs analyst, told the network's Kate Bolduan on "At This Hour." "This led to two things: President Obama issued a very stark warning to President Putin in September at the G-20 conference in China. What we saw, or thought we saw, after that, it looked like the Russians stopped their efforts. But the damage was already done." https://www.cnn.com/2017/06/23/politics/vla...tion/index.html That's a good point. Obama should have done this, Obama should have done that, but the reality is the republicans didn't want Obama doing anything. They stymied him every time he tried. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StrangeSox Posted February 21, 2018 Share Posted February 21, 2018 Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump Question: If all of the Russian meddling took place during the Obama Administration, right up to January 20th, why aren’t they the subject of the investigation? Why didn’t Obama do something about the meddling? Why aren’t Dem crimes under investigation? Ask Jeff Session! Russian meddling is an ongoing and serious threat per every Trump-appointed IC official. Obama didn't do anything because when he went to McConnell to ask for a unified front, McConnell said if Obama went public he'd make it a partisan issue. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dick Allen Posted February 21, 2018 Share Posted February 21, 2018 Whatever happened to Trumps cheap, better health care for everyone he promised? I am still waiting for the details. Believe me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RockRaines Posted February 21, 2018 Share Posted February 21, 2018 QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Feb 21, 2018 -> 08:20 AM) Russian meddling is an ongoing and serious threat per every Trump-appointed IC official. Obama didn't do anything because when he went to McConnell to ask for a unified front, McConnell said if Obama went public he'd make it a partisan issue. Also, I thought there wasnt any Russian meddling? Or if it happened its not important because the US does it too? I'm very confused by the ever changing talking points. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dick Allen Posted February 21, 2018 Share Posted February 21, 2018 Also like the kid in FL snapping back at Donny Jr. who claims the kid's ex FBI father is feeding him lines. I guess Donny forgot about his meeting with Russians in Trump Tower, and what daddy told him to say. Adoption. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StrangeSox Posted February 21, 2018 Share Posted February 21, 2018 QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Feb 21, 2018 -> 08:24 AM) Also like the kid in FL snapping back at Donny Jr. who claims the kid's ex FBI father is feeding him lines. I guess Donny forgot about his meeting with Russians in Trump Tower, and what daddy told him to say. Adoption. Donald Trump Jr. Liked Tweets Promoting A Conspiracy Theory About A Florida Shooting Survivor Donald Trump Jr. liked two tweets on Tuesday that peddled a conspiracy theory about a 17-year-old survivor of the Parkland school shooting, suggesting that he was "coached" to propagate an anti-Trump narrative by his father who is a retired FBI agent. Hogg told BuzzFeed News on Tuesday that Trump Jr.'s peddling of conspiracy theories was "immature, rude, and inhuman." "I just think it's a testament to the sick immaturity and broken state of our government when these people feel the need to pedal conspiracy theories about people that were in a school shooting where 17 people died and it just makes me sick," Hogg said. "It's immature, rude, and inhuman for these people to destroy the people trying to prevent the death of the future of America because they won't," he said. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StrangeSox Posted February 21, 2018 Share Posted February 21, 2018 Mueller asking if Manafort promised banker White House job in return for loans Federal investigators are probing whether former Trump campaign chair Paul Manafort promised a Chicago banker a job in the Trump White House in return for $16 million in home loans, two people with direct knowledge of the matter told NBC News. Manafort received three separate loans in December 2016 and January 2017 from Federal Savings Bank for homes in New York City and the Hamptons. Stephen Calk, who was announced as a member of candidate Trump's council of economic advisers in August 2016, is the president of Federal Savings Bank. Special Counsel Robert Mueller's team is now investigating whether there was a quid pro quo agreement between Manafort and Calk. Manafort left the Trump campaign in August 2016 after the millions he had earned working for a pro-Russian political party in Ukraine drew media scrutiny. Calk did not receive a job in President Donald Trump's cabinet. The sources say the three loans were questioned by other officials at the bank, and one source said that at least one of the bank employees who felt pressured into approving the deals is cooperating with investigators. In court filings Friday related to Manafort's bail, federal prosecutors said they have "substantial evidence" that loans made from the bank to Manafort were secured through false representations made by Manafort, including misstatements of income. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dick Allen Posted February 21, 2018 Share Posted February 21, 2018 Trump wants Sessions to investigate why Obama didn't investigate Russian meddling. LOL. Trump playbook to a tee. It's always someone else who needs to be investigated for something he did. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pants Rowland Posted February 21, 2018 Share Posted February 21, 2018 QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Feb 21, 2018 -> 12:17 PM) Trump wants Sessions to investigate why Obama didn't investigate Russian meddling. LOL. Trump playbook to a tee. It's always someone else who needs to be investigated for something he did. At a certain point in the Obama administration, the economy, Iraq, Afghanistan, Gitmo Prison, etc. all became his responsibility. It was no longer accepted to blame GW Bush, but rather take ownership and move forward. I think Trump is well past that point in his tenure now. No matter Obama's level of responsibility for Russian meddling in the 2016 election, it is now up to Trump to act on this threat to our nation. His inaction on pushing for broad safeguards and unwillingness to enforce congressional sanctions against Russia is 100% on him. He took the oath to "preserve, protect and defend" but fails to fulfill that oath every day. Do your job, Trump! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StrangeSox Posted February 21, 2018 Share Posted February 21, 2018 (edited) Additional charges against Manafort and Gates https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/fe...tion-fbi-latest Edited February 21, 2018 by StrangeSox Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kyyle23 Posted February 21, 2018 Share Posted February 21, 2018 QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Feb 21, 2018 -> 02:29 PM) Additional charges against Manafort and Gates https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/fe...tion-fbi-latest Manafort, lol Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dick Allen Posted February 21, 2018 Share Posted February 21, 2018 More coffee boys. Had nothing to do with the campaign. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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