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Filthy

Filthy

Iowa Wrestling Champion
Jun 28, 2016
27,507
29,641
Zeph said:
The third way democrats that took over the Democratic Party with Bill Clinton are mostly corrupt as fuck. That doesn't mean it was a good idea to put a rapist on the Supreme Court. It may get the Republicans a majority now, but I can tell you the movement to pack the court is picking up steam and decisions like blocking Merrick Garland and confirming Kavanaugh will be used to justify it.
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Garland and Kavanaugh voted together 93% of the time, wouldn't have mattered who got the robe. The State does what The State wants.
They wanted a Yes Man, they got a Yes Man. One side had to object, but they had couldn't challenge his record as a Yes Man, so they made their own circus about something completely unrelated.
 
BeardOfKnowledge

BeardOfKnowledge

The Most Consistent Motherfucker You Know
Jul 22, 2015
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Filthy said:
Correct. He was accused of rape by Juanita Broaddrick, who (unlike Mrs. Blasey-Ford) had told two close friends about the rape immediately after it happened. Kathleen Willey, Paula Jones, and Leslie Millwee all described sexual assaults, all reporting the same pattern of behavior.

These accusations were not enough to disqualify Bill Clinton from the office of POTUS, according to the DNC.
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Weren't the accusations fairly late in his second term?
 
Freeloading Rusty

Freeloading Rusty

Here comes Rover, sniffin’ at your ass
Jan 11, 2016
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Michael Cohen meets with prosecutors investigating Trump's family business, charity

Michael Cohen and his attorney met Wednesday with a group of state and federal law enforcement officials investigating various aspects of President Donald Trump's family business and charitable organization, according to people familiar with the meeting.

The group, which included the federal prosecutors from the US Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York who charged Cohen in August and officials from the New York Attorney General's office, met at the Midtown New York City office of Cohen's attorney, Guy Petrillo, these people said.
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Freeloading Rusty

Freeloading Rusty

Here comes Rover, sniffin’ at your ass
Jan 11, 2016
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BeardOfKnowledge

BeardOfKnowledge

The Most Consistent Motherfucker You Know
Jul 22, 2015
60,721
56,229
MC Gusto said:

View: https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1052529703800721408



View: https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/714617467839111173


View: https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/710923287430357001


View: https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/727634574298255361


View: https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/710920670608236544



View: https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1035575198169411584
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It's nice to see that Trump has the ability to form a new opinion after realizing he was wrong. Very self aware. Stable genius, imo.
 
Freeloading Rusty

Freeloading Rusty

Here comes Rover, sniffin’ at your ass
Jan 11, 2016
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Trump says he hasn't visited troops overseas because he's 'very busy'
Trump told The Associated Press that while he doesn’t think it is “overly necessary” that he visit a military base in a combat zone, he plans to do so “at some point” in the future.

“I’ve been very busy with everything that’s taking place here,” Trump said in Tuesday's interview.

“I’m doing a lot of things. But it’s something I’d do. And do gladly,” the president continued. “Nobody has been better at the military. Hey, I just got them a pay raise. I haven’t had a pay raise in 11 years… I have done more for the military than any president in many, many years.”

When pressed about the increase in the number of troops serving in harm’s way in Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq and Africa since he’s taken office, Trump said that he needs to keep soldiers abroad “to see safety at home.”

“The main thing I have to see is, I have to see safety at home… If I think people are likely to do some very bad things in faraway places to our homeland, I’m going to have troops there for a period of time,” he said.

Trump, who has called himself “the most militaristic person you’ll ever meet,” has drawn criticism from some veterans for not visiting active military personnel overseas, a long-held tradition of American presidents.

Alexander McCoy, a former U.S. Marine Corps sergeant and spokesperson for the grassroots organization Common Defense, which has been critical of the president, told the New York Daily News in a report published on Wednesday that “veterans aren’t surprised Trump has no interest in going to war, after he used his wealth and elite connections to avoid the draft five times while working class people went in his place.”

“What makes us even more furious isn’t that he won’t visit us in combat zones now, but that he continues to recklessly escalate and extend the pointless quagmire wars he’s making us fight, while back at home he’s using us as political props for his agenda of using bigotry to divide us so he can give tax cuts to himself and his fellow billionaires,” he added.
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Freeloading Rusty

Freeloading Rusty

Here comes Rover, sniffin’ at your ass
Jan 11, 2016
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Legal Experts: Ivanka Trump May Have Committed Felony Fraud
Ivanka Trump misrepresented the sales figures of various Trump-branded properties around the world on multiple occasions over the past decade, according to a lengthy exposé released late Wednesday by public interest news organization ProPublica in conjunction with Manhattan public radio station WNYC.

Those real estate-related misrepresentations were almost certainly criminal according to legal experts surveyed by Law&Crime.

First, a bit of backstory. According to the ProPublica-WNYC “Pump and Trump” report:

In interviews and press conferences, Ivanka Trump gave false sales figures for projects in Mexico’s Baja California; Panama City, Panama; Toronto and New York’s SoHo neighborhood. These statements weren’t just the legendary Trump hype; they misled potential buyers about the viability of the developments.

The specifics–all of which are contained and copiously documented in the joint exposé–proceed as follows:

In 2009, Ivanka Trump claimed that a Toronto Trump property was “virtually sold out.” In reality, fewer than 25 percent of those units had been sold–according to a bankruptcy filing by the property developers. The property was built. Then it went bankrupt. The Trump name was removed from the building.

In 2008, Ivanka Trump claimed that a Panama Trump property was “over 90 percent” sold. In reality, fewer than 80 percent of those units had been sold–according to Moody’s Investors Service. The property was built. Then it went bankrupt, too. The Trump name was removed from the building.

Also in 2008, Ivanka Trump claimed that a Manhattan SoHo Trump property was 60 percent sold. In reality, only 15 percent of those units had been sold–according to a legal affidavit filed by a Trump partner. The property was built. Then? Bankrupt again. Trump’s name was removed from the building.

The SoHo property shenanigans were egregious enough to raise alarm bells with New York City investigators. The report notes, “The Manhattan district attorney’s office [under Cyrus Vance] considered charging the Trumps but backed off after a visit from a donor — Trump’s attorney Marc Kasowitz.”

Even though Vance’s office passed on the prosecution, special counsel Robert Mueller focused some of his vast resources on the Trump Soho Hotel fiasco in late 2017. And there’s also an apparent coda here: The Manhattan District Attorney’s office is now under investigation by the FBI over those corruption and pay-to-play allegations, according to the New York Daily News.

In light of the FBI’s investigation into Vance’s office, it’s possible that Ivanka Trump could be facing criminal charges herself over the fraudulent real estate schemes.

Former federal prosecutor Daniel S. Goldman noted:

If Ivanka knowingly and intentionally made false representations to investors that were material to the investors’ decision to invest in one of her real estate projects, then that is the crime of wire fraud (or, potentially, securities fraud, depending on what instrument the investment was). The knowledge and intent is what makes it criminal fraud.

The one-time Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York also offered a caveat about Ivanka Trump’s potential liability over the misrepresentations due to how old they are.

“The Manhattan DA’s office reportedly looked into the Trump Soho and declined to prosecute for unknown reasons,” Goldman said. “There may be statute of limitations issues now, but with Trump Soho partner Felix Sater reportedly cooperating with law enforcement, there may be more evidence now.”

Elizabeth de la Vega is also a former federal prosecutor. In an interview with Law&Crime, she was emphatic that Ivanka Trump had engaged in criminal schemes to defraud investors and others.

“Yes, absolutely,” de la Vega said when asked if Ivanka Trump’s on-the-record statements were potentially criminal. The former chief of the San Jose branch of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of California then elaborated. She said:

A pattern of knowing false statements to real estate investors exposes perpetrators to multiple counts of bank, wire, and mail fraud, depending on the means used to convey the false statements. It’s likely that such a scheme may also involve money laundering. Defendants convicted of such frauds are also sentenced to pay restitution to any investors who have suffered provable losses.

Law&Crime reached out to the White House for comment on these allegations. No response was forthcoming at the time of publication.
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Here Are the Trump Projects Where Ivanka and Her Dad Misled Buyers
A pattern of deception ran through the Trumps’ real estate deals since the mid-2000s. Not only were the Trumps more than the mere licensors they claimed to be, extracting millions in fees from nearly every facet of these projects, but they often misled buyers and investors on key information — such as the level of sales and the Trumps’ role and investment in the deals. (Read our full investigation.) The Trump Organization did not respond to our questions, and the White House didn’t have a comment.

Projects Where a Trump Family Member Overstated Sales Numbers
DOMINICAN REPUBLIC
Claim: Donald Trump claimed $365 million in sales in a 2007 letter to The Wall Street Journal.

Reality: Trump reported $290 million in a 2009 project audit.

Result: Never built.

FORT LAUDERDALE
Claim: Trump announced the hotel/condo was “pretty much sold out” in April 2006, according to a broker who attended the presentation.

Reality: 62 percent of units were sold as of July 2006, according to bank records that emerged in a court case.

Result: Entered foreclosure. Trump’s name removed before construction completed.

LAS VEGAS
Claim: Condos “sold out,” Trump told The Associated Press in 2005

Reality: About 25 percent of units were sold by 2011, according to press accounts.

Result: Built.

PANAMA
Claim: “It’s a 1,000-unit building, we’ve sold over 90 percent of it,” Ivanka told Portfolio in 2008.

Reality: As of three months later, 79 percent of the units were pre-sold, according to Moody’s.

Result: Built, but went bankrupt; Trump name removed.

SOHO
Claim: In 2008, Ivanka told reporters that 60 percent of units had sold.

Reality: A Trump partner’s affidavit revealed that 15 percent had been sold at the time.

Result: Built, but went bankrupt; Trump name removed.

TAMPA
Claim: The building “sold out,” Trump told The Wall Street Journal in 2007.

Reality: The developers failed to sell a minimum of 70 percent of units, according to a Trump company letter that year, which deemed that a violation of its contract.

Result: Never built.

TORONTO
Claim: In a 2009 interview, Ivanka referred to the property as “virtually sold out.”

Reality: 24.8 percent of units had sold, according to a 2016 bankruptcy filing by the developers.

Result: Built, but went bankrupt; Trump name removed.

Projects Where the Trumps Suggested They Were Developers, Partners or Equity Owners (They Weren’t)
BAJA
More than 50 buyers claimed Ivanka said the Trump Organization was a developer on the project at a 2007 sales event, according to a lawsuit quoted by Univision.

DOMINICAN REPUBLIC
“I am excited to be building Trump at Cap Cana,” Trump was quoted saying in a 2007 press release, according to Univision.

FORT LAUDERDALE
Trump called the hotel and tower “my latest development” in a letter announcing the project.

REPUBLIC OF GEORGIA
“TRUMP INVESTS IN GEORGIA” read banners for the project, according to The New Yorker. Asked by a Fox anchor what he was “investing in,” Trump responded, “I’m doing a big development” in Georgia.

PANAMA
“I am honored to develop this extraordinary high rise with my partner Roger Khafif of the K Group,” Trump said in a 2009 marketing statement.

TAMPA
Trump claimed an ownership stake in a news article at the time, stating it was less than 50 percent, then adding: “But it’s a substantial stake. I recently said I’d like to increase my stake but when they’re selling that well they don’t let you do that.”

WAIKIKI
In the final episode of season five of “The Apprentice,” Trump announced the project on national TV, saying “that’s why I’m building the magnificent Trump Hotel and Tower Waikiki.” In 2007, he told The Wall Street Journal: “This building is largely owned by me and being developed by me.”
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Freeloading Rusty

Freeloading Rusty

Here comes Rover, sniffin’ at your ass
Jan 11, 2016
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Newest security worry: Trump without Mattis
National security leaders fear that Defense Secretary Jim Mattis is on his way out — and that Donald Trump’s next Pentagon chief will be far more subservient to the president’s unilateral and bombastic whims.

Mattis was instrumental in pulling back on Trump’s vow to “carpet bomb” ISIS or pull troops from Afghanistan. He moderated the U.S. military response to Syria’s use of chemical weapons and openly opposed Trump’s withdrawal from the Iranian nuclear deal.

Now Trump’s reverence for the retired four-star general has worn thin, and Mattis is widely expected to depart his post sometime after the November elections, according to multiple Pentagon and administration officials with knowledge of personnel discussions. And that’s fueling anxiety among officials of both parties who have viewed him for almost two years as a force for stability.

"Secretary Mattis is one of the only reassuring figures in the Trump administration, and I don’t mean that as a Democratic partisan," said Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), a member of the Appropriations Committee's defense panel. "I mean when our partners and our adversaries think about the United States and the Department of Defense, knowing that Secretary Mattis is there strengthens our hand."

urrent and former government officials say they worry about a repeat of what happened when Trump replaced former National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster with leading hawk John Bolton, and then-Secretary of State Rex Tillerson with conservative stalwart Mike Pompeo.

"Replacements might not be as good, just like Bolton was a real trade down from McMaster,” predicted Sen. Tim Kaine, a Virginia Democrat on the Armed Services Committee.

Mattis’ departure from Trump’s inner circle would also come at a time when much of the top military leadership, including Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Joe Dunford, are also preparing to retire. Mattis' successor would have major influence on the complexion of the new military command structure that Trump would nominate next year.

"If he leaves, you inject a whole issue of uncertainty," Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island, the top Democrat on the Armed Services panel, told reporters earlier this week. "Who's going to succeed him?”

For Kaine, the uncertainty goes well beyond just Mattis, whose overwhelming Senate confirmation includes yes votes from members who opposed virtually all other Trump nominees.

"Secretary Mattis and Gen. Dunford are the real pillars of protecting American national security right now," he said. "Either of them going, I think, would be extremely damaging to American defense and the credibility of our national security team."

That view rests on Mattis’ reputation for a steady hand and a steady voice in the inner circle.

Mattis is widely viewed as a force for continuity from the Obama administration on some of the biggest national security issues, including Iran policy and the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria.

On Afghanistan and the fight against ISIS in Iraq and Syria, Mattis successfully championed strategies that broadly echoed the Obama administrations approaches to the campaigns — and rejected Trump’s own impulses toward more drastic changes.

Rather than authorizing the “carpet bombing” against ISIS that Trump talked about during his campaign, or encouraging the president’s desire to pull out of Afghanistan, Mattis largely maintained the strategies the military was already pursuing in both theaters, with some tweaks such as giving field commanders more authority for air strikes.

Mattis has also made public remarks that seem calculated to shut the door to policy options that reportedly intrigued the president — such as privatizing the combat advisory effort in Afghanistan, a proposal pushed by Blackwater founder Erik Prince.

Mattis’ more subtle approach has also been successful in the U.S. response to the Syrian government's use of chemical weapons against civilians.

When Mattis and Dunford briefed Trump on Central Command’s five potential military options for punishing Syria, Mattis characterized the most restrained option — limited strikes against three targets — as more muscular than it really was, according to a military official involved in the deliberations who described them on condition of anonymity.

“He presented the lightest option as a heavy option,” the official recalled. And Trump signed off on it.

On Iran policy, Mattis has clashed more openly with the president, unsuccessfully opposing his decision to pull out of the pact negotiated by the Obama administration to try to curtail Tehran's nuclear weapons program.

That independence has steadily frayed the relationship between Mattis and the commander-in-chief.

In an interview with The Associated Press earlier this week, Trump called his defense chief "sort of a Democrat." That slap came on the heels of journalist Bob Woodward's book "Fear," which quoted Mattis as disparaging the president.

Mattis, who was traveling in Asia when Trump made the comment, told reporters: "I've never registered for any political party."

"I'm on his team," Mattis added of Trump. "We have never talked about me leaving.”

He also told the reporters that Trump had called to tell him, "I’m 100 percent with you."

But many close observers believe the writing is on the wall about Mattis' fate — especially if the growing friction continues to play out publicly as it had with Tillerson.

“POTUS is getting rid of him after midterms," said the same military official, who agreed to discuss knowledge of internal White House deliberations on the condition he not be identified by name. "It’s something they’ve wanted to do for a while. They weren’t going to do it before midterms.”

"Mattis has executed his own foreign policy," the official added. "He was able to get away with it by partnering with Tillerson and making McMaster irrelevant. Now with Pompeo and Bolton in, the jig is up.”

Loren Thompson, a defense industry consultant with close ties to the Pentagon leadership, put it this way: "What it comes down to is that Trump and Mattis don't see eye to eye. Trump is a change agent and Mattis is largely a product of the existing viewpoint, the status quo.

"He stopped doing those dinners with the president," he added. "I think they have drifted apart and they probably aren't on the same sheet of music in terms of priorities anymore. "

For many, that is exactly why they worry about what follows.

Keeping Mattis is a matter of stability, Reed believes. He said he worries that a new civilian leader will have to get up to speed even as a raft of top generals and admirals begins to retire en masse.

In addition to Dunford, whose term is up in September 2019, several members of the Joint Chiefs, including Air Force Gen. Paul Selva, the vice chairman, are expected to retire next year.

Several top commanders responsible for various regions of the world or other global missions are also likely to be selected in the coming months. For example, Army Gen. Curtis Scaparrotti, the top commander in Europe, is retiring.

"If he is gone and there is another secretary of Defense, you’re going to see next year … everybody new around the water cooler trying to figure out where the bathroom is,” Reed told reporters. “That’s not going to be good for national defense."

Others say the bipartisan support that Mattis has enjoyed on Capitol Hill could be difficult to replicate.

“It would be hard to imagine that person having quite the same rapport," said Michael O'Hanlon, a military and foreign policy specialist at the nonpartisan Brookings Institution. "It’s almost inevitable that the next person would have less of a bond with Democrats, but it could be much worse than that. It could be almost a poisonous relationship.”

Not everyone is convinced that Mattis is on his way out, including O'Hanlon, who said he believes the Defense secretary still offers Trump some political benefits.

Another senior administration official said he believes it would still be difficult for Trump to terminate someone with Mattis’ reputation without justification — though he might try to push the secretary out bit by bit by criticizing him.

“If he can’t tell you to find the exit, he’ll make you want to find the exit," said the official, who was not authored to speak publicly about internal deliberations. "This may be one of those cases where it’s not worth the daily knife fight.”

Others believe Mattis won’t leave unless he’s fired — as one retired senior military officer and longtime friend of Mattis predicted.

“I would be very surprised if he leaves without being told to leave,” he said, speaking on the condition he not be named. “His whole view is, leave the politics to the side and forge ahead.”

Those who see Mattis is a bulwark against more extreme policies — particularly Democratic lawmakers — say they hope Mattis does stick around.

"It is alarming to think that his tenure would come to an end," Schatz said. "I think it’s in the president’s interest to keep him. I think it’s in the country’s interest to keep him. And I think it’s in the interest of peace and stability to keep him. Which probably means he won’t keep him."
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10,000 Missouri voters received Republican mailers with false voting information
Some 10,000 voters in Missouri received mailers with incorrect information about the dates for their absentee ballots were due. The source? The Missouri Republican Party.

Ray Bozarth, the party’s executive director, admitted that his party was responsible for the misleading information but insisted the incorrect date was caused not by malice or an effort at voter suppression.

It was, he said, simply “the result of a miscommunication between the party and its vendor, which he declined to name,” as the Kansas City Star reported.

“Bozarth also did not say how the miscommunication occurred,” the daily added.

The Star obtained a photo of the mailer, which bears a bright red bar and the words “URGENT NOTICE” emblazoned in all-caps, urging voters to get their mail-in ballots sent “today.”

It also says, ballots must be returned by 5 p.m. on Tuesday, Oct. 30, which is not the case. Ballots are due on election day, Nov. 6, and requests for mail-in ballots aren’t due until Wednesday, Oct. 31.

According to The Star, Bozarth believes the ballots were sent to “likely Republican voters” as part of a get-out-the-vote effort. These voters should expect to receive correct information “very soon.”

Asked if he was concerned some voters might not vote as a result of the confusion, he said he was “very confident in the Missouri Republican Party’s get-out-the-vote effort.”

The error-ridden mass mailing comes amid numerous reported cases of incorrect or sometimes misleading information being distributed to voters across the United States — as well as outright efforts to suppress votes in some areas — ahead of next month’s narrowly-contested midterm election for control of Congress.
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