Trump Jr./Russian lawyer meeting: Jr. knew info was part of Russian Gov effort

[ProudModerate2]

This smells bad.

[ProudModerate2]

The meeting was only about "the adoption of Russian children," MY ASS !
trump jr must think of us as idiots, if he thinks we are going to swallow that not only he, but also Kushner and Manafort would want to attend a meeting to discuss "adoptions."
LOL.

[ProudModerate2]

Richard Painter (ethics lawyer under GW Bush) says that this borders on treason:

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Yep.
I completely agree.

[ProudModerate2]

This could end-up becoming a big revelation for Mueller and his investigation.
Hopefully 1 or all 3 of them get the slammer !

[ProudModerate2]

IF THIS TURNS-OUT TO BE TRUE, THIS IS HUGE & DEVASTATING NEWS !! Per the New York Times article :

Email Is Said to Indicate Clinton Dirt Was Part of Russian Plan to Aid Trump.

• The message was sent by the man who helped broker a meeting between Donald Trump Jr. and a Russian lawyer to discuss information damaging to Hillary Clinton.
• As it was described to The Times by three people, the email indicates that the Russian government was the source of the information.

Link: https://www.nytimes.com/?action=click&contentCollection=Politics&region=TopBar&module=HomePage-Button&pgtype=article&WT.z_jog=1&hF=t&vS=undefined

[ProudModerate2]

Oh EnglishPete! EnglishPete! Come out and pllllaaaaayyyyyy

Oh don't worry, he will be posting soon.
He has to call-in and check with his "trump support hotline" for the latest phony-baloney counter-defense statements. He will try to sway us, amaze us and startle us with his usual hogwash lines of excuses for this latest mess.
It does wonders on fooling many ignorant trump supporters, but as usual most Atlas members can see right through his bullsh*t.

[ProudModerate2]

To me the craziest thing about this line of reporting is the source is either in the White House or a close associate/friend of Junior.

Sometimes, when you know something is so awful, and that it can or does have negative effects on so many (US gov, US citizens and our allies), you just cant hold back. Loyalty becomes second place.
You feel so guilty and you just have to reveal the information. Usually these people have a higher set of personal morals/ethics, which is completely missing from scum like trump, trump jr, Bannon, etc.

This can be compared to actual stories where parents who know of their son/daughter murdering someone, and they reveal such info to the authorities. They even have close ties to their child, but they cant hide such a heinous act.

[ProudModerate2]

BWAHAHAHAHA

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OMG !
The trump family and their campaign associates, are amateurs.
The only thing worse is an actual trail of blood left behind as evidence.

[ProudModerate2]

Democrats say they want to "follow the facts wherever they lead". That's complete BS. They already came up with the conclusion that Trump is a traitor and they have been trying to make the facts fit their narrative.

The news about Jr.'s meeting with the Russians to collude on digging up dirt on Clinton came from White House sources, not the Democrats.

I'm not saying there's no smoke. I'm just saying that Democrats already convicted Trump of treason in their minds long ago, and no matter where things end up, they will always consider Trump to be a traitor who got away.

Who says trump is "getting away" with it ?
He, his family and his administration are currently paying severely for anything and everything related to Russia.
And it's not over yet. I'm sure there are more heads to roll, including jail time and resignations and possibly impeachment.

[ProudModerate2]

You guys realize your "collusion" narrative is hilarious since no one is better at digging up dirt than the Clintons, right?  They're just smarter about it.  Every campaign has a dirt digging operation, from your local councilman to the top doggie.

Yes, every candidate performs opposition research.  If this were ordinary opposition research, nobody would care about that. But in this case, we have what looks like use of criminally obtained material by a foreign government's intelligence service.  Do you really not see a difference?

Of course, I just haven't seen what you see.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2017/07/11/the-medias-mass-hysteria-over-collusion-is-out-of-control/?tid=sm_tw&utm_term=.cfee34b5c234

There Are None So Blind
As Those Who Will Not See

[ProudModerate2]

You guys realize your "collusion" narrative is hilarious since no one is better at digging up dirt than the Clintons, right?  They're just smarter about it.  Every campaign has a dirt digging operation, from your local councilman to the top doggie.

Yes, every candidate performs opposition research.  If this were ordinary opposition research, nobody would care about that. But in this case, we have what looks like use of criminally obtained material by a foreign government's intelligence service.  Do you really not see a difference?

Of course, I just haven't seen what you see.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2017/07/11/the-medias-mass-hysteria-over-collusion-is-out-of-control/?tid=sm_tw&utm_term=.cfee34b5c234

I'll be the first to admit this is far from proven at this point.  But the information so far is troubling, and keeps becoming more so.  Want to meet me halfway and acknowledge that it's a possibility and bears further investigation?

If there is an actual email, then it's clear evidence that can be proven to be authentic and that none of its contents have been manipulated.
This is not like a verbal conversation between two people, that can be disputed as to the exact details of what was said (barring a taping devise).

Remember, the NYT article specifically states :

• As it was described to The Times by three people, the email indicates that the Russian government was the source of the information.
  

So it seems that trump jr (and thus also Kushner and Manafort) KNEW BEFORE THE MEETING TOOK PLACE, that the information they were to receive was from the Russian government (or Russian KGB/FSB agencies).
This is treason !

[ProudModerate2]

Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) says Donald Trump Jr.'s meeting is part of an evolving storyline, and there will be "many more shoes that will drop."
When CNN's Manu Raju asked how serious this story was, McCain said he didn't know but it needs to be "pursued and looked at."

[ProudModerate2]

There will be a White House press briefing today -- but not on camera.

The White House just released its updated schedule today, and it includes an off-camera press briefing at 2 p.m. with Sarah Huckabee Sanders.
Some questions you can expect from reporters today? The NYT report and the high-stakes Senate health care bill.

[ProudModerate2]

Russian lawyer: Trump aides "so badly" wanted damaging info on Clinton.

Natalia Veselnitskaya, the Russian lawyer who is at the center of the controversial Trump Jr. meeting, told NBC's Today show that Trump aides wanted damaging information about Hillary Clinton "so badly."
"It's quite possible that maybe they were looking for such information, they wanted it so badly," Veselnitskaya said through a translator.

Here's that clip: http://snpy.tv/2uek4X6

[ProudModerate2]

lol:

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LOL.
What a bunch of ....

[ProudModerate2]

https://www.axios.com/inside-the-white-house-scramble-on-the-trump-jr-emails-2457466929.html

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Seems like a reach, and trying to prosecute a former president and former high-level administration officials for something like that could get real dicey. Not to mention it sets a pretty bad precedent - when the scandal gets too much, just start prosecuting your political opponents!

At first I thought "No, they would never pull this style of crap."
But then you think, "Well, this is trump we are talking about. He, his advisors and his administration are a bunch of lunatic idiots."

[ProudModerate2]

Oh .... and by the way ...
I just love the New York Times !
I think I'm going to marry them. LOL.

[ProudModerate2]

Don Jr. on Hannity playing down the Russia meetings as just a favor he did for an acquaintance. Says that nothing substantive happened in the 20-minute meeting and he never told his father about it because it wasn't important.

Considering Trump announced a "big speech" on Hillary Clinton's misdeeds just hours after the meeting was confirmed, it sounds like junior is lying (not very surprising here)

You got to be a fool to believe that trump sr did not know about the meeting.
There is no doubt in my mind, that jr (and possibly Kushner and Manafort) informed the donald about the details of the meeting BEFORE it took place.
I mean seriously .... from jr's own words in the email, there was huge excitement from the prospect of obtaining damaging information about Hillary. This would have been shared with daddy.

[ProudModerate2]

Atlas members,
Don't let EnglishPete derail this thread.
If his hogwash theories are not worthy of a response, don't respond.
If he tries to steer the topic somewhere else, don't respond.

[ProudModerate2]

You must be logged in to read this quote.

https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/885109663217352704

lol wow

Does donald understand how much of an idiot he sounds with such ridiculous Tweets ?
And does he care ?

[ProudModerate2]

For anyone who hasn't bother to actually read the emails Trump Jr released (as, ironically, Del Tachi over in the thread on facts apparently has not), I've put together some of the key messages here.

The fact of the matter is, at this time, there is actually very, very little that has been established as fact in the Trump/Russia case that actually implicates the President in illegally colluding with the Russian government to undermine the American electoral process.

His son, son-in-law, and campaign manager (who is also a long-time tenant) went to a meeting for the express purposes of getting damaging information on his opponent from a foreign government. Later that evening, Trump himself promised such information was forthcoming. At the very least he is directly implicated in attempting to collude with the Russian government to intervene in the US Presidential election.

Meeting with a random lawyer from Russia who may or may not have had any intelligible information on Hillary Clinton does not demonstrate a willingness to collude with the Russian government in order to break the law.

Random lawyer from Russia =/= Russian government

It would make no difference if this lawyer was from Russia, Nigeria, Holland or Florida.

Here are key parts of the email exchange, taken from the NYT's more readable presentation. If you doubt the contents or context, feel free to look at them else where, including on Jr's own twitter.
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/07/11/us/politics/donald-trump-jr-email-text.html
https://twitter.com/donaldjtrumpjr/status/884789418455953413







This is Trump Jr, Kushner, and Manafort going to a meeting specifically to meet with someone described to them as a representative of the Russian government with damaging information on Hillary Clinton that would be provided to them by the Russian government. What she turned out to be or have is certainly relevant, but it does not change the fact than Trump's son, son-in-law, and campaign manager specifically went to a meeting where they believed they could obtain damaging information on Clinton sourced from the Russian government.  

I have not seen a single post from a trumpist to defend any of this.
There is a whole-lota deflection, like pointing to a bird sitting on the street light pole, and trying to change the topic.
They are ignoring the facts that are in black and white print, and the emails were even supplied to the public/media by trump jr himself.
They're stumped. So they reduce themselves to acting like children and playing games with the truth. This should sound familiar, as the orange-haired clown is man-child number 1.

(Thanks for posting this summarization, Ghost of Ruin.)

[ProudModerate2]

Atlas members,
Don't let EnglishPete derail this thread.
If his hogwash theories are not worthy of a response, don't respond.
If he tries to steer the topic somewhere else, don't respond.

[ProudModerate2]

The fact that Don Jr. may have technically broken campaign finance laws is small potatoes, and the FEC is toothless anyway.

The real significance of these developments is that we've crossed the Rubicon from "no evidence of collusion" to "clear evidence of attempted collusion". Let's see where the evidence leads from here.

Ding ding ding

Well, f*** me sideways !
Did Santander just say that ? ("clear evidence of attempted collusion")
Someone pinch me .... I must be dreaming or something.

[ProudModerate2]

The Russians are our advisory.
To most of the citizens of the US, the Russian government is seen as an enemy and they can not be trusted.
Most recently, the Russians have been committing acts that go against democracy as the US and many other democratic nations (including Europe) see it.
They should not be meddling in our elections. Period. Even our government believes in this, otherwise they (Congress) would not be implementing harsh sanctions against Russia for doing so.
This is clear evidence of the trump campaign colluding with Russia to damage the Hillary campaign. Something the trump campaign kept denying over and over and over again.
One thing is clear, the trump family and their campaign have lied numerous times.

[ProudModerate2]

Trump-world's new party line seems to be that there's nothing wrong with American political candidates working with foreign governments to tip the outcomes of American elections.

OK, so then why were Tillerson and Haley saying just a few days ago that Trump confronted Putin over election interference and that he wanted "non-interference" in our elections?

http://www.politico.com/story/2017/07/08/haley-russia-election-meddling-240323
http://www.npr.org/2017/07/07/535832230/tillerson-trump-confronts-putin-over-russian-election-meddling

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Is the interference of foreign governments in American elections something that we should regard as a problem or not?

If you expect trumpist, trump and/or his administration to be consistent on anything .... forget it.