Tag: manafort

Narratives crumble on eventful Tuesday

First let’s talk about media censorship.  As we’ve documented, reporters like CNN’s Jim Acosta went crazy when Trump suggested Fake News was the enemy of the people.  Over 200 newspapers wrote coordinated editorials attacking Trump based on the narrative that he was anti-Press.  But in West Virginia, Trump shot down that narrative by going after social media censors.  “I would rather have fake news than have anybody — including liberals, socialists, anything –than have anybody stopped and censored,” Trump said.  He added warnings about the dangers of censoring opposing viewpoints.

Trump makes statement opposing censorship of any viewpoints, including liberals

The Left is frothing at the mouth over convictions of Paul Manafort and Michael Cohen.  But there’s very little chance it will amount to anything.  The media also seems to be confused into thinking that paying people for non-disclosure agreements of affairs is somehow illegal.  What was illegal was Cohen submitting the payoff to one of Trump’s companies as some sort of expense reimbursement.  For investigators to even begin to think they have a crime to charge Trump with, they have to get evidence beyond Cohen’s unreliable testimony.  But beyond that, Trump can’t be indicted.  He can only be impeached if evidence of criminal activity can be proven.  An impeachment vote won’t pass with the current House makeup and even after November there is no way the Senate will have 75 yes votes on impeachment.

But more importantly, the Russian collusion narrative is once again proven to be dead.  Manafort’s convictions are all for pre-Trump campaign financial crimes that have nothing to do with Trump.  Despite Cohen’s willingness to sing like a bird to Mueller, he had nothing to offer when it comes to Russia.  These two were literally the best hope Mueller had of ever having anything on Trump when it comes to Russia.  Both flipped.  Neither one had anything to offer.  There was no Russian collusion with Trump.

Trump could be in political trouble, but won’t be impeached

In another Russia related story that the media is dutifully ignoring, Rick Scott announced Tuesday that the Department of Homeland Security and FBI informed him that there is no evidence that Russia has infiltrated the Florida election system.  This was a wild and baseless claim made by his opponent Sen. Bill Nelson.  Nelson provided no evidence for the claims, but seemed to be indicating that it was classified.  After being called out on his claim by even the Washington Post, Nelson got quiet but hasn’t apologized for lying.

DHS and FBI confirm Bill Nelson lied about Russian meddling in Florida

Manafort and Cohen Guilty

On Tuesday, Paul Manafort was found guilty on 8 of the 18 charges against him.  The jury was hung on the other 10 charges.  All of the charges were related to Manafort’s actions before working with the Trump campaign.  They included tax and bank fraud and hiding a foreign account.  This was when Manafort was working with the Podesta Group.  None of the charges had any relation to Russian collusion or the 2016 election.

Michael Cohen plead guilty in a plea deal to tax and bank fraud and is facing 3-5 years in jail.  Cohen was Trump’s personal attorney.  While this had nothing to do with Russia, collusion, or election meddling, there is a charge with Cohen that could touch Trump.  Cohen is charged with two counts of illegal campaign contributions related to his paying off two porn stars who had alleged affairs with Trump.  The key here is that in Cohen’s plea he said he was directed by the candidate to make those payments.

If Trump directed Cohen to pay off Stormy Daniels, and then reimbursed Cohen from the campaign, that could be trouble for Trump.  However, if Cohen was paid by Trump’s company as a reimbursement as deputy US attorney Robert Khuzami explained, it could result in nothing more than an IRS issue for the President.  Even then, a prosecutor would have to prove that Trump knew Cohen’s invoice was fraudulent.  Cohen is less than trustworthy as a witness and had great incentive to rat on Trump.

Cohen also indicated that he would be willing to testify to Mueller that Trump knew about the Trump Tower meeting between his son and a Russian attorney, but there doesn’t seem to be anything illegal about that meeting even if he did.

The two biggest takeaways from these huge stories is that Russian collusion still has not materialized, but that Trump likely has not been honest about his affair with Stormy Daniels.  That leaves Trump in the same boat as Bill Clinton in 1998, but without the perjury or obstruction of justice.

Ocasio-Cortez bans the press so the people will feel “safe”

It wasn’t Trump who banned the media from a recent townhall.  Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez banned the media from a recent press conference claiming that it was a “non-story” and that she did it so that her potential constituents could “feel safe discussing sensitive issues in a threatening political time.”  So far no one in the media has thought to ask her if she thinks the press are the “enemy of the people”.  But many media members weren’t buying her reasons.

Ocasio-Cortez bans the press so the people can feel safe

James Clapper, Leon Panetta, and several other former CIA directors and Obama administration big wigs joined 70 former CIA leaders in ridiculing Trump for taking away John Brennan’s security clearance.  Apparently their argument is that former intelligence officials should be able to use their unclassified information to hit the President with partisan attacks.  However, security clearance is usually maintained for those who “need to know” so that their successors can go to them for help and information.  But it is doubtful that anyone from the Trump administration is going to be going to hostile John Brennan for help.

Former intel agents upset about Brennan’s clearance being revoked

The jury in the Manafort trial is home for the weekend, but Judge Ellis is not revealing any information about their identities.  Apparently the jury had expressed to him that they feared their identities being released.  That’s probably a good move.  The media and public opinion has already condemned Manafort, and any verdict that sets him free is sure to cause riots.  As it is, the Manafort trial has been a disappointment for many on the Left.  He is in trouble for tax and bank fraud, but the massive Russian collusion has once again failed to materialize.

Manafort jury fears the press

8/10/2018: Ohio sets record for 116 year old voters

An investigation by Accountability In Government has revealed that Ohio’s 12th district has about 170 voters who are at least 116 years old.  Some were as old as 216.  The birthdates from the 2016 report were either 1/1/1900 or 1/1/1800.  While this could be as simple as a computer error or human error, it reflects a system that desperately needs review and repair.  However, Trump’s election commission was shuttered after months of Democrat obstruction. A study showed that 6.4% of the nation’s approximately 20 million illegal aliens managed to vote in 2016.

Voter rolls in Ohio’s 12th filled with issues

Another day, another harsh smack down from Judge Ellis in the Manafort trial.  Ellis has daily rebuked the prosecution for going off topic, bringing up meaningless points, emphasizing Manafort’s wealth, and other errors.  Ellis did apologize for one of his remarks, but continued today to knock the prosecution for going off topic.  The prosecution has attempted to use Manafort’s wealth to paint him in a negative light and to focus on confusing procedural issues to muddy the waters.  At one point Judge Ellis hit them for spending time talking about Manafort’s clothes and other aspects of his lavish lifestyle.  Being rich is not a crime.

Judge Ellis chastises Manafort prosecution for 8th day

Islamic terrorists were caught running a camp in New Mexico where they were training children to be school shooters.  The investigation began after one of the men at the camp abducted his son from foster care.  The son later died and was buried at the camp.  The 11 children found at the camp were also close to starvation.  At the bottom of the article, CNN mentions that the sheriff characterized them as “extremists of the Muslim belief”.

Islamic child terrorist training camp discovered in New Mexico

Who colluded with Russia?

It’s time to play spot the criminal.  Who colluded with Russia?  See if you can figure it out.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Hillary Clinton is the only person in the story who actually colluded with the Russians to try to meddle with the election.  She used her contacts in the Obama administration to get the phony information to the friendly FBI agents who were out to stop Trump.  The Trump Russia dossier bought and paid for by Clinton, and created by a British spy working with Russian agents was deemed “salacious and unverified” by none other than former FBI director James Comey.  If we are going to accuse anyone of Russian collusion, it has to be Hillary Clinton.

Need to Know 8/2/18

More winning for the Trump economy.  Incomes rose at the highest rate in over a decade this past year.  Generally in an economic recovery wages lag behind.  But with the fast drop in unemployment, it’s become harder to find good workers without paying a premium.  The free market is once again showing that minimum wages don’t need the strong arm of government to go up.

Trump economy gives workers a raise

The Paul Manafort trial is off to a rough start as the judge found himself chastising the prosecution on several occasions.  In one case, they continued to go on about Manafort’s lavish lifestyle before Judge Ellis reminded them that being wealthy isn’t a crime.  At another point, the prosecution teased that their star witness Rick Gates might not testify, eliciting another eruption from the judge.  Gates is thought to be a keystone witness for the case against Manafort.

Prosecution earns judge’s ire hours into Manafort case

Ocasio-Cortez just got snubbed by former President Barack Obama.  Obama released a list of endorsements for the 2018 midterm.  She’s not on the list.  The former President and political godfather may include her in future endorsements, but it’s pretty telling that he wouldn’t include her in the first round.  As Ocasio-Cortez continues to produce more gaffs than Joe Biden, more and more moderate Democrats have let go of her coattails and even openly criticized her.  Personally, I’m rooting for her.  It’s not often you see a Democrat candidate just come out and admit that they want to double taxes in America.

Obama releases list of endorsements, Ocasio-Cortez isn’t on it

Need to know 7/20/18

Fact checking the factcheckers: Politifact had an article out yesterday giving Kamala Harris a “True” rating for her statement that “nearly 2,600 children who are separated from their parents” on June 17th.  Harris also said “these children are in prison”, a completely false statement that wasn’t fact checked by Politifact.  In fact, the very reason children are separated from their parents at the border is the Flores decision which says you can’t put kids in jail.  Obama ran afoul of this ruling and we ended up with the now infamous photos of kids in cages from the Obama era.

Back to Politifact.  The first problem with with their analysis is that this number is a moving target.  The number Harris is using is from July 13th testimony, but since family reunification has been ordered by Trump and the courts, that process continues.  That number was very likely inaccurate when she said it and far less accurate now.

But the bigger problem is that many of the children held by the state didn’t come with their parents or won’t be reunified with their parents because their parents are criminals.  According to Politifact’s own article, nearly 50% of children under 5 were not reunified because they were brought here by traffickers or because their parents were violent criminals.  If you extrapolate that out over Kamala Harris’s figure, we are looking at about 1,250 children who hadn’t been reunified days before she made her statement.  We rate Politifact’s analysis to be 75% biased.

Politifact gives True rating to inaccurate statement about family separation

Rumor has it: Tony Podesta is being offered immunity to testify against Paul Manafort.  If you remember, Manafort is in trouble for laundering Russian money to two US lobbying groups.  One of them was run by Democrat and Clinton ally Tony Podesta.  Podesta and Manafort worked together to lobby for the Ukraine in the United States.  Isn’t it interesting that Robert Mueller and his team of Clinton supporting lawyers would offer immunity to Tony Podesta in order to bring down Paul Manafort for the same crime?

Tony Podesta offered immunity to testify against Paul Manafort

Gallup has a new poll out.  Apparently no one cares about Russia.  The biggest issues on the minds of Americans are the economy, dissatisfaction with government, illegal immigration, and race relations.  Russia garnered less than 1% as a concern in the poll.  Seems like Schumer should consider this since the DNC seems to be running on obstruction, economy crushing tax hikes, open borders, racial division, and Russia.

Gallup poll shows no one cares about Russia