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First Charges Filed in Mueller Investigation

Newenglanddeac said:
Why Are So Many Leftists Skeptical of the Russia Investigation?
By
Jonathan Chait


A theme of their skepticism is a sense of frustration with the way the Russia investigation cuts across the electorate, and especially the political intelligentsia, in a way that frustrates their ideological project. While some leftists have disdained the Mueller investigation, many centrists and even some conservatives have supported it. By expanding the Democratic coalition into the center, at least temporarily, the Russia issue runs counter to their goal of repositioning the party to the left. An undercurrent of frustration expresses itself in sniping at the commonality between liberal Russia skeptics and right-of-center Russia-hawks-turned-Trump-critics like David Frum, Max Boot, and Bill Kristol. What’s more, Trump’s Russia policy has produced a quiet struggle pitting the president against the mostly standard-issue hawkish Republicans who staff his administration. Trump is the enemy of the left’s enemy.

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligence...y-leftists-skeptical-of-the-russia-probe.html
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NED, what did you think of this piece? I ask because I don't really know where I fit in. Robin's take here seems pretty fair:

https://www.facebook.com/corey.robin1/posts/1838734776192235

So that's one tack Ryan takes with which I disagree. The other tack he takes is to say that as the Democrats ascend (and Ryan and I are very much on the same side of pushing for the Sanders/Ocasio-Cortez wing of things, as I've said), they'll have to confront the threat of Russian hacking.

Here is what Ryan says: "And whoever wins the 2020 Democratic primary — say Elizabeth Warren or Bernie Sanders — is highly likely to face a serious campaign of dirty tricks from Russian intelligence. Email hacking will be attempted, any compromising past history dug up, and third-party candidates boosted up — all in an attempt to throw the election to Trump. It probably won't move that many people, but Trump only won by less than 100,000 votes spread across three states. It's a threat that needs to be reckoned with."

Now if all Ryan means is: let's beef up cybersecurity and the like, fine. But he doesn't really say that. Instead, there's this discussion of the political hay that can be made from attacking Trump (or presumably the Republicans in 2020) on this. But if that's the route you take—which is essentially a fanning of the political flames rather than a simple prudential call for beefing up cybersecurity—it's hard to avoid the paranoia that this kind of argument can generate. Which, again, is dangerous.

Let me explain. In any campaign, no matter whether the Russians are involved or not, a candidate's compromising history will be churned up (remember Jeremiah Wright and Obama in 2008? the swift-boating of John Kerry?). In any campaign, there is the possibility of third party candidates, getting boosted by writers, activists, and the like. Once you introduce the Russia question into all this, it becomes almost impossible to distinguish someone bringing up a candidate's compromising history as part of normal politics and someone doing that as a Russian op. Do we seriously want an American politics where good old-fashioned dirty pool—exposing someone's embarrassing past—is suddenly cast as one element in the potential plot of a foreign power? That seems like not a good way to go.
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Regardless of your position on russian interference, the issue will undoubtedly be weaponized against the left by claiming any dissent from centrist positions is evidence of russian meddling.

Last week, Shaun King responded to criticisms of him from the left by dismissing it as russian propaganda.
 
Newenglanddeac said:
Why Are So Many Leftists Skeptical of the Russia Investigation?
By
Jonathan Chait


A theme of their skepticism is a sense of frustration with the way the Russia investigation cuts across the electorate, and especially the political intelligentsia, in a way that frustrates their ideological project. While some leftists have disdained the Mueller investigation, many centrists and even some conservatives have supported it. By expanding the Democratic coalition into the center, at least temporarily, the Russia issue runs counter to their goal of repositioning the party to the left. An undercurrent of frustration expresses itself in sniping at the commonality between liberal Russia skeptics and right-of-center Russia-hawks-turned-Trump-critics like David Frum, Max Boot, and Bill Kristol. What’s more, Trump’s Russia policy has produced a quiet struggle pitting the president against the mostly standard-issue hawkish Republicans who staff his administration. Trump is the enemy of the left’s enemy.

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligence...y-leftists-skeptical-of-the-russia-probe.html
Click to expand...

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Newenglanddeac said:
Why Are So Many Leftists Skeptical of the Russia Investigation?
By
Jonathan Chait


A theme of their skepticism is a sense of frustration with the way the Russia investigation cuts across the electorate, and especially the political intelligentsia, in a way that frustrates their ideological project. While some leftists have disdained the Mueller investigation, many centrists and even some conservatives have supported it. By expanding the Democratic coalition into the center, at least temporarily, the Russia issue runs counter to their goal of repositioning the party to the left. An undercurrent of frustration expresses itself in sniping at the commonality between liberal Russia skeptics and right-of-center Russia-hawks-turned-Trump-critics like David Frum, Max Boot, and Bill Kristol. What’s more, Trump’s Russia policy has produced a quiet struggle pitting the president against the mostly standard-issue hawkish Republicans who staff his administration. Trump is the enemy of the left’s enemy.

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligence...y-leftists-skeptical-of-the-russia-probe.html
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HorseshoeLogo-1.png
 
Donald tweeting about Manafort as trial ongoing today - inappropriate (of course) but will present interesting issue moving forward regarding jury. I don't believe they are sequestered or anything
 
Junebug said:
I found the below Cillizza article interesting:

https://www.cnn.com/2018/07/31/politics/donald-trump-rudy-giuliani/index.html

In sum, Trump isn’t getting indicted regardless of what Mueller finds, and the real fight, which Rudy and Trump are already fighting, will be in the court of public opinion.

While I agree a sitting president can’t be indicted, I don’t agree fully with Cillizza. I think the battle could be fought in the house and senate over impeachment proceedings, particularly if Mueller’s report is damning and/or a blue wave washes over us in November.
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If the Democrats win back the House in 2018 (above 60% to do so every where I look at present), I expect them to impeach. Shares on PredictIt are 40 cents that he'll be impeached during his first term, 60 cents that he won't be.
 
MHBDemon said:
Still just as dumb as all the other times you've posted it. Care to actually engage in the argument?
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I don't think there is a valid argument from anyone on the left that the Russian investigation is a nothingburger/should not be pursued/is a distraction/somehow hurts the left's cause, etc., etc.
 
Shooshmoo said:
I don't think there is a valid argument from anyone on the left that the Russian investigation is a nothingburger/should not be pursued/is a distraction/somehow hurts the left's cause, etc., etc.
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Do you think there is a danger in an entity, like Facebook, being an arbiter of what is and is not fake news?

We are already seeing the effects of this Russia paranoia. People are using Abolish ICE and BLM movements to say that they are pushed by Russian trolls, not by legitimate grassroots activists. A certain segment of Hillary twitter already engages in the "Bernie is a Russian agent" fear mongering.

The danger, which we see with your horseshoe response, is that any political disagreement from the establishment is dismissed because the establishment wants to smear leftists as either "just like fascists" or russian agents.
 
So, they should allow obviously fake, racist and falsely but intentionally incendiary material shouldn't be blocked?

More importantly, the 1st Amendment has nothing to do with anything on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter or other platforms. Those companies are not the government. They have the absolute right to block anything and anyone they so choose.
 
tiltdeac said:
It works much better for him if he says the treasony bits out loud and then laughs them off as jokes. Can you imagine if he had sent a private message to Russia to hack Clinton/the DNC, and they started working on it immediately that day? But because he said it out loud on national television, everyone just sort of shrugged, even though the result was the same.
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Again, if he went to Sessions privately and told him to stop the investigation, it would be obvious obstruction of justice. But he just says it publicly, and the natural reaction is well, it can't be that bad, he's saying it on twitter!

 
RJKarl said:
So, they should allow obviously fake, racist and falsely but intentionally incendiary material shouldn't be blocked?

More importantly, the 1st Amendment has nothing to do with anything on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter or other platforms. Those companies are not the government. They have the absolute right to block anything and anyone they so choose.
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You repeatedly misunderstand my arguments. Slow the fuck down and read more carefully.
 
MHBDemon said:
Do you think there is a danger in an entity, like Facebook, being an arbiter of what is and is not fake news?

We are already seeing the effects of this Russia paranoia. People are using Abolish ICE and BLM movements to say that they are pushed by Russian trolls, not by legitimate grassroots activists. A certain segment of Hillary twitter already engages in the "Bernie is a Russian agent" fear mongering.

The danger, which we see with your horseshoe response, is that any political disagreement from the establishment is dismissed because the establishment wants to smear leftists as either "just like fascists" or russian agents.
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what does this have to do with the legitimacy of the investigation
 
MHBDemon said:
You repeatedly misunderstand my arguments. Slow the fuck down and read more carefully.
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You said this:

"Do you think there is a danger in an entity, like Facebook, being an arbiter of what is and is not fake news?"

My response very accurately responds to that.

My bad, you are so superior. I should defer.
 
Sessions is so fired when this Mueller witch hunt is wrapped up

Good riddance
 
Sarah Sanders just said Strzok and the Steele dossier were the reasons for the Mueller probe. She tells this lie at every briefing. What a bunch of wusses in the WH press corps to call it for the lie it is and ask why she tells that lie so often.
 
tiltdeac said:
Again, if he went to Sessions privately and told him to stop the investigation, it would be obvious obstruction of justice. But he just says it publicly, and the natural reaction is well, it can't be that bad, he's saying it on twitter!

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Someone on TV asked what we'd think of tweets like this if they were said in private and we had to find out about them. That's how we should react to the ones in public.
 
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