January 9, 2018

Steele went to FBI-NOT-Because He Thought Trump Was Conspiring w-Russia - But To PROTECT Him

@HoarseWisperer
Consider this a preview of a thread to come later...

Christopher Steele, author of the dossier, went to the FBI after the very first of his memos not because he thought Trump was conspiring with Russia...

...but because he was worried Trump was being blackmailed.
1/2
https://twitter.com/HoarseWisperer/status/950813498468130818

Steele went to the FBI bc he was concerned Trump was being blackmailed, according to Simpson transcript https://www.feinstein.senate.gov/public/_cache/files/3/9/3974a291-ddbe-4525-9ed1-22bab43c05ae/934A3562824CACA7BB4D915E97709D2F.simpson-transcript-redacted.pdf …







https://twitter.com/thegarance/status/950799895593652230

January 9, 2018

Steele & Fusion GPS --- both agreed they were seeing a "crime in progress":

Steele concluded himself that the Russian meddling was a national security issue, Fusion GPS founder says.

They both agreed they were seeing a "crime in progress":






********


Christopher Steele told Simpson that the FBI said they had a “walk-in” whistleblower—from within the Trump organization or campaign— “someone who was concerned about the same concerns we had.” (Pages 175-76).







Simpson says that “there was a concern that the FBI was being manipulated for political ends by the Trump people...” (Page 179)




Steele concluded himself that the Russian meddling was a national security issue, Fusion GPS founder says.

They both agreed they were seeing a "crime in progress":








https://twitter.com/kylegriffin1/status/950800620000305152
https://twitter.com/kylegriffin1/status/950820854568497152
https://twitter.com/ThePlumLineGS/status/950797277928611840



**************

Senate Was Told FBI Had Whistleblower on Trump
January 9, 2018 at 2:05

-presidential candidate Donald Trump was told the FBI had someone inside Trump’s network providing agents with information,” the Washington Post reports.

“Glenn Simpson, founder of research firm Fusion GPS, spoke to investigators with the Senate Judiciary Committee for 10 hours in August. As the partisan fight over Russian interference in the 2016 election has intensified, Simpson has urged that his testimony be released, and a copy of the transcript was made public Tuesday.”

“It was released by the ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA). That decision marks the most serious break yet in the once cooperative relationship she has had with the Republican chairman of the committee, Sen. Charles E. Grassley (R-IA).”


https://politicalwire.com/2018/01/09/senate-told-fbi-whistleblower-trumps-network/

January 9, 2018

A reminder for our times...

?w=600&h=381

January 9, 2018

Cmte to Protect Journalists give Trump award for "Overall Achievement in Undermining Global Freedom"

Trump Named The World’s No. 1 Oppressor Of Press Freedom
A journalism group named the president among repressive leaders who “have gone out of their way to attack the press” and undermine free speech.

President Donald Trump, who recently said he would announce the “MOST DISHONEST & CORRUPT MEDIA AWARDS OF THE YEAR,” has been awarded the title of the world’s most oppressive leader toward press freedom by the Committee to Protect Journalists.

Trump claimed the journalism organization’s top prize for “overall achievement in undermining global press freedom,” and joins four other leaders, including strongmen like Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Russian leader Vladimir Putin, who “have gone above and beyond to silence critical voices and weaken democracy,” the Committee to Protect Journalists said Monday.

The group said its awards were for “recognizing world leaders who have gone out of their way to attack the press and undermine the norms that support freedom of the media.” Though CPJ determined that countries like Russia and China hold the tightest grip on their national media, it declared Trump the winner for “overall achievement.”

Trump’s disrespect for the First Amendment is his most obvious offense, CPJ noted, and is so flagrant that leaders in other countries have adopted his “fake news” term for unflattering coverage.



https://cpj.org/blog/2018/01/press-oppressor-awards-trump-fake-news-fakies.php
https://twitter.com/willafrej/status/950754805663838208
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/trump-oppressor-press-freedom_us_5a54bc75e4b003133ecc3439?ncid=engmodushpmg00000004

January 9, 2018

MAGA: Pfizer, pocketing a big tax cut from Trump, will end investment in Alzheimer's and Parkinson's

With every passing day, it becomes clearer who’s reaping the benefit of the huge tax cut handed over to American corporations by the Republican-dominated Congress in December.

Spoiler alert: Not workers or customers, but shareholders, especially the rich ones. (Don’t be fooled by those $1,000 bonuses handed out by a few big companies anxious to curry favor with the Trump White House — if they were serious about improving their employees’ lot they’d distribute the money in the form of permanent raises, not a bonus that you can safely bet will be a distant memory by this time next year.)

The big drug company Pfizer seems intent on being a pace-setter in cranking out the benefits of the tax cut to stakeholders who need them the least. In an announcement over the weekend, Pfizer said it was shutting down its research efforts on treatments for Alzheimer’s and Parkinsonism. The company didn’t say how much it was spending on the two conditions, but said about 300 researchers will lose their jobs as it redirects its research and development budget elsewhere.

............

http://www.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-hiltzik-pfizer-20180108-story.html?platform=hootsuite
https://twitter.com/Jake_Bernstein/status/950740249474404352

January 9, 2018

Point, Counterpoint

https://twitter.com/harrysiegel/status/950733196479614976

January 9, 2018

Rocket Man...

January 9, 2018

Cartoon: See no evil

By Jen Sorensen

?1515492198

January 9, 2018

Trump - doesnt know the words, look!

VIDEOS:
https://twitter.com/WillOrtizVlogs/status/950538652484014080
https://twitter.com/tribelaw/status/950544244221054976
https://twitter.com/AntonioFrench/status/950543702308610048
https://twitter.com/KaivanShroff/status/950553829358977024

more:
http://www.joemygod.com/2018/01/09/watermelon-trump-mumbles-national-anthem-video/

January 9, 2018

Fire and Fury: President of Macmillan Responds in Memo to Trump's Cease and Desist Demand

?1515439236


Macmillan Publishers and their President, John Sargent, responded to the Trump administration’s demand they "immediately cease and desist from any further publication, release or dissemination" of Michael Wolff’s bestselling book, Fire and Fury. In the memo to employees, Mr. Sargent succinctly lays out the constitutional basis for Macmillan’s refusal to comply with this clearly fascist attempt to stifle the free press, and makes it clear this is about much more than just this one book.

Below is Sargent’s full letter:

To: All Macmillan Employees
From: John Sargent

Last Thursday, shortly after 7:00 a.m., we received a demand from the President of the United States to “immediately cease and desist from any further publication, release or dissemination” of Michael Wolff’s Fire and Fury. On Thursday afternoon we responded with a short statement saying that we would publish the book, and we moved the pub date forward to the next day. Later today we will send our legal response to President Trump.

Our response is firm, as it has to be. I am writing you today to explain why this is a matter of great importance. It is about much more than Fire and Fury.

The president is free to call news “fake” and to blast the media. That goes against convention, but it is not unconstitutional. But a demand to cease and desist publication—a clear effort by the President of the United States to intimidate a publisher into halting publication of an important book on the workings of the government—is an attempt to achieve what is called prior restraint. That is something that no American court would order as it is flagrantly unconstitutional.

This is very clearly defined in Supreme Court case law, most prominently in the Pentagon Papers case. As Justice Hugo Black explained in his concurrence:

“Both the history and language of the First Amendment support the view that the press must be left free to publish news, whatever the source, without censorship, injunctions, or prior restraints. In the First Amendment, the Founding Fathers gave the free press the protection it must have to fulfill its essential role in our democracy. The press was to serve the governed, not the governors. The Government’s power to censor the press was abolished so that the press would remain forever free to censure the Government.”

Then there is Justice William Brennan’s opinion in The New York Times Co. v. Sullivan:

“Thus we consider this case against the background of a profound national commitment to the principle that debate on public issues should be uninhibited, robust and wide-open, and that it may well include vehement, caustic, and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks on government and public officials.”

And finally Chief Justice Warren Burger in another landmark case:

“The thread running through all these cases is that prior restraints on speech and publication are the most serious and least tolerable infringement on First Amendment rights.”

There is no ambiguity here. This is an underlying principle of our democracy. We cannot stand silent. We will not allow any president to achieve by intimidation what our Constitution precludes him or her from achieving in court. We need to respond strongly for Michael Wolff and his book, but also for all authors and all their books, now and in the future. And as citizens we must demand that President Trump understand and abide by the First Amendment of our Constitution.

This is what patriotism looks like.

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2018/1/8/1730845/-Fire-and-Fury-President-of-Macmillan-Responds-in-Memo-to-Trump-s-Cease-and-Desist-Demand
https://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2018/01/08/us/ap-us-trump-book-publisher-letter.html