Trump-Russia Story Is Coming Together. Heres How to Make Sense of It. Bill Moyers.

[Amaryllis]

http://billmoyers.com/story/trump-russia-story-coming-together-heres-make-sense/

Editor’s Note: The news is coming so fast and furious, from so many sources and in so many fragments, that it takes more than a scorecard to keep up with the Trump-Russia connection. It takes a timeline — a “map,” if you will, of where events and names and dates and deeds converge into a story that makes sense of the incredible scandal of the 2016 election and now of the Trump Administration.

For years Steve Harper produced timelines for the cases he argued or defended in court as a successful litigator. Retired now from practicing law, Harper has turned his experience, talent, and curiosity to monitoring for BillMoyers.com the bizarre and entangled ties between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump and the murky world of Russian oligarchs, state officials, hackers, spies, and Republican operatives. You can check out the over 700 entries right here. But for an overview — and some specifics — of recent developments, I called up Steve to give us a sense of the emerging story —Bill Moyers

Long but excellent article. This is the conclusion:

Moyers: One more: I assume most people believe Russia’s interference in the election last year is a bad thing, a serious offense, but is it possible that by treating Vladimir Putin and his cronies as an existential threat, we’re playing directly into Putin’s hands and making him appear a more significant figure in the world than he really is?

Harper: Well, he’s already achieved that, but the problem is, what’s the alternative? Back in January, John McCain and Lindsey Graham were on national television acknowledging the seriousness of the Russian interference. McCain called it the cyber equivalent of “an act of war.” And if you acknowledge and recognize the existential threat, do you sit back and let the let the next thing happen in 2018 that Vladimir Putin wants to do? Remember, we have elections coming up next year. The uniform view of US intelligence is unambiguous, and if you don’t view it as an existential threat then you’re willing, I think, to sacrifice democracy.

We keep hearing, “Yeah, but Trump was still legitimately elected, he won the election fair and square.” Now we’re realizing that that may not even be true. I don’t personally believe that to be true anymore. I rankle every time somebody says he won fair and square, because that’s become less obvious every day. So the last line of defense would be, “Well, even if he didn’t win fair and square, he’s our president, so we’ve got to sit back and let whatever Putin’s going to do to us continue to happen because we don’t want our response to raise his standing in the world.” Well, I would submit it raises Putin’s standing in the world even more to have an accomplice in the White House.

[Puzzledtraveller]

1. Trump is the useful idiot.

[BigmanPigman]

2. That is the problem...The constitution.

There is no precedent for a president who has committed not only the number but the extent of the crimes that have occurred in the past two years. The founding fathers didn't have ESP. There is no "Plan D". What if the Moron, Pence, McConnell and Ryan all go down...Hatch is retiring so do we get President Pelosi?

Do we have a completely new election and null and void all the candidates who won from the last election since people voted down ballot? That would mean Congress to the local city counsel. Does the candidate who did not commit crimes to get elected yet won the popular vote assume presidency? Who will "substitute" as acting president while all of this is attempted to be corrected and save our democracy?

[Mr.Bill]

5. The members of the Electoral College

could have stopped this from happening. In fact, I believe the founding fathers intended for that to be their duty. They are who failed us.

[Dave Starsky]

12. Most states vote for slates of electors.

In other words, if the Democratic candidate wins the election, the state will send electors drawing from the Democratic slate. If the Republican wins, the electors will draw from the state's other slate of raving pedophile-loving maniacs. So it would be nigh impossible to "flip" an Electoral College on the basis of conscience or a desire to do the right thing.

[hedda_foil]

8. Isn't there a law against conspiring with a foreig power to take down the government?

There sure as hell should be.

[7wo7rees]

3. That last paragraph is a humdinger. Read it again. n/t

[0rganism]

4. oh to know what Robert Mueller knows right now

of all the people in the world, only he has seen the full scope of our defeat from every possible angle in all its horrifying detail.

and now it's ultimately up to Mueller and his formidable staff to do something about it, if indeed anything can be done at all. if he somehow succeeds and brings down the orange tyrant through internal legal procedures and the justice system of the United States itself, the founders' constitution will have withstood a crucial test, and most of the western world will hail him as a great hero to be played by Matt Damon in the movies that will inevitably be made of this period.

one funny thing is that the prosecutions for a lot of this mess would be so damned easy. the scary and tragic thing is the Russians and their puppet cabal could crush Mueller's investigation very easily too -- both possibilities exist in a precarious high-tension situation on an epic scale with the fate of the nation and perhaps human civilization hanging in the balance.

i hope we get to see the epic period movies.

[sandensea]

6. "Oh, yeah, Donald Jr. You know, he was only my son for a very limited period of time."

[iluvtennis]

7. Wow, what an article. Steven Harper's analysis and threading the evidence is eye opening...

...thanks for this post.

[steve2470]

9. kick and rec nt

[ornotna]

10. That time line is huge

Lots of info there.

[Lugnut]

11. K&R n/t

[Hekate]

13. KnRnBookmark

[jimmil]

14. We lost the election last year...

We all lost. Russia won.

[panader0]

15. Bookmarking--thanks

[spanone]

16. 'an accomplice in the White House' ....that's trump.