“This life’s hard, but it’s harder if you’re stupid.” — George V. Higgins, The Friends of Eddie Coyle
Dick Cheney served Ronald Reagan as Secretary of Defense. Later, when George W. Bush won the nomination, Dubya asked Dick to do a search for the best man to be the Vice President on his ticket. Dick Cheney reported that the best man for the job was – Dick Cheney.
Maybe that was the first time that W. got played by Cheney, but history tells us it wasn’t the last. When W. was elected, sort of, Cheney served as Veep. Cheney has been a consistent voice of conservatism. Except, that is, for his rather liberal position on gay rights, but that’s another story. I haven’t liked him much, and I didn’t care for his comment about having had “other priorities” rather than serve in the Vietnam War.
Cheney was heard from again this week. On March 28, 2017, Dick said, in regard to Russian meddling in the U.S. election of 2017, “in some circles that would be considered an act of war.” Hmm. It’s known they meddled, what is not known is if there was collusion between the Trump people and Russia. Maybe Cheney is not too pleased with the coziness of the current (Republican) administration and the Russkies. One can’t help but wonder why so many Trumpkins had so much contact with Putin and the Gang. Why so comfy? What would Ronald Reagan say about all this?
If there is nothing nefarious going on, why the lies about contact with the Russians? Why did Manafort get fired? Why did Flynn get fired? Flynn’s lies seem to have been known well before his firing. Something doesn’t smell quite right.
I must say Devin Nunes’ behavior is troubling. He’s head of the U.S. House of Representatives Intelligence Committee, and is charged with investigating some of this stuff. And yet, when he learns something that might be of interest to Don and his pals, he runs over to the White House and informs Trump of findings. During the course of my 34-year career I did more than a few investigations. I never shared findings with subjects of investigations until the investigation was complete. This is not anything to boast. It is standard procedure for anyone doing investigation.
Why did Nunes cancel the hearing when Sally Yates was scheduled to provide testimony? Yates was the Acting U.S. Attorney General in the new Trump Administration. She was fired for her position contrary to Trump’s immigration ban. Sean Spicer says the White House would welcome her testimony. It doesn’t really appear that way. Would Spicer say something that wasn’t entirely true?
Trump is unqualified for the job, and he seems to give every indication that he is quite uninterested in it. He loves his little platitudes, but he stays right on the surface. Recently he said, “Who knew health care is so hard?” Then, also on March 28th, that “health care is easy.” Does he still stand by his claim that the President Obama “wiretapped” him? Or is he crafting an apology for the odd claim, which he tweeted four times.
He’s our president. He lost the vote of the American people by 3 million, but he won the Electoral College, so there we have it. There are people who can help him. He needs to listen to some of the more mature voices.
Trump associates having had Russia connections; a partial list:
Paul Manafort, Jeff Sessions, Michael Flynn, Jared Kushner, Roger Stone, Carter Page
Yes It is an act of War!
“Trump associates having had Russia connections; a partial list:
Paul Manafort, Jeff Sessions, Michael Flynn, Jared Kushner, Roger Stone, Carter Page”
As usual I found your comments interesting, but somewhat one sided.
Here is part of an article I read about the Clinton campaign’s Russian ties:
“Still, those pushing the narrative of troubling ties to Russia lose all credibility by wholly ignoring the far deeper and more troubling relationships the Clintons and their closest aides have maintained with Russian government officials for years, including while they were in public office. Unlike the revelations so far concerning Russian ties in the Trump camp, the Clinton deals involved hundreds of millions of dollars and enormous favors that benefitted Russian interests.
Bill and Hillary Clinton received large sums of money directly and indirectly from Russian officials while Hillary Clinton was Secretary of State. Bill Clinton was paid a cool $500,000 (well above his normal fee) for a speech in Moscow in 2010. Who footed the bill? An investment firm in Moscow called Renaissance Capital, which boasts deep ties to Russian intelligence. The Clinton Foundation itself took money from Russian officials and Putin-connected oligarchs. They also took donations from:
•Viktor Vekselberg, a Putin confidant who gave through his company, Renova Group
• Andrey Vavilov, a former Russian government official who was Chairman of SuperOx, a research company that was part of the “nuclear Cluster” at the Russian government’s Skolkovo research facility
• Elena Baturina, the wife of the former Mayor of Moscow, who apparently gave them money through JSC Inteco, an entity that she controls
Then there is the glaring fact that the Clinton Foundation also scored $145 million in donations from nine shareholders in a Canadian uranium company called Uranium One that was sold to the Russian government in 2010. The deal required the approval of several federal government agencies, including Hillary Clinton’s State Department. The deal allowed Rosatom, the Russian State Nuclear Agency, to buy assets that amounted to 20 percent of American uranium. Rosatom, by the way controls the Russian nuclear arsenal.
Equally troubling: some of those donations were hidden and not disclosed by the Clintons. President Obama required the Clinton Foundation to disclose all contributions as a condition of Hillary Clinton becoming Secretary of State. But that did not happen. The only reason the hidden donations ever came to light is because we uncovered them by combing through Canadian tax records.
Everyone got what they wanted in this deal: the uranium investors made a nice profit; the Russians acquired a strategic asset; and the Clinton Foundation bagged a lot of money.
It seems strange that while some in Congress are eager to investigate the activities of General Mike Flynn and his contacts with Russia, they have no interest in looking into a transaction in which the Clinton Foundation received a staggering $145 million. It’s that kind of inconsistency that saps all credibility from those raising these issues.
Beyond the Clintons themselves, there is also the troubling case of one of their closest aides, John Podesta. He served as Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign chairman. Podesta didn’t just have conversations with Russian officials. He went into business with the Russian government while he was advising Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State.
In 2011, John Podesta joined the executive board of a small energy company called Joule Unlimited. Two months after he joined the board, the Russian government invested one billion rubles (approximately $35 million) into the company. The money came from a Russian government investment fund called Rusnano. What is Rusnano? It is a fund started in 2007 by Vladimir Putin and has been described by Russian Education and Science Minister Andrei Fursenko as “Putin’s Child.”
I have to say, Russian involvement in our election was almost to be expected, after Hillary’s pronouncement of the election of Putin in the Soviet Union. Another quote:
“When mass protests against Russian President Vladimir Putin erupted in Moscow in December 2011, Putin made clear who he thought was really behind them: Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
With the protesters accusing Putin of having rigged recent elections, the Russian leader pointed an angry finger at Clinton, who had issued a statement sharply critical of the voting results. “She said they were dishonest and unfair,” Putin fumed in public remarks, saying that Clinton gave “a signal” to demonstrators working “with the support of the U.S. State Department” to undermine his power. “We need to safeguard ourselves from this interference in our internal affairs,” Putin declared.”
In my opinion, America has long been a provocateur, when it comes to trying to interfere with elections in other countries and setting up regimes that will bend to our will. Is it no wonder, whether we like it or not, that others would try to interfere in our own elections? Seems kind of hypocritical to be so outraged, while turning a blind eye to our own interference. Truth be told, I think Putin is not so much for Trump as he was so against Hillary. In other words, Trump was just the lesser of two evils.
One would have to be naïve to think that no other country would try to interfere in our elections or at least have a preference as to who Americans would elect as President. What is more alarming to me is that it is now coming to light that Nixon was not the only culprit when it comes to trying to use his Presidential Power to sway an election. The Democrats are trying very hard to pivot from the use of intelligence agencies by Obama, to influence the last election, to keeping up a narrative of Trump collusion with the Russians, to win the last Presidential Election. Even after all intelligence agencies have stated that there is no evidence of Trump Campaign collusion with Putin or any Russian agencies.
In fact, Evelyn N. Farkas a former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Russia/Ukraine/Eurasia during the Obama administration confirmed the fact that Obama used the intelligence agencies to spy on the Trump campaign. By the way, they found zero evidence of wrong doing or ‘Russian influence’.
As one of my favorite radio broadcasters closed with; “And that is the rest of the story!!”
Mr. Moras,
Bob,
Well done. President Obama placed four thousand more political people in government than before, an increase from 5 to 9 thousand. Many of the political appointees went to the intelligence agencies. The Democrats are blowing smoke as you so very clearly pointed out, a smoke screen to mask what they did in using intelligence agencies against Americans inside America, in violation of the law.
And what was even more devastating were the Judicial appointments that Harry Reid used the “Nuclear Option” to appoint. Some may say he was rather short sighted in devising that option for judicial appointments, but Trump is suffering the consequence of those Judicial appointments right now, as we can see with the judicial over reach and obstruction of the Immigration & Refugee Ban.
Would it not be fitting and ironic if Trump were to relocate and settle those Syrian Refugees in Hawaii? It would be fitting if he did so, after that unconstitutional decision by that Circuit Court , to let Hawaii suffer the burden of taking care of them and watching a portion of that island turn into a ghetto or to suffer a terrorist attack. Seems fitting to me that the concern shown by that court/judge should be rewarded with some responsibility for that decision.