nsplayr

Seriously, a lot of y'all haven't even read the dossier have you? It's not that long (~35 pages) and has been out for over a year. If you care about this story one way or another it's worth at least reading just to understand the contours of the battlefield. The relevant section reads, with all typos being original to the document: "However, there were other aspects to TRUMP's engagement with the Russian authorities. One which had borne fruit for them was to exploit personal obsesslons and sexual perversion in order to obtain suitable 'kompromat' [compromising material] on him. According to Source D, where s/he had been present, (perverted) conduct in Moscow included hiring the presidential suite ofthe Ritz Carlton Hotel, where he knew President and OBAMA {whom he hated] had stayed on one ottherr orhcial trips to Russia, and deriling the bed where they had slept by employing a number of prostitutes to perform a 'golden showers' (urination) show in front of him. The hotel was known to be under FSE control with microphones and concealed cameras in all the main rooms to record anything they wanted to." So FWIW, which may not be much, it's not "pissing on hookers," it's paying hookers to piss on the bed that Obama had previously slept in in the Moscow Ritz. You are correct sir that pissing with a boner is a challenging physics problem to overcome Also FWIW, all the most salacious stuff isn't the meat of the issue here. I honestly wish the dossier hadn't been published and people would focus on the obstruction case and other more probable issues rather than the very jusciest of the unverified allegations. Hey, if Moscow has kompromat of that level on POTUS, that's bad, but I'm not sure we're ever gonna find that out unless Putin decided to release any compromising evidence he might have. Since none of us are Putin, not sure it's relevant to speculate on whether or not that kompromat exists because if it does, there's nothing we can do about it, and if it doesn't then well problem solved, there is no problem. If I'm was the prediction business, I would predict Mueller has a much stronger case on obstruction of justice than he would on Trump or Trump associates straight-up being agents of the Russian government based on kompromat or collusion or whatever else. Based on everything I've read I think some untoward things happened during the campaign between the Trump campaign and Russia, but there's not a super-clear legal area to prosecute that...not colluding with foreign powers to win an election is more of a norm than a law I guess. Obstruction of justice however is more clear and has been the basis for the two modern impeachments of Presidents, and again based on everything I've read, I think there is a solid obstruction case to be made. It's been a weird case to digest mostly because it seems like the President doesn't quite understand what that crime entails and just says things out loud in public that would be scandalous if said in private and then uncovered later. Nixon at least had enough political savvy to run a pretty tight ship in terms of the cover up for over a year before that obstruction case got blown open by one of the convicted burglars, James McChord. The Slow Burn podcast is worth checking out re: Watergate for those who are interested.

President Trump, as a candidate, touted wikileaks regularly...141 times in the last month of the campaign alone. Here are some direct quotes: ""This just came out," Trump said. "WikiLeaks, I love WikiLeaks." - 10 Oct 16 ""Another one came in today," Trump said. "This WikiLeaks is like a treasure trove." - 31 Oct 16 "Boy, I love reading those WikiLeaks." - 4 Nov 16 Don Jr. was also in direct, private, personal contact with Julian Assange during the campaign. Ok, so wikileaks released the hacked Podesta emails as well as some of the hacked DNC emails. But what is wikileaks? They're just some transparency-loving neutral party led by this kooky vampire holed up in the Ecuadorian embassy in London right? From the DNI report "Background to “Assessing Russian Activities and Intentions in Recent US Elections”: The Analytic Process and Cyber Incident Attribution": "We assess with high confidence that Russian military intelligence (General Staff Main Intelligence Directorate or GRU) used the Guccifer 2.0 persona and DCLeaks.com to release US victim data obtained in cyber operations publicly and in exclusives to media outlets and relayed material to WikiLeaks." - page ii-iii "We assess with high confidence that the GRU relayed material it acquired from the DNC and senior Democratic officials to WikiLeaks. Moscow most likely chose WikiLeaks because of its self-proclaimed reputation for authenticity" - page 3 "The Kremlin’s principal international propaganda outlet RT (formerly Russia Today) has actively collaborated with WikiLeaks. RT’s editor-in-chief visited WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London in August 2013, where they discussed renewing his broadcast contract with RT, according to Russian and Western media. Russian media subsequently announced that RT had become "the only Russian media company" to partner with WikiLeaks and had received access to "new leaks of secret information." - page 3 "Russia used trolls as well as RT as part of its influence efforts to denigrate Secretary Clinton. This effort amplified stories on scandals about Secretary Clinton and the role of WikiLeaks in the election campaign." - page 4 "We assess the 2016 influence campaign reflected the Kremlin’s recognition of the worldwide effects that mass disclosures of US Government and other private data—such as those conducted by WikiLeaks and others—have achieved in recent years, and their understanding of the value of orchestrating such disclosures to maximize the impact of compromising information." - page 5 So for those keeping score from the 2016 Presidential election, the hacker alias Guccifer 2.0 (which is the Russia GRU) hacks DNC and John Podesta's emails, then releases them via Wikileaks (which is paid directly by Russian government through RT contracts), then RT and paid Russian social media operators amplify negative messages about Clinton in english-language media including RT TV, twitter and facebook. There is no question who hacked the DNC and John Podesta (Russian intelligence), there is no question what wikileaks is or who they were working for (Russian government), and there is no question that the U.S. media and Trump campaign were all too happy to amplify those email releases during the fall campaign, to the detriment of most other public policy issues. As Americans, we need to stand up together and say NO to foreign intelligence services interfering with our elections. Voters need to reject foreign influence campaigns, and both parties need to be clear that using or touting or highlighting information about your opponent derived from criminal activity and released by foreign intelligence services is out of bounds. A big fear after 2016 was that this type of campaign could continue unabated in 2018 and beyond, and guess who's in power? The GOP controls Congress and the White House, and if the Russians want to cause maximum chaos and make the U.S. look weak, divided, and scandalous, who do you think are the next logical targets? This is a good start from Sens. Rubio and Van Hollen...there is absolutely no reason why this issue has to be so brazenly partisan. The Russians and other adversaries want us divided and squabbling amongst ourselves instead of steeling our defenses for the next attack. Unfortunately this thread is a great example of that being "Mission Accomplished."

Relevant new information. "Russians Penetrated U.S. Voter Systems Says Top U.S. Official" https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/elections/russians-penetrated-u-s-voter-systems-says-top-u-s-n845721

Whataboutism at its finest. 1. No mention that the final Treasury IG report released in Sep 2017 found that the IRS gave extra scrutiny to what we can assume are both liberal and conservative groups, targeting words like, "Patriot," "Tea Party," "Occupy," and "Progressive." Are you against the IRS giving an extra check on the validity of the tax-exempt status of these groups regardless of political affiliation? Remember they're supposed to primarily be groups serving the public good, not primarily politically-oriented...I think we both know groups on all sides flaunt that intent with impunity. I'd prefer we more strictly enforce the law across the board; none of these groups (conservative, progressive or otherwise) should be tax-exempt if they are conducting unlawful political activity. Should we ask Trump-Appointed, Republican Secretary of the Treasury Steve Mnuchin if he stands behind his own department's report? 2. If Hillary were the President, let's consider re-litigating those questions (and you know the Congressional GOP would be). She's not President though and I frankly hope to never hear from her (or Bill) again. If law enforcement cleared her then I'm not sure I have any additional evidence to bring one way or the other. 3. Well, Comey testified under oath to Congress that what he shared was unclassified. I don't like leaks from the FBI all that much, but then again at that point Comey was a private citizen who was popping flares against his boss who was very publicly maligning him in statements and claimed to have "tapes" of their private conversations. Again, I don't have any additional evidence to bring one way or the other here either. Re: lying to the FBI and attacking the FBI...this tweet has aged well and ya know what Ms. Sanders, I agree! BL: I say at this point let's get it all out there. All the memos. All the tax returns. All the IG investigations. All the Congressional investigations. The Mueller investigation. I'm willing to let the chips fall where they may...is the President?

Which of those senior leaders exactly? Maybe you mean the Trump-appointed Attorney General Jeff Session? Or is it Trump-appointed Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein? Maybe Trump-appointed FBI Director Christopher Wray? Those insidious liberal working to take down the President...they’re really playing the LONG, long game. All they had to do to get here was be lifelong Republicans, then be personally vetted and hired by the President himself before they’d have enough power to take him down from the inside! Brilliant. Probably would have been much easier to get Soros to bus a few more people over to Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan in 2016. “I’ll hire only the best people, believe me.” 1 year in: 2x guilty pleas, 2x indictments, 1 fired FBI Director, 6 fired/resigned top WH staff, 1 fired/resigned Cabinet Secretary, etc. Mueller (another lifelong Republican FWIW) is not known to fuck around, so we’ll see where his investigation ends up. More to come at 11, stay tuned.

GMBL would be an epic callsign for an MQ-9 sensor operator...thanks for the tip (sts)!

This is a good, wonky podcast episode that discusses the Nunes Memo. Just finished listening myself. https://www.lawfareblog.com/lawfare-podcast-special-edition-memo-released

We've circled on this before, but here's the initial DHS/DNI statement from October 7th, 2016 (i.e. before the election happened) and here's the full IC report from January, 2017. Without revealing sources and methods it's pretty damn detailed, and I've read the entire report. I would encourage you to read it too. To answer your point #1, from the initial statement put out before anyone knew the outcome of the election: The U.S. Intelligence Community (USIC) is confident that the Russian Government directed the recent compromises of e-mails from US persons and institutions, including from US political organizations. The recent disclosures of alleged hacked e-mails on sites like DCLeaks.com and WikiLeaks and by the Guccifer 2.0 online persona are consistent with the methods and motivations of Russian-directed efforts. These thefts and disclosures are intended to interfere with the US election process. So you can choose to believe the US intelligence community or not; I'm going to believe their assessment. The rest of your points follow an interesting narrative arc. You start with (sic), "I don't think they did it, show me the proof that they did." Then you move to, "We do the same thing all the time, not so bad." Next up is, "If they did do it, we should thank them because my preferred candidate won!" And finally you end with, "Well, they did something, but I'm moving the goal posts and pulling a Bill Clinton-esque argument to quibble over what 'hacking' means." NO ONE IS ARGUING that the Russians literally changed vote totals. Luckily enough for us our system of elections is arcane and diffuse enough that it's pretty hard to change vote totals enough to tip national elections. Kinda like why we still use 8" floppy disks to launch nukes. Russia ran an pretty wide-ranging influence campaign that included the use of hacked and stolen emails released through intermediaries. They wanted to cause chaos and they wanted to make the US political system look bad and divide us against ourselves...unfortunately I'd say mission accomplished. Those actions are "hacking" by any reasonable definition, that's still a direct attack on our electoral process, that's why the GOP-controlled Congress voted 517-5 to sanction Russia (among other bad actors) for their actions. I will also stand up and say absolutely, 100% I would have still cared about this issue if Hillary had won. In fact, if the Russians intervene in our elections in 2018 or in 2020 trying to defeat Congressional Republicans or President Trump, I'm against those actions just as much as any Republican. If Vladimir Putin goes on Russian state TV and personally releases the infamous (alleged) pee tape as an October 2020 surprise that sinks the President's reelection chances, fuck that guy, although I still reserve the right to at least lol as a partisan Dem. The voters of this country should decide who our leaders are, free of malevolent influence by an foreign nation. I'm not sure that exactly should earn a Profile in Courage, but apparently it needs to be said because for some, it seems partisanship is trumping patriotism when facing this threat.

In that case, well played

Can you be more specific on how any shenanigans that did happen changed the outcome? The DNC staff definitely favored her and that's not right. I support the new DNC Chairman Tom Perez and his work to change the primary system and the relationship the DNC has with candidates. That being said, Hillary Clinton received 3.7 million more votes in the primary than Bernie did. It's pretty hard to "rig" that many more votes spread out across 50+ states and territories. Hell, the GOP establishment tried pretty hard to "rig" their primary for anyone but Trump and they were spectacularly unsuccessful. In fact, if "the system" has screwed anyone in politics, it's screwed Hillary pretty hard twice. She got (barely) more primary votes than Obama in the 2008 primary, but he won the nomination because he won more delegates, including more superdelegates. In the 2016 general she got almost 3 million more popular votes than Trump, but he won the Presidency because he won more electoral college votes. So for all that "rigging" in favor of "Crooked Hillary," she sure did manage to win more votes a bunch of times and yet not get elected to shit in over a decade. Bangup job by those political masterminds in Brooklyn :/ They forgot to rig the things that actually mattered somehow... And all this is coming from someone who has never been a big Hillary fan. My personal picks were Obama in his primary campaign over her in 2008 and I wanted Biden to run in 2016 instead of her.

Ok, copy. I disagree but we don't need to get into specifics if you're not interested. My big point was that it doesn't make sense to wonder why the political opposition isn't cheering for your guy...because he's not doing thing things we support! Same went for why you didn't cheer when my guy was in the seat. The mere fact of that political opposition doesn't signal bad faith necessarily, although again, that's a discussion that needs to be at a higher level than talking points. Because the Democratic Party base decides who their nominee is. Because she is the daughter of a Republican President and a White House official in a Republican administration that's polling at about 7% among Democrats. Because if she's supportive of her father and his administration's policies, then she's opposed to a lot of the core values that the Democratic Party stands for. Those are just the top few points I can think of. Doesn't mean the Democratic Party is immune to an outsider celebrity talking a big game and sweeping away a lot of more conventional politicians in a primary. Someone like Oprah would be much smarter money if you're betting on a dark horse future Dem nominee who's a celebrity.

Hahahahahahahahaha...ok, interesting fantasy but it's never gonna happen. The part about her trying to be a Democrat anyways. Dude, you have to realize what you're saying right? I can literally make the exact same argument in reverse. "How can the GOP not applaud when millions more people got insurance coverage, but now they can cheer when we borrow $1.5 trillion dollars from our kids and grandkids as a giveaway to corporations and billionaires? Anyone can see that those bonuses are one-time and just for show, those companies are going to pocket the vast majority of those tax cuts and now we have less money to provide health care/housing/defense/etc." The Democrats and Republicans have real differences of opinion on policy. Beyond the rhetoric and bad-faith virtue signaling politicians do on the news, they genuinely have different philosophies on what is a "good" and a "bad" policy for the country. Arguments can be had over what has worked in the past, what makes sense, what has the support of relevant experts, etc. and I love having those kinds of arguments. If you want to debate whether or not different parts of the ACA are working well and why that might be or whether or not the recently passed tax cuts are likely to stimulate the economy or help average workers then great! But naively saying that you're side is right and my side is wrong, and not understanding why everyone isn't on board with that assessment, just demonstrates a fundamental lack of understanding of the political arena and how persuasion works. It would be equally wrongheaded of me to say "Dem policies are great, GOP policies suck, can't you see that?!" without providing any evidence to even start to convince you why that may be true.

Did the GOP clap while Obama was touting how millions of people gained health insurance under the ACA? Remember when former Rep. Joe Wilson interrupted the President during a Joint Session address by yelling out, “You lie!”? I went to the way-back machine for a story about the response to Obama’s first SOTU: https://content.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,1957301,00.html The opposition’s lack of enthusiastic support for a President of the other party isn’t news, it’s par for the course. A true rally round the flag effect only happens during a genuine crisis, like when GWB’s approval rating a shot to > 90% after 9/11 and the Senate passed the PATRIOT ACT 98-1.

This has nothing to do with Roth vs Traditional. You as the employee can contribute $18.5K, and that’s an IRS limit. You’re employer can contribute more and that’s not governed by that same cap. Total contributions, meaning you + employer, cannot exceed $55K. The limits are the same whether you choose traditional or Roth.

I was waiting for them to work that in, big-time missed opportunity.

See above. I can see it both ways. And yes, under the current system it is the responsibility of the majority in both Houses to produce the votes they need to govern, whether that’s solely from within their caucus or from across the aisle. If they need to reach across the aisle, it’s standard ops for the minority to want to include a policy priority of their own in the bill in exchange for their votes. The President should also be a leader on the “making the government work” front, but as we saw in both 2013 as well as this year, that sounds easy from the cheap seats but it can be hard to pull off when you are on the field. Just as a citizen, not a partisan, it’s frustrating when the government doesn’t work. The again I do have partisan interests on policy, and when you’re in the minority you’re often glad you have more levers to pull in the Senate than you do in the House. What do you think? I was asking you originally after all. Do you go to 50+VP for all Senate business? Do you exempt some spending bills but maintain the legislative veto for other type of legislation? This is an issue with nuance and both sides have been in on sides so I’m interested to hear different arguments for/against changing the current Senate rules.

The author is a friend of mine. Good dude, very legit. Glad to see him published.

I’m just asking questions. I can see the merits of either way and I remember how both parties have taken advantage of rule changes when it suited them. Obviously it’s natural to want majoritarian rule when your preferred side has the majority and you appreciate the merits of the senate’s somewhat more drawn out process when your preferred side is in the minority.

So you’re ready for just pure majoritarian rule in the Senate huh? Would you expand that policy to all votes or just to specifically spending bills?

How mad were you about the 17-day shutdown in 2013 compared with the 69-hour shutdown this year? I’m genuinely curious without looking to open a huge can of worms. And FWIW I’m generally not a supporter of shutdowns of any length. I want our country’s government to function well and am less open to arguments about why it should be made to stop than you might imagine. Does it make a difference whether or not the shutdown is perceived to have happened because of a policy position you support? My recap of the two situations: This year’s shutdown was generally seen as happening because the GOP controlled Senate needed Dem votes to pass a spending bill and the Dem senators wanted a deal on protecting the “Dreamers.” BL: full GOP government, Dems withheld votes as the minority to get something they wanted. The 2013 shutdown was generally seen as happening because the Dem controlled Senate and GOP controlled house couldn’t agree on a spending bill. Ted Cruz in the Senate and several GOP house members wanted to defund parts of the ACA and Cruz held a brief talking filibuster and the GOP house members withheld their votes from their own Speaker’s proposed bill to try to force the issue. BL: split government, minority faction of the party controlling the House and one Senator withheld votes on and filibustered a negotiated compromise spending bill to get something they wanted. Finally, +1 to the use of “shitdown” for labeling this year’s debacle

IMHO you’re putting a ton of bias into this assessment of the situation. And I keep up with Fox News somewhat, so I’m aware of the stories they are featuring. Just realize that this is one particular narrative of a process that is largely opaque by design and not necessarily the facts. So long story short to answer your question: no. What I fear at this point is that Mueller will release the results of his investigation and only ~45% of people will believe him depending on what he says. I would imagine that given one of the possible outcomes, you’re fully prepared to join the non-believers. 10% of that fear is that Mueller will clear the President of any wrongdoing (even though several of his associates have already plead guilty to various crimes), and liberals won’t believe it and will want POTUS strung up from the nearest tree anyways, which will put the country in a bad place. I am not one of those people but I know some. 90% of that fear is that Mueller will bring damning evidence along with charges and the right wing won’t believe him, the GOP Congress won’t back him, and he’ll be fired which will put the country in a very bad place. I believe in Mueller’s integrity based on his incredibly sterling reputation as a long-serving, non-partisan public servant and law enforcement official. I plan to believe the results of his investigation no matter the outcome (within reason, it’s not blind faith obviously). I hope most folks out there can commit to the same so we can, as a nation, once again at least start to have a conversation based on a shared set of facts and values. This is an important test for whether or not that kind of shared worldview is even possible anymore, and unfortunately I’m not optimistic.

There was already a bill proposed late last night to fund mil pay separately from the rest of the shutdown and also halt Congressional pay until the government reopens. Hopefully something like this passes, or better yet, the shutdown ends quickly early next week. https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/369829-trump-state-dems-introduce-bill-to-withhold-lawmaker-pay-during-shutdown

Valid critique, I am not a gunship guy. Y’all did have some incredibly big balls. I guess my point was something you mentioned as well - in a modern fight, I’m choosing to field modern technology. The smart conversation at the procurement level is how to we ensure we don’t lose key capabilities when “upgrading” platforms and technology and making sure decision makers don’t get too wow’d by shiny new toys, and those folks need ops input into that process. The “Let’s replace the U-28 with the MC-12” process in AFSOC was a great examples for how input from the ops units helped steer the service away from a decision that would have led to a big loss of specific capabilities that are important on the battlefield. Despite the fact that some of the Brass has it in their head that “Two engines better than one...let’s do this!” If the U-boats or Ws or Js dropped capability that existed on the H that was key to keeping the eagles safe then that’s a foul. I know multiple ways in which this is true, especially for the W. If some of that can be corrected with training or changes to the fielded systems then let’s do that ASAP. But that being said let’s not throw the baby out with the bath water...more modern tech has a massive list of advantages over systems first fielded 40+ years ago.

This is a publicity stunt, not a real run for office. Senator Ben Cardin, the 2-term incumbent of that seat, has literally 50 years of electoral success in Maryland and has never lost a race. Not worth even mentioning other than she is a terrible person and an attention-seeking douche. My prediction is Cardin wins the primary with basically no effort by 50+ points. Lucky for me, when my party has lunatics run for office they are typically defeated handily in primaries by distinguished public servants. Can’t quite say the same for my friends on the right...Senator Doug Jones sends his regards to the GOP primary voters of Alabama

Wut? BL on this thread derail: we’ll have to agree to disagree on the idea that somehow the H-model LLTV is a superior sensor when compared with modern 20” sensors like the MX-20 or MTS-B. Is there some niche in the spectrum where that old ball excelled when paired with tons of SO training and experience? Probably. Would anyone flying today rather have that obsolete tech over the sensors we actually have in the field? I would not at least, and I’ve watched over lots of eagles taking small arms fire. I’m confident that the proof is in the pudding and that the operational crews and specialized procurement programs are making good choices on sensor tech. Good day to you sir 🇺🇸