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The Russia Investigation: Trump Pardons Flynn (8 Viewers)

Top of Page 2 says "the investigation did not establish that members of the Trump campaign conspired (colluded 😉) or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities."

 
Top of Page 2 says "the investigation did not establish that members of the Trump campaign conspired (colluded 😉) or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities."
"No evidence of conspiracy with Russia is clearly stated"

"A statement that the investigation did not establish particular facts does not mean there was no evidence of those facts."

 
I'd probably say stuff like this too if I staked my entire career on TrumpRussia alarmism.  

A finding of no collusion is everywhere to be seen in real life.  It's in Trump's posture toward Russia, which has "been much tougher on Russia than any in the post-Cold War era".

It's in his DOJ's prosecution of Julian Assange, who could totally out him for his supposed role in the conspiracy if it was a real thing that happened (it didn't).

It's in the fact that characters like Rob Goldstone (a British music publicist) and Felix Sater (an FBI informant that couldn't figure out contacting important Russians to get a Trump Tower deal from a hole in the ground) have been revealed to be sideshow hucksters, not participants to an international conspiracy theory.  

It's in Deripaska's lawsuit against the US govt for sanctions that have cost him billions of dollars (sanctions which the EU opposed).

It's in Trump badgering Merkel to pull Germany out of the Nordstream 2 pipeline with Russia.

It's in Trump's bombing of Russian client state Syria, Trump's suffocating sanctions and regime change attempts against Russian ally Venezuela.  

It's in Trump giving lethal weaponry to hostile anti-Russian forces in Ukraine.  

It's in Trump's threatened withdrawal from the INF treaty (which NATO supports).  

It's in Trump packing his administration with antiRussian neocon hawks.

It's in the fact that despite all of this, despite this conspiracy theory taking all the air out of the room and newsrooms allocating an obscene amount of investigative resources to it for years, despite a 22-month special prosecutor investigation with all the resources and subpoena power in the world, despite relations with Russia being so fraught that the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists cited how "the US-Russia nuclear rivalry re-emerged" in keeping the Doomsday Clock at 2 minutes to midnight, that despite all of that, Russia has still not outed their "puppet".  

At every turn, the things happening in the real world and not in total fantasyland reveal collusion to be a literal joke.  It reveals Adam Schiff to be a complete fraud, and the whole thing to have been predicated on a ####### conspiracy theory.  
As usual you are defining the other side's various positions in a narrow way that suits your argument.  Most reasonable people never alleged the vast international conspiracy you are straw-manning.  Most simply claim that Trump welcomed and lied about Russia's support of him, and in doing so compromised his own position, and that there may also have been some collaboration on a smaller scale, say for example meeting in secret to discuss their mutual interest in defeating Clinton, sharing polling data, etc..

But aside from the standard-issue Greenwald/Tracey straw man you are attacking here, the idea that all this circumstantial evidence cuts only one way is beyond preposterous. There are literally dozens of counterexamples, including the fact that the Trump administration lifted sanctions against Derispaska's company. But really, all one needs to say is "Helsinki" and this list of circumstantial counterexamples is immediately overshadowed.

 
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A statement that the investigation did not establish particular facts does not mean there was no evidence of those facts.

We applied the term coordination in that sense when stating in the report that the investigation did not establish that the Trump Campaign coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.

That page, 1-2?
IOW, after throwing two years and the unlimited resources of the Federal government at looking, they did not find any collusion or conspiracy

 
Former national security advisor Mike Flynn has hired attorney Sidney Powell as his new counsel.

"I'm honored to be representing General Flynn, who i've long considered an American hero. The General and his family want to thank everyone across the country for their cards and contributions to his legal defense fund. He is going to continue to cooperate with the government, pursuant to his plea agreement," Powell told Hill.TV in a phone call. 
- eta - Actually Powell is a proponent of the Deep State theory.

 
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MCCARTHY, under questioning from Schiff, says he thinks FBI officials made mistakes on the Carter Page FISA, but not intentionally. “I don’t think anyone was acting in bad faith on the FISA warrant,” he said.

More MCCARTHY under questioning by Schiff: "I don’t know that there’s evidence [FBI officials] were trying to scuttle the Trump campaign."

***

Etc. This is a GOP witness.

 
This is why letting Trump define the story in terms of "collusion!" was such a bad move for politicians and the media.  IMO it really doesn't matter whether and to what degree they conspired with the Russians to commit illegal acts. As soon as the campaign welcomed Russian assistance and then lied about it (not to mention pushing forward with business interests in Russia and then lying about that too) they were compromised.  A president who can be exposed and embarrassed by a foreign adversary at any time if he crosses them is a far bigger deal than whether any of their actions violate federal criminal law.

 
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Schiff opening statement: "For those who have not yet read the Mueller report, and most have not, they might be astonished to learn that a finding of no collusion, much less a finding of no obstruction, is nowhere to be seen on any page, or in any passage, of the Mueller report."
This statement is correct. With regard to the IRA's social media exploits, Mueller found that certain members of the Trump campaign did cooperate in some ways, but didn't realize that the people they were cooperating with were Russian. They were fooled. That is a legal exoneration (since criminal coordination must be done knowingly). But with regard to the GRU's release of hacked materials, while Mueller was not able to prove coordination, he also was not able to establish that coordination didn't happen. The Stone stuff is redacted, so we don't know exactly what he found there. The Manafort stuff, though, likely amounted to coordination ... but evidence sufficient to establish coordination couldn't be obtained because Manafort, Kilimnick, Putin and various other persons who may have been able to provide such evidence all refused to cooperate with the investigation. That's not an exoneration. It's just a legal dead end.

(ETA: And I forgot to mention the Trump Tower meeting. That's another example of evidence of coordination, but insufficient evidence to press charges because (a) the participants might not have known that their conduct was illegal [in a rare situation where ignorance of the law is an excuse], and (b) the promised information would have had to be worth at least $2,000 to trigger a crime, and valuation would have been difficult.)

It's not correct to say that there was no evidence of coordination. There was evidence -- just not sufficient evidence to constitute proof beyond a reasonable doubt.

And there was obstruction up the wazoo.

 
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This statement is correct. With regard to the IRA's social media exploits, Mueller found that certain members of the Trump campaign did cooperate in some ways, but didn't realize that the people they were cooperating with were Russian. They were fooled. That is a legal exoneration (since criminal coordination must be done knowingly). But with regard to the GRU's release of hacked materials, while Mueller was not able to prove coordination, he also was not able to establish that coordination didn't happen. The Stone stuff is redacted, so we don't know exactly what he found there. The Manafort stuff, though, likely amounted to coordination ... but evidence sufficient to establish coordination couldn't be obtained because Manafort, Kilimnick, Putin and various other persons who may have been able to provide such evidence all refused to cooperate with the investigation. That's not an exoneration. It's just a legal dead end.

It's not correct to say that there was no evidence of coordination. There was evidence -- just not sufficient evidence to constitute proof beyond a reasonable doubt.

And there was obstruction up the wazoo.
Nope.  Barr said there wasn't.   And he is the top lawyer in the land!  So he must be right.

 
Hope Hicks to testify next week...but in private.

Sorry, but the Democrats are dopes here IMO. Don't they realize that when these people are allowed to testify behind closed doors, it means nothing? They're spinning their wheels.

 
You guys do know that you're setting yourselves up for yet another disappointment...right?

How many is that now?

Seriously...what will it take for you to believe that you have been lied to by the Democrats and the MSM?
Is it possible at all?  Will you ever believe it?  I don't think so.

You placed all your chips on Mueller and he crapped out so you just keep trying to roll again after everyone has left the table.

We all know that the plan is to keep this up through the 2020 election.
Will it stop when President Trump is a lame duck after the 2020 election?

Not likely.  

 
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You guys do know that you're setting yourselves up for yet another disappointment...right?

How many is that now?

Seriously...what will it take for you to believe that you have been lied to by the Democrats and the MSM?
Is it possible at all?  Will you ever believe it?  I don't think so.

You placed all your chips on Mueller and he crapped out so you just keep trying to roll again after everyone has left the table.

We all know that the plan is to keep this up through the 2020 election.
Will it stop when President Trump is a lame duck after the 2020 election?

Not likely.  
Which lies by the MSM and democrats?  Be specific.

 
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Better yet...show me the evidence that you've seen....not heard about.

That should narrow it down.
No...you made a claim and have been asked to support it.  

Ive made no claim in that post...have I?

 
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Slam dunk.

Predictable, if anything.
You made a claim that people here believed the lies. That is what was asked of you.  You have provided nothing. In addition lies made by the MSM and democrats was the first claim.  You’ve shown nothing.

Your slam dunk was rejected by the rim.  And yeah seeing my shadows in here is quite predictable as is your inability to back up bogus claims you have made.

 
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You made a claim that people here believed the lies. That is what was asked of you.  You have provided nothing. In addition lies made by the MSM and democrats was the first claim.  You’ve shown nothing.

Your slam dunk was rejected by the rim.  And yeah seeing my shadows in here is quite predictable as is your inability to back up bogus claims you have made.
...and struts around like he won.

 

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