Tag: Donald Trump

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Dan Rather: Flynn Debacle Could Be Worse Than Watergate

Veteran news anchor and iconic journalist Dan Rather writes that “Flynnghazi” could end up being worse than Watergate.

And – if this were all written up as a movie pitch, it would be seen as too “far-fetched” for Hollywood.

This has been shared over 58,000 times on Facebook:

Watergate is the biggest political scandal of my lifetime, until maybe now. It was the closest we came to a debilitating Constitutional crisis, until maybe now. On a 10 scale of armageddon for our form of government, I would put Watergate at a 9. This Russia scandal is currently somewhere around a 5 or 6, in my opinion, but it is cascading in intensity seemingly by the hour. And we may look back and see, in the end, that it is at least as big as Watergate. It may become the measure by which all future scandals are judged. It has all the necessary ingredients, and that is chilling.

When we look back at Watergate, we remember the end of the Nixon Presidency. It came with an avalanche, but for most of the time my fellow reporters and I were chasing down the story as it rumbled along with a low-grade intensity. We never were quite sure how much we would find out about what really happened. In the end, the truth emerged into the light, and President Nixon descended into infamy.

This Russia story started out with an avalanche and where we go from here no one really knows. Each piece of news demands new questions. We are still less than a month into the Trump Presidency, and many are asking that question made famous by Tennessee Senator Howard Baker those many years ago: “What did the President know, and when did he know it?” New reporting suggests that Mr. Trump knew for weeks. We can all remember the General Michael Flynn’s speech from the Republican National Convention – “Lock her up!” in regards to Hillary Clinton. If Hillary Clinton had done one tenth of what Mr. Flynn had done, she likely would be in jail. And it isn’t just Mr. Flynn, how far does this go?

The White House has no credibility on this issue. Their spigot of lies – can’t we finally all agree to call them lies – long ago lost them any semblance of credibility. I would also extend that to the Republican Congress, who has excused away the Trump Administration’s assertions for far too long.

We need an independent investigation. Damn the lies, full throttle forward on the truth. If a scriptwriter had approached Hollywood with what we are witnessing, he or she would probably have been told it was way too far-fetched for even a summer blockbuster. But this is not fiction. It is real and it is serious. Deadly serious. We deserve answers and those who are complicit in this scandal need to feel the full force of justice.

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President Trump Suddenly Concerned About “Leaks Coming Out Of Washington”

President Trump tweets today that the “real story here is why are there so many illegal leaks coming out of Washington?”

And yet, last fall, when it was clear Russia had hacked into American email servers and leaked info about Hillary Clinton, the “leaking” was of no interest to Trump – only the info leaked.

Shoe on the other foot now?

And by the way, if Trump is concerned about folks finding out how he deals with North Korea, perhaps he shouldn’t handle a national security crisis from the middle of dinner at Mar-a-Lago surrounded by club members…

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Catching Up With “Michael Flynn’s Wild Ride”

In this episode of “As The Trump Turns:”

Last night, White House senior advisor Kellyanne Conway told MSNBC that (then) National Security Advisor Michael Flynn had “the complete confidence of the president.”

Just hours later, Flynn resigned as the news emerged that the acting Attorney General Sally Yates (fired for telling the truth) informed the White House last month that Flynn had probably misled Trump and the administration, and had possibly opened himself up to blackmail by the Russian government.

So, President Trump knew of these reports last month, but last Friday when asked about the issue onboard Air Force One by reporters, Trump said he had not read or heard of such reports and he’d have to get back to the media over it.

So, which is it? Did Trump know about the moves by Flynn? Or did President Bannon not keep Trump in the loop?

If Trump knew about these revelations last month, how did Flynn have the “full confidence of the president?”

Or, more importantly, if this had not come to light, would Flynn STILL have the full confidence of the president?

If Trump knew all this, why did he allow Flynn complete access to American intel when he might be vulnerable to Russian blackmail?

It wasn’t Flynn’s lie to Vice-president Pence that brought Flynn down. It was the facts coming to light. The White House knew about these allegations for weeks. Nothing was done until the info got out to the public.

CNN is now reporting that Republican Sen. Roy Blunt, a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, on Tuesday has called for an investigation into connections between President Donald Trump and Russia, and wants the Intelligence Committee to speak with Michael Flynn.

Here’s Kellyanne Conway this morning twisting in the wind with NBC’s Matt Lauer:

And while Kellyanne was talking in circles at NBC, poor Rep. Chris Collins seemed to have drawn the short GOP straw, and had to spin his own circular nonsense over at CNN:

And just one final piece of irony: here’s now-former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn last summer at the Republican National Convention where he led the crowd in chants of “Lock her up!” in regard to possible security leaks from Hillary Clinton’s email server.

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Donald Trump Handles Missile Incident Surrounded By Mar-a-Lago Members At Dinner

On Saturday night, Donald Trump hosted a dinner with Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe at his exclusive Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida.

During the dinner, news came in that North Korea had tested a mid-range ballistic missile. Both leaders went to work. The problem is – they went to work right there in the middle of the dinner surrounded by club members.

Paying members of the social club had the added bonus of entertainment with their meals, as they got to watch Abe and Trump deal with an international crisis.

Many shared the experience on Facebook and other social media like Richard DeAgazio.

DeAgazio wrote on Facebook:

“HOLY MOLY!!! It was fascinating to watch the flurry of activity at dinner when the news came that North Korea had launched a missile in the direction of Japan. The Prime Minister Abe of Japan huddles with his staff and the President is on the phone with Washington DC. the two world leaders then conferred and then went into another room for hastily arranged press conference. Wow…the center of the action.!!!”

So, for $200K, you can get a Mar-a-Lago membership and have unfettered access to the President of the United States. What could possibly go wrong?

While it doesn’t seem like club members were close enough to overhear anything being discussed, the waiters – who according to CNN continued service as the leaders addressed the incident – certainly were.

Shouldn’t they all have gotten up immediately and moved to a secure, private setting? Didn’t Trump thrash Hillary Clinton during the campaign over issues of security breaches with sensitive info? And Trump sits in his club dining room addressing his first international ‘incident?’

Oh – and you thought YOUR club was exclusive? Before the night was over, the Mar-a-Lago member took a pic with (according to the poster) the guy who was carrying the nuclear football.

And, no – the agent’s name was NOT blacked out in Mr. DeAgazio’s post…

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Piers Morgan Told To “F*ck Off” For Defending Donald Trump

I loved this on last night’s Real Time with Bill Maher – Piers Morgan being told to fuck off after defending Donald Trump.

Bill Maher began by asking for an apology from all those folks who said “Hillary as lesser of two evils” now that we see the hot cup of crazy we have in the White House now.

After comedian Jim Jeffries told Morgan he was sucking up to Trump just because he won The Celebrity Apprentice and enjoys having a famous friend, Morgan called Jeffries ridiculous, unpleasant, and “losing his audience.”

Check how the audience reacts when Jeffries asks the audience for their opinion. Here’s a hint: not so great for Morgan.

In truth, most Americans had no idea who Piers Morgan was until his run on Celebrity Apprentice. He owes a lot of his U.S. fame to the Donald. No wonder he’s so “loyal.”

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Kmart And Sears Drop Trump Home Product Line

According to Business Insider, there’s more bad news on the retail front for the Trump organization:

Sears’ and Kmart’s websites no longer sell products from the Trump Home line, which is owned by the Trump Organization. As of Friday, a search for Trump Home items on both retailers’ sites yielded no results, except items sold by third-party sellers.

“As part of the company’s initiative to optimize its online product assortment, we constantly refine that assortment to focus on our most profitable items,” a Sears Holdings spokesperson told Business Insider. “Amid that streamlining effort, 31 Trump Home items were among the items removed online this week. Products from the line are still offered online via third-party Marketplace vendors.”

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Justice Department Signals Step Back On Transgender Protections

During the presidential campaign, Donald Trump initially suggested he supported transgender rights during the campaign, but later retreated saying it should be left to the states.

Now, just two days after Jeff Sessions became Attorney General, his administration is signaling a step back from support for trans protections in a current lawsuit in the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals.

From Buzzfeed:

The Justice Department took a step back Friday from its prior position of advancing transgender people’s rights under existing civil rights laws. On just the second day of Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ tenure at the helm of the Justice Department, the federal government filed a notice in the lawsuit Texas and other states had brought against the Obama administration’s pro-transgender policies.

The moves taken in the filing — a joint filing made with the states — suggest that the federal government’s position on the pending legal questions surrounding transgender people’s rights could be changing soon. At the least, it suggests the new administration is pulling back while it determines the position it will be taking in the case.

The Justice Department announced in the short filing that it was withdrawing its request that the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit limit a lower court’s nationwide injunction of the pro-transgender policies to instead cover only those states that had brought the litigation. Then, in a joint request with the states challenging the policy, the states and the Justice Department both requested that the oral arguments on that issue be removed from the court’s calendar.