by Darryl Cooper

[Ziggy Stardust]

illegally

 

[bernie14]

ok so

literally, he said some mexicans were rapists, not specifying how many. yes. this is the case.

but reading it as pure literalism is a bad reading and not appreciating how language works (i know you're smart enough to understand inference, subtext, rhetorical devices, what speech can be legally protected, and how you work within the latter)

so.

some twitterstorming et al did not take his statement at a literal level while believing they were reading him on a literal level, reading it as all mexicans = rapists. this gave fodder for that part of trump's base, as pretending mock propriety in conversation past actual beliefs or base assumptions is what they do. "that's not technically what he said", because that was not his literal claim (depending on where the line is from "they" and "some" actually is, since some as under they usually means the some is the relatively irrelevant minority, but you have a point here, so let's go with it)

functionally "they are racists, some are good people) was race bait for racists, drawing on a long running structure of how to frame the Other. the idea that the Other is a rapey race or whatever goes back centuries, and is not reserved speculations about afroamericans in the us (kill a mockingbird is just one instance of this, another now mostly forgotten stereotype is the chinese sexual beastlike nonperson, which has been used some places). people that deal with cultural history (ie the left, usually) are acquainted with a buckload of examples of how the Other was denied personhood through assumed rapeyness.

that is, functionally, he framed mexicans at large because that's how that voter base's brains generally work, and people correctly identified this since this is not new and that's how these rhetorical devices are structured. especially in an age where there are legal consequences for hate speech

so.

there were plenty of twitterstormers et al that correctly identified the function of an otherwise (relatively) ambigious literal statement. just enough racism to be interpreted as racism by a certain part of the base (ie good racism, for that base), but just enough lack of literal clarity to allow denial

trump does this all the time and is generally really good at maneuvering the line in order to not be legally culpable for his speech and actions. he's been doing it for a long time, even if he gets sued a lot when he screws up

this is generally the line that he rode in order to speak to a certain base while retaining a mock semblance of propriety because of the technicality of literalism while he's dogwhistling

it's a very old and very widely used rhetorical device for bigots

OTOH as you point out, this rhetorical device even when correctly identified and understood, when a leftie points out this function, or misread the literal content to having been something else (which of the two doesn't matter to the following point) - it's a chaotic thing to deal with as an opponent, since yes it's bait that you can keep a sense of propriety over while dogwhistling to racists

it's a really toxic rhetorical device, and it's important for his opponents to learn how to deal with it properly (i don't know the solution) but exonerating him from blame in the discord is really stupid mate <3 it was his function, whether it was a display of beliefs or base assumptions through a rhetorical device, or whether it was cynically intentional.

sry bout the no caps but come on

My take, FWIW, the "when mexico sends" conditional statement refers to the Mexican government. The assumption is that the Mexican government is (or at least should be) responsible for it's border and they are allowing bad people with bad intentions to enter the US. the entire statement was directed at the government, not the Mexicans coming across.

 

[Ajidica]

I read thru the first link, it was long and not about Trump conspiring with Putin. Maybe you didn't read that far, but that link was devoted to showing Russian interference.

Of course it wasn't about the person of Trump conspiring with Putin, you can count on one hand the number of people who would trust Trump to return a pen he loaned them; nobody would be stupid enough to tell him about a potential conspiracy.
My position has been that the behavior of Flynn, Manafort, Sessions, Stone, and others in relation to figures either part of the Russian government or closely associated with the Russian security services has many unanswered questions due to those parties actively seeking to hide, lie, or mislead Federal counterintelligence investigations into allegations Russian intervention in the election process.

I dont know Flynn's motivation, I suspect he was acting on Trump's behalf and didn't want to tell Obama's FBI about policies they were pursuing and felt obliged to keep Pence out of the loop on something. That was all after the election and is inconsequential to the charge of conspiracy, incoming administrations discuss their priorities with other countries before inauguration day.

That's a weaksauce explanation if I ever heard one. You are afraid of a potential political conspiracy so you have your NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISOR lie to Federal counterintelligence investigators -a lie he was easily caught out in- about an action that was not illegal and then proceed to lie TO THE VICE PRESIDENT which was the direct reason Flynn was fired.

What game? One of the next moves in the game was the Tower meeting, Fusion sent a 'Russian delegation' to meet with Trump about adoption, but the Trump people were lured by the prospect of information damaging to the Dems. So Putin wasn't involved and that makes sense, why would Putin send someone to NYC with it? They didn't need Trump to publish emails. That meeting was to set Trump up for the collusion accusation, that was the game George P got played in.

Unless I'm misremembering something quite badly, I have no idea where you are getting a Papadopolous- Trump Tower meeting from, unless you are confusing your own conspiracy theories. (The Trump Tower meeting was set up by some Russian businessmen and an idiot who thought Russia -who famously executed the monarchy- had a 'crown prosecutor'.) I read the Papadopolous senate transcript very carefully when it came out. Papadopolous picked up a rumor from somewhere - I forget where- that the Russian security services were actively involved in the DNC email hack. During a grip-and-grimace with the Greek foreign minister, Papadopolous started blabbing about how as a fact the Russians were responsible for the DNC hack. That information spread like wildfire through the various European security services, and rather than catching on he might be caught up in a game he didn't understand, Papadopolous kept pretending he was a wise man of the world and that he knew what was going on. Small surprise he got burned by professionals.

How did unconfirmed reports find their way into a Fisa application to spy on Trump? Comey was fired for heading an FBI caught lying to a Fisa court to spy on Trump and he should have been gone on day 1, but it took a little while for this to unfold. Basically when Page went public the house of cards began to fall.

Methinks you are confusing your own conspiracy theories, unless you want to talk about how the Department of Justice lied to the White House about why Comey should be fired.

The current FBI Director is an articulate and persuasive speaker about leadership and the immutable principles of the Department of Justice. He deserves our appreciation for his public service. As you and I have discussed, however, I cannot defend the Director's handling of the conclusion of the investigation of Secretary Clinton's emails, and I do not understand his refusal to accept the nearly universal judgment that he was mistaken. Almost everyone agrees that the Director made serious mistakes; it is one of the few issues that unites people of diverse perspectives.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-39866767
It has been a while since I read the Comey transcript, but I don't believe he ever made any comment about Page to Trump.

Sessions 'all but lied' after the election and the Fisa warrant was issued on Page, not Sater, Manafort or Stone.

Lying to the Senate is lying to the Senate.

In the Senate Judiciary Committee’s January confirmation hearings for Sessions, Franken asked the attorney general nominee what he would do “if there is any evidence that anyone affiliated with the Trump campaign communicated with the Russian government in the course of this campaign.”
“Sen. Franken, I’m not aware of any of those activities. I have been called a surrogate at a time or two in that campaign and I did not have communications with the Russians,” Sessions replied.

In a written questionnaire to the Senate Judiciary Committee during his confirmation, Sessions also told the panel he was not in contact with anyone associated with the Russian government -- despite the fact that Sessions met twice with Sergey Kislyak, then the Russian ambassador to the U.S., during the campaign.

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/dem...ons-clarify-comments-russia/story?id=50913023
Also, you are wrong and there were FISA orders on Manafort.

Notably, CNN reported that two FISA warrants were issued against Manafort, first before he worked for the Trump campaign and then after he was no longer affiliated with it. The first “centered on work done by a group of Washington consulting firms for Ukraine's former ruling party” and was “discontinued at some point last year for lack of evidence.” While it is unclear when the second warrant began—former FBI director Jim Comey has testified that the FBI investigation began in July 2016—this time it was related to the investigation of “ties between Trump campaign associates and suspected Russian operatives.”

https://www.lawfareblog.com/latest-scoops-cnn-and-new-york-times-quick-and-dirty-analysis

Was it diplomatic and tactful with the foreign leader? Tell us President Trump, is Putin a liar or do you mistrust your own intelligence?

If Trump couldn't find someone to tell him a way on how to diplomatically say "Putin and I discussed allegations of Russian cyberwarfare and I support the findings of the US security services", that's a him problem.

Trump's people were not indicted for conspiracy, so I'd expect 'concern' from some guy asking if Trump is a traitor at news the Mueller report debunked Russiagate. Well, I'm still concerned.

You've created your own "Russia-gate" where it is focused on Trump-the-person, and can therefore claim all the serious questions raised by actions of Flynn, Manafort, Stone, etc, are all proof of your own personal Russia-gate being debunked. It is getting tiring and you can do better than this.
For one who claims to be concerned about abuses of surveillance by US security services, you seem to be doing your very best to avoid what Horowitz actually found on the FISA problems; instead preferring to be a Manafort simp.

 

[Berzerker]

And I believe it isn't a scam because of left-wing journalists.

Now all you need is evidence to support your belief. I suggest you compare what your sources were saying during Russiagate with the Mueller and Horowitz reports. The notion Biden told Shokin to investigate Hunter's company or be fired is hilarious, but I saw that nonsense repeated many times by Democrats. That was your source.

The laptop, you mean the same laptop that got Greenwald fired from the Intercept because of the abombinable censorship of making him provide sources that are more credible than Rudy Giuliani and an article more factual than the sadly increasingly common Greenwald ranting about the liars and fakers who dared to question him?

Greenwald quit and the laptop is real. I thought several people had access to the hard drive, the FBI, the NY Post, etc.

Which sources of mine?

The people you're citing in the thread, the person(s) who told you the Steele dossier wasn't used to get the Fisa warrant to spy.

Cast your mind back to how Nunes raised the underlying issues - late night scurrying around to the White House like he was in a crappy Forsyth thriller knock-off - and using what turned out to be genuine problems to paint a fantasy of some sort of Clinton Cult in the FBI seeking to smear poor innocent Donald Trump, and ask yourself: if Nunes genuinely cared about the actual issues identified in the Horowitz report, was that the best way to generate the consensus needed to address them? The Democrats were seething at the time over the poor handling of the Hotel California feeling Clinton email saga by Comey, the FBI in general, and the fact the New York office was leaking like a sieve. There were circumstances that we could have seen a Church Commission for the 21st century, but Nunes didn't care about that. He wasted what turned out to be genuine issues at the FBI for cheap political hackery.

The Democrats would have helped Nunes investigate how the Democrats spied on Trump?

From your link:

One of the striking features of the public reaction to Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s report on the FBI’s Crossfire Hurricane investigation is just how many people of just how divergent points of view are claiming vindication for whatever positions they held prior to the document’s release.

There were 2 positions supported by Horowitz, 1) The predicate for Crossfire Hurricane (the investigation into George P) was not biased. Durham made a rare announcement disputing that so he must have something. 2) The Fisa warrant applications and spying on Page et al is a completely different matter. Horowitz even busted an FBI lawyer hiding exculpatory evidence and he said his investigation in no way claims that was clean, on the contrary.

Ofc Democrats ignore what they did to Page to spy on Trump and focus on what Horowitz said about the investigation into George P.

 

[Birdjaguar]

Yeah, lying to a Fisa court to spy on your political opponents to win an election is a nasty trick.

As I recall it was an agent acting on his own that lied to the FISA court.

As I recall, wasn't it Jared Kushner (a private citizen at the time) who met with the Russians in their embassy to establish a back channel to Putin using Russian communications channels to avoid the NSA or CIA knowing about it?

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

Trump on his job on the pandemic: “We’ve done a phenomenal job. Not just a good job, a phenomenal job”
Reality: "No you didn't"
Trump rates his response to the pandemic on a scale of one to ten: “I'd rate it a ten.”
Reality: "I don't"
Trump: OBAMAGATE!

 

[Lexicus]

My take, FWIW, the "when mexico sends" conditional statement refers to the Mexican government. The assumption is that the Mexican government is (or at least should be) responsible for it's border and they are allowing bad people with bad intentions to enter the US. the entire statement was directed at the government, not the Mexicans coming across.

If true, this makes the whole statement even dumber and more racist lol

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

well luckily, Trump defused the situation and brought some nuance to the party. He explained that the lamestream media misrepresented his words and illuminated his position.

“Remember my opening remarks at Trump Tower when I opened – everyone said, ‘Oh, he was so tough.’ I used the word ‘rape,'” Trump said.
“And yes, it came out where this journey coming up – women are raped at levels that nobody’s ever seen before,” he continued. “They don’t want to mention that. So we have to change our laws. And the Democrats, what they’re doing is just – it’s insanity. Nobody understands what’s going on.”

He's referring to: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino...ing-picture-central-america-migration-n758446

Among its findings:

- Almost 40 percent of those interviewed said they left home due to attacks, threats, extortion or attempts at forced recruitment by gangs in Central America. About 44 percent of the migrants had a relative who had died in the last two years due to violence, and that rose to 56 percent for those from El Salvador.

- Nearly 70 percent of those entering Mexico reported suffering violence during transit toward the United States, and nearly a third of women reported being sexually abused. They said the perpetrators "included members of gangs and other criminal organizations, as well as members of the Mexican security forces responsible for their protection."

- Of the 166 female migrants treated by MSF for sexual violence, 60 percent had been raped and the rest were subjected to other kinds of assault such as forced nudity. Among 1,817 people treated for mental health issues, about 47 percent had experienced physical violence during transit.

 

[bernie14]

If true, this makes the whole statement even dumber and more racist lol

How so?

 

[Lexicus]

How so?

I'm not gonna go down the rabbit hole of Trump exegesis with you. If you want to pick apart the Dear Leader's words, start a book club.

 

[Berzerker]

Of course it wasn't about the person of Trump conspiring with Putin, you can count on one hand the number of people who would trust Trump to return a pen he loaned them; nobody would be stupid enough to tell him about a potential conspiracy.

My position has been that the behavior of Flynn, Manafort, Sessions, Stone, and others in relation to figures either part of the Russian government or closely associated with the Russian security services has many unanswered questions due to those parties actively seeking to hide, lie, or mislead Federal counterintelligence investigations into allegations Russian intervention in the election process.

What lie did Flynn tell about Russian interference in the election? They got him for lying about post election discussions with the Russian ambassador about policy directives Trump wanted to pursue. The investigation into Flynn began in the summer of 2016 and was about to be dropped in Jan 2017 when Obama, Biden and their people met to discuss how to screw him.

Sessions lied about what exactly? I thought he met a Russian at some function and didn't mention it during his confirmation because it was nothing more than a handshake greeting. Have you seen Stone's lies? I haven't... Something about contacts with Assange and Wikileaks comes to mind, but I thought he was caught claiming to have contacts he didn't really have. But didn't he lie after the election too? As for Manafort, they busted him for financial crimes during his stint in Ukraine.

That's a weaksauce explanation if I ever heard one. You are afraid of a potential political conspiracy so you have your NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISOR lie to Federal counterintelligence investigators -a lie he was easily caught out in- about an action that was not illegal and then proceed to lie TO THE VICE PRESIDENT which was the direct reason Flynn was fired.

I dont know that Trump told Flynn to lie and I dont know what lie he told, he took a plea deal under duress. If the conversation wasn't illegal why did Obama send his FBI to interrogate him about it? As for Pence, I dont know what happened. Maybe he got mad at Trump for not keeping him in the loop and Flynn paid the price.

Unless I'm misremembering something quite badly, I have no idea where you are getting a Papadopolous- Trump Tower meeting from, unless you are confusing your own conspiracy theories. (The Trump Tower meeting was set up by some Russian businessmen and an idiot who thought Russia -who famously executed the monarchy- had a 'crown prosecutor'.) I read the Papadopolous senate transcript very carefully when it came out. Papadopolous picked up a rumor from somewhere - I forget where- that the Russian security services were actively involved in the DNC email hack. During a grip-and-grimace with the Greek foreign minister, Papadopolous started blabbing about how as a fact the Russians were responsible for the DNC hack. That information spread like wildfire through the various European security services, and rather than catching on he might be caught up in a game he didn't understand, Papadopolous kept pretending he was a wise man of the world and that he knew what was going on. Small surprise he got burned by professionals.

Thats the 2nd time you mentioned how Papadopolous got played without describing the game. The game was making it look like Trump and Putin conspired. A western asset (Prof. Misfud?) told George the Russians had dirt on Hillary and he mentioned it to the Aussie ambassador. That guy told the FBI.

Thats how George and Trump got played, George told Trump and then all of a sudden Fusion GPS sets up the Tower meeting. Glenn Simpson met with the Russian woman the day before and after the Tower meeting, a meeting where she discussed the issue of adoption. Trump thought he was getting dirt on Hillary.

Methinks you are confusing your own conspiracy theories, unless you want to talk about how the Department of Justice lied to the White House about why Comey should be fired.

Russiagate is the conspiracy theory and it was debunked by Mueller and Horowitz.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-39866767

It has been a while since I read the Comey transcript, but I don't believe he ever made any comment about Page to Trump.

That isn't why Trump wanted him gone, but I didn't say Comey told Trump about Page. The house of cards began falling when Carter Page went public, thats when the FBI lawyer caught hiding exculpatory evidence by Horowitz committed his crime, early 2017. Page told people he was a CIA asset and that caused the FBI a problem, the CIA confirmed Page was an asset and Klinesmith hid that from the courts.

Lying to the Senate is lying to the Senate.

You said he all but lied

Sessions also told the panel he was not in contact with anyone associated with the Russian government -- despite the fact that Sessions met twice with Sergey Kislyak, then the Russian ambassador to the U.S., during the campaign.

Were these sit down meetings to discuss policy or greetings at social functions? I thought it was the latter.

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/democrats-attorney-general-jeff-sessions-clarify-comments-russia/story?id=50913023

Also, you are wrong and there were FISA orders on Manafort.

The 1st was about Manafort's dealings in Ukraine before Russiagate and was dropped for lack of evidence, your link says they dont know when the 2nd happened. Neither of these is Russiagate, the Fisa warrant to spy on Page is Russiagate.

If Trump couldn't find someone to tell him a way on how to diplomatically say "Putin and I discussed allegations of Russian cyberwarfare and I support the findings of the US security services", that's a him problem.

That would be calling Putin a liar. Besides, maybe he didn't support those findings. Obama's top people - like the former heads of these agencies - were out there lying about Trump, why would he place any faith in their opinions? Brennan and Clapper were smearing him as a traitor and Schumer warned Trump dont piss off the intel community because they will get pay back. Oh they got pay back, led to the 1st impeachment and delayed our withdrawal from Afghanistan just to name a couple.

You've created your own "Russia-gate" where it is focused on Trump-the-person, and can therefore claim all the serious questions raised by actions of Flynn, Manafort, Stone, etc, are all proof of your own personal Russia-gate being debunked. It is getting tiring and you can do better than this. For one who claims to be concerned about abuses of surveillance by US security services, you seem to be doing your very best to avoid what Horowitz actually found on the FISA problems; instead preferring to be a Manafort simp.

I dont care about Manafort and the Horowitz report focused on Page. We did not go thru several years of smearing Trump as a traitor because he was not the focus of Russiagate, the Mueller and Horowitz reports exonerated him so die-hard Russiagaters moved the goalposts to 'serious questions' they cant answer.

Now where have I done my best to avoid Fisa abuses? Jhc the Democrats are trying to avoid that because they abused the system to spy on Trump. I object to it and you accuse me of doing my best to avoid the problem, WTH.

 

[Berzerker]

As I recall it was an agent acting on his own that lied to the FISA court.

As I recall, wasn't it Jared Kushner (a private citizen at the time) who met with the Russians in their embassy to establish a back channel to Putin using Russian communications channels to avoid the NSA or CIA knowing about it?

Klinesmith committed his crime in early 2017 after 2 Fisa warrants had already been approved and after Page went public. The only reason he committed the crime was because Page was telling the truth and the CIA confirmed his version to the FBI, but that was just a continuation of Russiagate. That started back in 2016 before the election with the 1st Fisa application, according to the Horowitz report the Steele dossier was critical to the warrant to spy on Trump.

The Steele dosser and its role in obtaining the Fisa warrant on Page was the big lie. First the Democrats told us the Steele dossier wasn't relevant and then they portrayed Steele and his dossier as unimpeachable. It was BS, Democrats paid foreigners to interfere in our election, they conspired to feed lies to a Fisa court to spy on their opponents.

As for Kushner and a back channel, so what? Assuming thats not more Russiagate nonsense, if I was Trump I'd want to talk with other leaders without my political enemies listening in. Course they were already spying on him so I dont know how they could have avoided that.

If true, this makes the whole statement even dumber and more racist lol

How so?

I'm not gonna go down the rabbit hole of Trump exegesis with you. If you want to pick apart the Dear Leader's words, start a book club.

Thanks, a good laugh always brightens the day...

 

[bernie14]

If true.....bla, bla

I'm not gonna go down the rabbit hole of Trump exegesis with you. If you want to pick apart the Dear Leader's words, start a book club.

No, i want to pick apart your statement