RandomAccess
RandomAccess's JournalSome good news to go with all the GOP Congressional retirements
Here's a stat that should be telling on the Royce/Issa seats: in the last 3 midterms, in situations where incumbents have retired from districts carried by the opposite party in the most recent prez election, the incumbent's party has batted 0% trying to hold it (0/10).
https://twitter.com/Redistrict/status/951248737829081088
Recommend a good, cheap 4Gig Windows VPS????
I barely know what I'm doing so a little decent techs support would be needed, probably.
Actually could probably do with 3gig, and maybe even 2.
Thanks in advance!
Sarah Kendzior on Fire and Fury -- good insights
- I had a few other thoughts on "Fire and Fury" that I couldn't touch on in this article due to space. They add to my belief that the book is in many respects helpful for Trump. So I'll tweet them out here.
- Wolff often writes about his subjects through their own eyes, imagining their thoughts. This narrative device conveys Trump as sincerely believing himself to be innocent -- afraid of being framed, not found out.
- This narrative of course flies in the face of all evidence in the public domain (emails, meetings) as well as Trump's own admissions of obstructing justice.
- To my surprise, Wolff -- a very sharp media critic -- largely takes Trump's portrayal of the media as an enemy at face value. There is almost nothing on how the sycophantic members of the press or even the sheer volume of coverage helped Trump.
- Some of the most obsequious journalists -- who write fawning profiles and who Trump actively seeks out -- are presented as if Trump truly considers them his enemies. It's odd that a savvy media critic like Wolff did not break these relationships down.
Trump is no genius, but he’s smart at playing dumb SARAH KENDZIOR
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/trump-is-no-genius-but-hes-smart-at-playing-dumb/article37518954/
From his days as a tabloid staple to his scandal-ridden campaign, Donald Trump operated under the rubric that there is no such thing as bad publicity. As long as the focus was on him – and as long as a ruthless team of NDA-granting lawyers could help him buttress the blows – all attention was welcome. Mr. Trump could not be shamed, for he had no shame; he could not lose, because he'd rewrite the rules. Lies were always truths for Donald Trump.
Pundits who expected Mr. Trump to become presidential found instead that the office exacerbated his worst tendencies: the narcissism was now backed by executive power, and the media now had no choice but to cover him constantly as the leader of the free world. Under political pressure but still craving the spotlight, Mr. Trump controlled the press by communicating almost entirely through Twitter, a one-sided relationship that continues to this day.
... But Fire and Fury is also an incomplete portrayal – and here is why the book is useful to Mr. Trump.
Is THIS what happened to turn Graham and Grassley?
https://twitter.com/krassenstein/status/949475855104987138(Speculation probably not be definitive, but the additional connections are interesting.)
- Up until recently Lindsey Graham was one of Trump's harshest critics and one of Mueller's biggest supporters. Something has happened over the last 2 months or so which has suddenly cause @LindseyGrahamSC to make an abrupt turn.
That something I believe may be related to.. (2)
- his 2016 campaign manager named Christian Ferry @christianwferry. Ferry was and still is very close to Graham. In 2008 Ferry became the Deputy Campaign Manager for the McCain-Palin campaign. In order to take that position he apparently left his previous job... (3)
- as a strategic consultant at Davis Manafort, Inc. Yes that's right, he was an influential part of Paul Manafort's firm. Not only that but he also worked with Manafort, Gates, and several Russians on a major deal in Ukraine (4)
- Recall that on July 26th of this year, Paul Manafort's home was raided. In the raid Mueller's team was said to have obtained thousands of emails, many related to a business deal which went sour between the Russian billionaire Oleg Deripaska, Manafort, Ferry and others. (5)
- Deripaska basically felt he was conned out of $18 million by Manafort and his team. In a court filing in the Caymen island, where Deripaska decided to wind down his relationship with Manafort's company, which included Perry... (6)
- his attorneys name the Manafort men "involved in furthering the Partnership's investment program included Rick Davis, Rick Gates, Paul Manafort, Alexander Balanutsa, ---Christian Ferry--- Philip Griffin, and Konstantin Kilimnik". (7)
- One email recovered by Mueller's team, which Manafort sent to Kilimnik in April, read:
“I assume you have shown our friends my media coverage, right?”
“Absolutely,” Kilimnik responds,“Every article.”
“How do we use to get whole” Manafort asks.“Has OVD operation seen?” (8)
- OVD stands for 'Oleg Vladimirovich Deripaska'.
Then on July 7, 2016 Reportedly using a Trump campaign account, Manafort continues to send emails to Kilimnik. Referring to the possibility of briefing Oleg Deripaska about the presidential campaign (9)
- So now lets Return to Christian Ferry. He was seemingly a very key figure in one of the main deals that Mueller is currently investigating related to Manafort and Deripaska. Ferry also happens to be incredibly close to Graham and was his campaign manager only 2 years ago. (10)
- This almost HAS TO be the connection which ties it all together. Ferry likely found out that he was under investigation, which either led Graham to figure out that he too may be under investigation.Graham then abruptly turned against Mueller & the Russia Investigation. (11) END
- (Bonus) Here is a contract with all their names on it: https://pbs.twimg.com/card_img/949477133507850240/STLtZxPv?format=jpg&name=600x314
- (BONUS 2) In Ukraine, Ferry was part of a Davis Manafort team that advised Yanukovich, the country’s then-prime minister, whose pro-Russian party made gains in the 2006 parliamentary elections. So Ferry was lobbying for the guy the American government opposed.
- I want to provide a bit of an update. @EdKrassen and I reached out to @christianwferry and he has stated that he is not currently under investigation. Ferry also states that he stopped his work for Davis Manafort in 2006 and does not know why his name was listed on the document
- Also want to add that Ferry was very open with me and very willing to answer my questions. Just want to be fair here. @christianwferry
BREAKING: Putin-linked Russian oligarch Len Blavatnik was a VIP at RNC Convention
https://twitter.com/ScottMStedman/status/9498546930306785292- He is a co-owner of the Russian aluminum company RUSAL with Oleg Deripaska and Viktor Vekselberg. Deripaska was in business with Manafort and Vekselberg worked with Wilbur Ross at the Bank of Cyprus.
3- Deripaska and Vekselberg are widely seen as the closest oligarchs to the Kremlin.
4- Also on the VIP list at the RNC: Current US Ambassador to the UK Woody Johnson, and mega-donors Robert Weiser, Louis DeJoy and Roy Bailey.
5- "Possible drop ins": @Reince, @stevenmnuchin1, US Ambassador to Italy Lew Eisenberg
6- Blavatnik has donated to the RNC's legal defense fund for the Russia investigation: WSJ https://t.co/bCD8XMKlxg
7- During the 2016 Trump Tower meeting with the Russians, Paul Manafort typed a cryptic note on his phone referring to the RNC and political donations: NBC https://t.co/GRYAizXxBU
I thought this tweet was an incredibly important response, IF true and I believe it is.
My cats' butler (not-so-stable not-so-smart like) @ladykayaker
Replying to @ScottMStedman
he has dual citizenship and is allowed to donate to US elections and vote in them under his US citizenship. This means he can launder Putin's money into US campaigns--he can make a contribution and Putin can reimburse him under the cover of some other business transaction.
Seth Abramson Live-Reads Fire and Fury
Part 1:
https://twitter.com/SethAbramson/status/949330818056454145
Here's the unrolled thread: https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/949330818056454145.html
Part 2:
https://twitter.com/SethAbramson/status/949748052071460864
Unrolled: https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/949748052071460864.html
I had several really good laughs with this and thought I'd share
Malcolm Nance - how Russia used Jill Stein (new info)
I am a HUGE fan of Malcolm's -- in fact, I can't think of many people who are as high, let alone higher on my list. This is a 18 minute video, but IMO it's worth it because Nance goes into more info about Russia's strategy and tactics, in this case how they included Jill Stein. And who ELSE was at that table with Stein, Flynn, Putin, etc. (You'll be surprised.) Anyway, watch it when you can spare 18 minutes. It covers other stuff too, but those topics are the reason i'm posting it here at DU.
The Time I Got Recruited to Collude with the Russians
This is an amazing article, from June 2017. Remember Peter Smith, the old guy who committed suicide (or so they said)? That's who tried to recruit this guy. An amazing read that to my mind most surely shows conspiracy if not treason in the Trump campaign. Warning: You really have to read the whole thing to fully appreciate it, I think.
I referred to it from this October 17 article:
Mueller has interviewed the cybersecurity expert who said he was 'recruited to collude with the Russians'
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/mueller-has-interviewed-the-cybersecurity-expert-who-said-he-was-recruited-to-collude-with-the-russians/ar-AAtEyV7
Officials identified in the document include Steve Bannon, now chief strategist for President Donald Trump; Kellyanne Conway, former campaign manager and now White House counselor; Sam Clovis, a policy adviser to the Trump campaign and now a senior adviser at the Agriculture Department; and retired Lt. Gen. Mike Flynn, who was a campaign adviser and briefly was national security adviser in the Trump administration.
I’m writing this piece in the spirit of Benjamin Wittes’s account of his interactions with James Comey immediately following the New York Times story for which he acted as a source. The goal is to provide a fuller accounting of experiences which were thoroughly bizarre and which I did not fully understand until I read the Journal’s account of the episode yesterday. Indeed, I still do not fully understand the events I am going to describe, both what they reflected then or what they mean in retrospect. But I can lay out what happened, facts from which readers and investigators can draw their own conclusions.
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