Trump Watch

[ThunderIdeal]

Delete 

Edited April 23, 2017 by ThunderIdeal

[Halcyon Daze]

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/apr/27/trump-tax-plan-millions-small-businesses

 

Trump tax plan could save him millions under guise of helping small businesses

 

The structure of the Trump organization makes it a prime potential beneficiary – one estimate says the tax plan will save Donald Trump $65m a year in taxes.

 

A tax plan released by the White House on Wednesday could deliver many millions of dollars annually in tax savings to Donald Trump personally under the guise of helping small businesses, multiple tax experts have told the Guardian.

 

Chuck Marr, director of federal tax policy at the nonprofit Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, referred the Guardian to a paper in which he wrote that, “conservatively… the Trump plan would give the 400 highest-income households a tax break of about $9m each” per year.

 

Dean Baker, co-founder of the nonpartisan Center for Economic and Policy Research, estimated loosely – given the dearth of information about Trump’s income, assets and tax strategy – that “the Trump tax plan will save Donald Trump $65m a year in taxes”.

 

The mechanism by which Trump would claim those savings would be irrelevant for most small business owners, analysts said, despite the White House billing the tax plan as “helping the low- and middle-income families who have been left behind by this economy”.

 

 

 

[☽Ţ ҉ĥϋηϠ₡яღ☯ॐ€ðяئॐ♡Pϟiℓℴϟℴ]

 

 

Edited April 30, 2017 by ☽Ţ ҉ĥϋηϠ₡яღ☯ॐ€ðяئॐ♡Pϟiℓℴϟℴ

[WoodDragon]

I'm assuming that these have not been posted before (I'm still catching up...):

 

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCi38HMIvRpGgMJ0Tlm1WYdw

All his own words, but exposed for their shallowness by the simple expedient of adding sass.

And for extra chuckles:

 

 

 

[Halcyon Daze]

I finally figured out the missing piece of the Trump puzzle/ equation...

 

 

 

 

BUSH

 

 

 

+

 

 

 

CHENEY

 

 

 

 

+

 

 

 

NIXON

 

=

 

 

~TRUMP~

 

 

 

Edited June 9, 2017 by Halcyon Daze

[ThunderIdeal]

Oops ^ 

 

As yet I think theres a shortage of evidence.

 

 

[Halcyon Daze]

 

 

LOL

 

 

 

 

[Halcyon Daze]

http://www.news.com.au/world/president-donald-trump-faces-testimony-from-former-fbi-director-james-comey/news-story/248e2f3a3e52cb35880bb8b061b6d713

 

President Donald Trump faces testimony from former FBI director James Comey

 

PRESIDENT Donald Trump has claimed “total and complete vindication” after ousted FBI director James Comey said he was not personally under investigation in a probe into Russian interference in last year’s US election.

Comey — who was sensationally sacked by Mr Trump on May 9 — had taken the stand in a crucial Senate hearing, repeating explosive allegations that US President Donald Trump badgered him over the highly sensitive investigation Russia’s meddling in the 2016 election.

Trump, who did not post on his Twitter account as Comey appeared before the Senate intelligence committee, sent a tweet at daybreak Friday US time. In the post, the president said: “Despite so many false statements and lies, total and complete vindicaiton ... and WOW, Comey is a leaker.”

 

Trump was referring to Comey’s revelation that he had passed on to a friend a written memo he’d made detailing a meeting with Trump at the White House - and had asked a friend to give it to a reporter for the New York Times.

“I thought that might prompt the appointment of a special counsel”, Comey said. The ploy worked. The Russia investigation is now being handled by a high-powered special prosecutor.

Comey painted a devastating picture of an untrustworthy president, who at best unknowingly shred the norms of office by pressing him on the Russia probe, and at worst may have criminally obstructed justice.

 

TRUMP ADMINISTRATION LIED, DEFAMED FBI

James Comey says he doesn’t buy the reason he was fired, saying the Trump Administration has lied and defamed him.

Mr Comey said Mr Trump’s administration spread “lies, plain and simple” and “defamed” him and the FBI.

 

Mr Comey said he was “confused” by the explanation that decisions he made (namely making public an investigation into Hillary Clinton’s emails) during the 2016 election were the reason he was fired by Mr Trump.

“The explanations … the shifting explanations confused me and increasingly concerned me. They confused me because the president and I had had multiple conversations about my job both before and after he took office, and he had repeatedly told me I was doing a great job and hoped I would stay,” Mr Comey said.

“It confused me when I saw on television the president say he actually fired me because of the Russia investigation and learned again from the media that he was telling privately other parties that my firing had relieved great pressure on the Russia investigation.”

 

“I was also confused by the initial explanation offered publicly that I was fired because of the decisions I had made during the election year — that didn’t make sense to me,” he said.

“That didn’t make sense to me for a whole bunch of reasons including the time, and all of the water that had gone under the bridge since those hard decisions that had to be made. That didn’t make any sense to me,” the former FBI director said.

“And although the law required no reason at all to fire an FBI director, the administration then chose to defame me and, more importantly, the FBI, by saying the organisation was in disarray; that it was poorly led. That the workforce had lost confidence in its leader. Those were lies plain and simple.”

Watch: James Comey's testimony

COMEY TOOK NOTES BECAUSE HE FEARED TRUMP WOULD LIE

Mr Comey said after his first meeting with Mr Trump, he had a “gut feeling” that he should start taking notes of what was said in order to “protect the FBI”, something he never did with former presidents Obama or Bush.

When asked why he felt that was necessary, he replied, “a combination of things; I think the circumstances, the subject matter and the person I was interacting with.”

 

“The circumstances first; I was alone with the president-elect of the United States, soon to be president. The subject matter that I was talking about, matters that touch on the FBI’s core responsibility that relate to the president-elect personally. And then the nature of the person.

“I was honestly concerned that he might lie about the nature of our meeting and so I thought it really important to document. And the combination of things I’d never experienced before that had led me to believe I’ve got to write it down and I’ve got to write it down in a very detailed way.”

Deputy White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders told reporters to direct their questions to the president’s personal lawyer.

She was clear on one point, though — President Trump is not a liar.

“I can definitively say the president’s not a liar, and I think it’s frankly insulting that that question would be asked,” she said.

Mr Trump wanted Mr Comey to publicly state the private assurance he had given to the President that he was not the subject of any FBI probe amid widespread reports he was susceptible to blackmail for using Russian prostitutes.

 

Mr Comey told Mr Trump on three occasions there was no FBI investigation into the President and in his statement he reveals the pair’s conversations in awkward detail.

“The President said, “I need loyalty, I expect loyalty,” Mr Comey said of a January 27 dinner, in a written statement released ahead of his appearance before the hearing today.

“I didn’t move, speak, or change my facial expression in any way during the awkward silence that followed. We simply looked at each other in silence.”

Mr Comey said he tried to settle the conversation by instead pledging “honesty”, to which Mr Trump replied: “That’s what I want, honest loyalty”.

Mr Comey said the dinner was designed to “create some sort of patronage relationship”.

“My common sense told me that what’s going on here is he’s looking to get something in exchange for granting my request to stay in the job,” he told the hearing on Thursday.

Mr Comey said he felt “uneasy” about the loyalty pledge.

“The reason that Congress created a 10-year term (for the FBI director) is so that the director is not feeling as if they’re serving with political loyalty owed to any particular person,” he said.

“The statue of justice has a blindfold on because you’re not supposed to be peeking out to see whether your patron is pleased or not with what you’re doing.”

COMEY ‘STUNNED’ TRUMP ASKED HIM TO DROP FLYNN PROBE

Mr Comey said he was “stunned” when Mr Trump asked him to drop the bureau’s probe into ex-national security adviser Mike Flynn.

“I was so stunned by the conversation,” he said.

 

Asked by Democrat Senator Diane Feinstein why he just didn’t tell Mr Trump the conversation was inappropriate, Mr Comey said he probably should have.

“Maybe other people would be strong in that circumstance. I hope I never have another opportunity, [but] maybe if I did it again I would do it better,” he replied.

Instead, he only said, “I agree that Flynn was a good guy.”

KUSHNER BACK CHANNEL WOULD HAVE AIDED RUSSIA

Mr Comey also said Mr Trump’s senior adviser and son-in-law Jared Kushner would have helped Russian intelligence efforts if he had succeeded in setting up a “back-channel” line of communication with the Kremlin.

 

“The primary risk is obvious. You spare the Russians the cost and effort of having to break into our communication by using theirs and so make it a whole lot easier for them to capture all of your conversations and to use those to the benefit of Russia against the United States,” he said.

Mr Kushner is a person of interest in the special counsel’s criminal probe into Russia’s meddling in the election.

He allegedly approached Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak and inquired about establishing the line of communications using equipment at the Russian embassy.

COMEY LEAKED TRUMP MEETING MEMOS

Mr Comey admitted that he leaked his personal notes on his meetings with President Donald Trump to prompt the naming of a special prosecutor to lead the Russia probe.

He said he asked a friend at Columbia Law School to share his written recollection of those conversations with a reporter after Mr Trump fired him on May 9.

 

“I didn’t do it myself for a variety of reasons,” Mr Comey told the Senate Intelligence Committee. “But I asked him to, because I thought that might prompt the appointment of a special counsel” to conduct the investigation into the Trump campaign’s possible collusion with Russian meddling in the 2016 election, he said.

The New York Times published a report on the Comey memo on May 16, and the following day former FBI director Robert Mueller was named special counsel to take over the investigation.

Professor Daniel Richman confirmed that he provided the information to the media at Mr Comey’s request.

AG LYNCH ‘WORKING WITH CLINTONS’

Mr Comey said that he suspected former Attorney-General Loretta Lynch was in cahoots with the Hillary Clinton campaign last summer.

Ms Lynch, he said, told him not to refer to the probe into Mrs Clinton’s private email server as an “investigation.”

“She said just call it a matter. … That concerned me because that language tracked how the campaign was talking about the FBI’s work,” he said.

 

Former President Bill Clinton’s surprise meeting with Ms Lynch at an Arizona airport also prompted him to go public with results of the FBI probe into the email server.

“That was the thing that capped it for me, that I had to do something separately to protect the credibility of the investigation, which meant both the FBI and the Justice Department,” Mr Comey said.

Mr Comey announced last July that criminal charges were not warranted, angering Republicans.

COMEY: ‘LORDY, I HOPE THERE ARE TAPES’

Mr Comey also said he hoped that his private conversations with Donald Trump were recorded, as the president had suggested in a menacing tweet.

Mr Comey said he felt the need to document the interactions — during which he says Trump urged him to drop a probe into a former aide — for fear the president might “lie” about their meetings.

He directly addressed Trump’s suggestion, saying: “I’ve seen the tweet about tapes. Lordy, I hope there are tapes.”

Three days after he fired the FBI chief last month, Mr Trump tweeted: “James Comey better hope that there are no ‘tapes’ of our conversations before he starts leaking to the press!”

‘LORDY’ QUOTE GOES VIRAL

Meanwhile, Twitter users have latched on to Mr Comey’s use of “Lordy.”

“Lordy, I hope there are tapes,” Mr Comey said in referring to his meetings with Mr Trump.

The term quickly became a trending topic on Twitter.

 

TRUMP JR LIVE TWEETS COMEY TESTIMONY

Mr Trump managed to not give into any temptation to live tweet Mr Comey’s testimony, however his son Donald Jr couldn’t help himself.

 

Mr Trump Jr disputed Mr Comey’s suggestion that he was unclear about whether the president was putting pressure on him to drop the investigation into General Michael Flynn.

“Knowing my father for 39 years when he ‘orders or tells’ you to do something there is no ambiguity, you will know exactly what he means,” he wrote.

Mr Trump was reportedly bunkered down with a team of lawyers in his personal dining room at the White House, just off the Oval Office, ABC News reported.

 

 

 

 

[ThunderIdeal]

 trump is unscathed by the testimony which meanwhile reveals that obamas AG, lynch, told comey that Clintons emails were a matter not an investigation, leading him to make the recommendation not to prosecute.  It exposes an entire mess of politicisation.

 

And by his own testimony the only person he was ever pressured by was Loretta lynch

 

He decided Clinton wasnt a hill worth dying on 

 

This is what happens when you run with a narrative and push and push until eventually the lack of evidence is revealed.  trump has been dragged through the mud with all that entails but emerges clean.

 

[ThunderIdeal]

http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/the-administration/336962-dems-dreams-dashed-as-comey-testimony-clears-trump

 

Ooh thats gotta hurt

 

[Sallubrious]

It turns out malcolm turncoat fancies himself as a trump impersonator, but only when he thinks it won't be aired publicly.

 

All his yes men arse kissers thought it was hilarious at the time, I think it's funny too but not for what he said, the fact he got caught making an international arse clown of himself does it for me.

 

Good one king bozo!

Edited June 15, 2017 by Sallubrious

[Halcyon Daze]

I never knew how true Obama's predictions of a Trump White House could actually be.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[ThunderIdeal]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2017/07/27/the-quest-to-prove-collusion-is-crumbling/?utm_term=.ab86782f3ac7

 

From wapo no less

 

But i do get the sense that in the battle to remove or cripple trump, either he or his enemies are soon to gain the upper hand.  50/50.

 

Edit: mind you my last few calls were duds.  Maybe the grapple will continue.

Edited July 31, 2017 by ThunderIdeal

[DiscoStu]

iit doesn't matter if there's something there or not. they'll run with whatever they can until the midterms. 

[Halcyon Daze]

If there's war with China, his own party will likely impeach him.

 

In favour of someone capable.

Edited July 31, 2017 by Halcyon Daze

[ThunderIdeal]

Nearly three quarters of syria became refugees and something like one in forty dead.  ISIS prevailed in syria because syrian army was worn down by proxy opposition forces: foreign sunni jihadists armed and trained by CIA programs with help from turkey and saudi Arabia.  Trump ended this program.  Thats one positive development.  Meanwhile the latest sanctions against russia (strongly opposed by allies in europe) passed with almost no resistance meaning a Trump veto would be pointless and only fan the flames of russia collusion narrative.  If Trump wants to normalise relations with russia, so far his hands have been tied.

 

In other news while russia collusion narrative loses steam some republicans seem motivated to seek justice against the likes of loretta lynch, susan rice, samantha powers, and others.  Some pakistani DNC IT staffers are embroiled in a major controversy which looks damn juicy and quite damning but dont count on reading about this in the msm.  the democrats stink so bad.  Theyre just now realising they have no platform worth a shit so expect some changes there, maybe a mix of bernie and the don.

 

I think history will show trump's gravest error was taking credit for stockmarket highs.  this means he will own the crash too.  Maybe he knows something we dont.... Dovish fed to infinity?  Some say trump is part of a master plot to discredit populist conservative leaders for all time.  I still cant tell.  hes had some really kickass moments and others are just confusing or embarassing.

 

(there was supposed to be a link here.  Oh well)

 

Not much value in posting this link but its a brief assesment of trumps current predicament.

Edited August 6, 2017 by ThunderIdeal

[DiscoStu]

who leaked that transcript to wapo? it's a pretty egregious breach of trust.

[ThunderIdeal]

 

The gist was leaked at the time anyway its old news now (aussie media rehashing it all weekend)

 

Some people think some of these leaks are instigated by trump himself, which is possible.

 

The new chief of staff is going to bring some order to the white house for sure, kelly is easily my favourite of trumps appointed generals.  

 

Things definitely extremely crazy in both camps.  Interestingly ANY testimony given to Muellers grand jury can legally be passed on to the media.

[ThunderIdeal]

Soetoro watch (thats obama watch)

 

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/451053/not-comeys-decision-exonerate-hillary-obamas-decision

 

It has leaked out that comey was drafting h clintons exhoneration long before he issued it, before critical phases of the investigation were complete.

 

Obama directed comey to exhonerate Hillary!

 

Why?  Because clinton would have been communicating with his sec state about classified matters, and it would have come out that soetoro i mean obama was guilty of the same crimes

 

 

at this stage who cares.  I just want to destroy the shining image of idolised commies i mean leaders.

 

Interesting because soetoros presidency handover letter to trump also leaked and it says nothing interesting except dont interfere with institutions such as democracy, rule of law and separation of powers.  Not sure if these his interference legally qualifies as such but in principle, certainly.  

 

He and his team were up to some real slimeball stuff during the election and i wont be surprised if lynch, rice, clinton and maybe even soetoro all go down for it eventually.

 

Back to trump watch, i must harshly criticise his plan to expand the war in afghanistan.  I can understand that nobody wants all the lost lives to count for nothing but what about futurr lives?  Trump wasnt elected to continue raising tensions with russia and continue overseas military actions but that has happened.  he is failing in what could have been the greatest legacy of any recent president.

 

Actually just found this which is a pretty good overview on afghanistan

 

https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2017/09/04/endless-regional-chaos-american-presence-in-afghanistan-explained.html

Edited September 5, 2017 by ThunderIdeal

[freakazoid]

Sooo much butthurt over the new book, makes me grin.....

 

”I am a very stable genius....” hahahahaha

[Halcyon Daze]

26 minutes ago, freakazoid said:

 

”I am a very stable genius....” hahahahaha

 

 

That's just trump-talk for "I am an unstable imbecile"

 

 

Tell us something we don't know. ..

Edited January 7, 2018 by Halcyon Daze

[Halcyon Daze]

So far all he's done is taken away environmental protections, taken away internet nuetrality, taken away health care for millions, brought us to the brink of nuclear war, locked in a huge increase in America's debt, and given himself a huge tax cut. 

 

 

I'd hate to be a Trumper lately, where is their heroic saviour now.

 

The sad thing is that many of them maintain denial rather than putting their country first. 

Edited January 7, 2018 by Halcyon Daze

[Siggor]

Money/power hungry narcissist has a pretty much one way view he can say all the shit he wants about people/insitutions but when opinions are turned around onto him, holy shit does the inner raging child rears its ugly head.

The sad thing is that if he hasn't been impeached by now it doesn't look like it's going to happen.

Will have to wait for Kanye 2020. 

[DiscoStu]

"This book filled with imaginary truth and outright lies WILL BE THE END OF TRUMPS PRESIDENCY FOR GOOD THIS TIME"

[Halcyon Daze]

Trump is off golfing AGAIN **SMH**

 

 

"I'm going to be working for you. I'm not going to have time to go play golf." --Donald J. Trump, August, 2016

 

 

http://trumpgolfcount.com/