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Spicer Presser

the fact that none of the Conservo-bots have named a legit 'scandal' of Lewinsky proportions is meaningful
 
Well debating policy that actually has consequences isn't as fun or humorous as laughing at trump fits of rage and denial, humor and talking points sell. Also trump and his team know the American public has the attention span of zero, if you overwhelm them with enough shit they won't know where to look and what to think. Like have you been hearing about Russia at all lately, yeah me either we have moved on already because we are lazy distracted and need new entertainment constantly.
 
Well debating policy that actually has consequences isn't as fun or humorous as laughing at trump fits of rage and denial, humor and talking points sell. Also trump and his team know the American public has the attention span of zero, if you overwhelm them with enough shit they won't know where to look and what to think. Like have you been hearing about Russia at all lately, yeah me either we have moved on already because we are lazy distracted and need new entertainment constantly.

Exactly. It is an intentional media strategy. Create fake controversy after fake controversy, all the while questioning the media's credibility, so that the public remains distracted and you can quietly implement your far right policies and get away with treason.
 
When you phrase/interpret those actions in this manner, it is easy to see why you would consider those scandals. The problem is in the rhetoric, which has been the issue with Trump since day 1. There is nothing but speculation that validates terms like "pay for play" or "ransom."

This isn't about Trump's view of these matters. It is about your view of them. How can you or anyone else look past these things so easily. They are not right no matter who does them. And they are not speculation. But one example.

The State Department on August 18th was asked if the U.S. government would have delivered the $400MM USD to Iran without the release of the prisoners. This is from a press conference.

Q - "So you are saying in basic English that you would not deliver the $400MM payment until the prisoners were released. Is that correct?"

A - Nodding his head. "Correct".

That is the definition of paying a ransom. You release the prisoners. I pay you this money. And that is exactly what happened. And it violates Federal law.
 
Really? Do you think it is a violation of the Fourth Amendment to record anything and everything you send across your phone or your laptop that through no fault or consent of your own happens to leave the United States and then return to our shores to reach it's final destination through the magic of how things travel all the time across the internet? That's o.k. in your book? You see nothing but a "policy" position in this?

This did not happen to every person. Although I disagree with this policy, multiple courts have said it is legal. Plus, Obama used the courts to get approval more than W or the intelligence community wanted him to do.

It's o.k. to have a policy that targets for audit and harrassment organizations based on their political leanings?

We've shown sources that prove that this didn't happen. But no amount of historical facts will get in the way of your brainwashed bullshit.

Is it o.k. for the Secretary of State to have a pay for play scheme?


The problem is this has been totally disproven and had nothing to do with Obama. If you don't think the Crown Prince of a country where the US has its largest base in Asia would get to meet the SOS, you are delusional. Another "pay for play" was a Nobel Laureate whom the US was supporting already. Like your other assertions this has has been empirically proven to be wrong, it doesn't matter.

It is o.k. to pay a ransom for prisoners?

Shoo and others have shown that is also false. Giving a country back a small portion of what we actually owe them as a part of a deal that disarms their nuclear program is tremendous deal.

Those aren't "policies" or "campaign promises". The reason all of these things became scandals and investigations is because they represented real or potential violations of Federal law. They are no different than Iran-Contra.

Except not a single indictment for committing a federal crime was ever attained. This is in spite of tens of millions of dollars spent trying to find crimes. The found NONE.

And, ultimately, how did a significant part of the population feel about some or all of the above things? Obviously not very good.

How does the population think? Obama is leaving office more popular than POTUS in the past fifty years. That's how they think.
 
We're not quibbling over whether or not it's wrong. We're quibbling about the semantics of scandal.

Closest things I can think of to the classic definition of scandal are IRS and Benghazi and neither of those stuck legally.

Ah, so to you unless there is an indictment or a conviction we can't have a scandal. So, for instance, massive surveillance gets a pass because both Obama and the GOP support it. And admitting you paid a ransom to Iran gets a pass because it happens to come to light months before there is a change in power? And Clinton gets a pass because Trump now decides not to pursue it further? But if in the past our politicians had more integrity about pursuing matters further, that made things a scandal?

How did the voters ultimately react to all of these things? And now that Trump's running the show how do we all feel about all this corruption and overreach? Because isn't the concern, in large part, that he'll be even more abusive?
 
This isn't about Trump's view of these matters. It is about your view of them. How can you or anyone else look past these things so easily. They are not right no matter who does them. And they are not speculation. But one example.

The State Department on August 18th was asked if the U.S. government would have delivered the $400MM USD to Iran without the release of the prisoners. This is from a press conference.

Q - "So you are saying in basic English that you would not deliver the $400MM payment until the prisoners were released. Is that correct?"

A - Nodding his head. "Correct".

That is the definition of paying a ransom. You release the prisoners. I pay you this money. And that is exactly what happened. And it violates Federal law.

I really do understand why you see it that way. The debate arises when you consider the cause and affect of what happened. You attribute the cause of our paying the $400 mil to us wanting hostages back. Where as I attribute it to, and those who uphold the law attributed it to, paying back a debt and getting something out of it. It would have been illegal if we did not owe them a single thing, and we simply traded hostages for money. But from what I have read, that is not what happened.

When arriving at your "cause", ask yourself these questions: Would it have still been a "ransom" in your mind if we did not get the hostages back? Would it have still been a "ransom" in your mind if we paid the $400 mil and a year later, a "diplomatic discussion" lead to the release of the hostages?

It's not the best look, but it wasn't illegal. We could sit here all year arguing the morality of prisoner exchanges. And I attribute the public outrage to biases, emboldened by alt right news and Trump.
 
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This is entirely intentional. They are creating all this controversy over crowd size and unsubstantial lies regarding inauguration attendance to distract everyone from the actual policy changes they are implementing. There are twice as many outrage posts on my Facebook feed about "alternative facts" and using "1984" quotes than there are posts about the re-implementation of the global gag rule, or DAPL. This is Trump's strategy and has been his strategy since he started running...creating bullshit controversies over stuff that amounts to very little in the end so that you can get away with other actually substantive things and few people will notice.

Generally I agree this this is his tactic, but the need to be popular and the willingness to lie openly openly to the public in order to shape the narrative shows the authoritarian tendencies, the global gag rule and DAPL are normal Republican moves.

Now, it is also keeping the media from discussing his many conflicts of interest and possible violation of the constitution, which is not business as usual. Also, to TWMD's point, Russia.
 
Generally I agree this this is his tactic, but the need to be popular and the willingness to lie openly openly to the public in order to shape the narrative shows the authoritarian tendencies, the global gag rule and DAPL are normal Republican moves.

Now, it is also keeping the media from discussing his many conflicts of interest and possible violation of the constitution, which is not business as usual. Also, to TWMD's point, Russia.

Absolutely. So is calling the media liars and getting the public to distrust news outlets.
 
I'm saving all my outrage for the budget proposal and the Supreme Court nominee they will announce no way either of those isn't a complete shit show.
 
the meaning of alternative is "different," not "false" no matter what that silly reporter claimed

http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/alternative

http://www.dictionary.com/browse/alternative


a choice limited to one of two or more possibilities, as of things, propositions, or courses of action, the selection of which precludes any other possibility:
You have the alternative of riding or walking.
2.
one of the things, propositions, or courses of action that can be chosen:
The alternative to riding is walking.
3.
a possible or remaining course or choice:
There was no alternative but to walk.

Using that we could have the "alternate" choices of - sailor doesn't like Muslims or sailor is a self-loathing Muslim

Alternate doesn't mean true or even reasonable, it simply means a choice, but if one of the choices is a lie, using the word "fact" after it doesn't change the lie.
 
alternative facts are not falsehoods as the reporter claimed but different facts

Not as Trump's people have used the term. It's not an "alternate fact" to say 1-1.5 million people were at the inauguration. It's a lie.
 
So can anybody figure out whether DeacMan thinks President Obama had any scandals during his term?
 
Now, there's a website that allows ice cream fans to send a package of Dippin Dots to Spicer with a single click.

Senddippindots.com will mail Spicer the frozen treat for 6 dollars, payable with credit card or even Bitcoin- the cash of the future.
 
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