***Official Political Discussion Thread***

[whywesteppin]

the white-haired intellegencia has spoken:



yup, this is how the world viewed Trump throughout the 80s and 90s. a joke. a punchline. an afterthought.

Spoiler: bonus

 

[dwalk31]

This plausible deniability shtick is really getting old.

Do you know what plausible means?

 

[frenchbreadbuilds]

Do you know what plausible means?

I guess not because we keep drawing different conclusions.

 

[Sharpshoeter13]

Wait, did he just...

Russian did what, Donald?

 

[deleted]

I'm happy dwalk31 has informed us that the standard for Trump's language is that he must say something in plain English to determine if it reflects his true feelings

And there we have him very clearly saying that he believes Russia stole the election

Good stuff

 

[PatRiley]

I'm happy dwalk31 has informed us that the standard for Trump's language is that he must say something in plain English to determine if it reflects his true feelings

And there we have him very clearly saying that he believes Russia stole the election

Good stuff

SMH WOW

 

[Kimchi Papi]

You know deplorables know what plausible deniability means. Their administrations have been practicing use of that term dating back decades...

 

[boris]

Short answer: political discussion.

The antics in this thread aside I try to address issues respectfully. The reality is that the majority in this thread are actually trolling. See coal gang, Etc.

I actually give a factual account. Many in here say “well technically yea, but if you read between the lines then what I’m saying makes sense.”

It is completely possible that Trump is a vile racist. It is completely possible that Roy Moore is a pedophile. It is completely possible that Dr. Ford’s allegations against Justice Kavanaugh were true. The opposite is also true. I don’t know. This thread, for some reason, ignores any other possibility in support of their political leanings. Then, when someone points out fatal flaws in reasoning names are called.

As I said, I respond to posts respectfully. If dissenting views are bothersome, utilize the ignore function. I realize a lot of people find peace in echo chambers.

This is some hilarious bait. I applaud the effort.

 

[northoaklandfc]

It's funny how we had a Black president for 8 years, and you didn't see this level of white extremist activity. Somebody comes along and campaigns on implied xenophobia, and all the deplorables get vocal and violent.

Defend Trump's lack of racism all you want, the facts are clear: White supremacists think they have one of their own in the WH.

Every individual aligned with the right in this country fall into one of three groups:

1) Open white supremacist (vile racists)
2) Conscious but discreet white supremacist (vile racists, and cowardly)
3) Subconscious white supremacist (Apathetic to racism, unless they are accused of being a racist, can't stand for that, but actual racism and harm to minorities OK)

We may not have seen the exact same level of grotesque violence and terrorism from white conservative males in the eight years we had a black president but it hurt conservatives deeply, and we absolutely saw open racism in mainstream conservative thought and rhetoric get ratcheted up multiple levels.

For a generation Republicans have championed implicit xenophobia, bigotry, and racism (and covert classism), eight years of Obama caused it to fester, then Trump came along and explicitly paraded their racist and bigoted identity with pride and bravado.

Respect to all the former Republicans who can admit that the party went rogue racist a looooooong time ago, who can admit that they either didn't seen it or outright accepted it from the party, but who have grown into decent human beings who reject it disavow the party now.

 

[whywesteppin]

The antics in this thread aside I try to address issues respectfully. The reality is that the majority in this thread are actually trolling. See coal gang, Etc.

This is some hilarious bait. I applaud the effort.

you know your point is weak when your list of examples is one example followed by "etc."

that said, i am proud that Coal Gang is the majority of this thread and I would like to thank all my compatriots aepps20 , @noskey, rexanglorum (albeit a Libertarian by name, he is privately a Coalie), @RustyShackleford (when he was with Tomi), Belgium , @blastercombo , @Diego Pasta , @elpablo21 , dwalk31 , @fargin , @Based Jesus , @nawghtyhare , @kanyewest (up until last week), @AEA18, gry60 Etc. for making this happen. NT used to be a liberal paradise for hyperbole and innuendo, all funded by Soros and the globalists, but now we have turned the tide back in the direction of truth, honesty, and pride. ROLL COAL! CHOOOO CHOOOO!!!!!

 

[Kimchi Papi]

I disagree with point #3. Ain’t no subconscious white supremicast among the deplorables. They’re all racist sons of *******....

 

[aepps20]

you know your point is weak when your list of examples is one example followed by "etc."

that said, i am proud that Coal Gang is the majority of this thread and I would like to thank all my compatriots aepps20 , @noskey, rexanglorum (albeit a Libertarian by name, he is privately a Coalie), @RustyShackleford (when he was with Tomi), Belgium , @blastercombo , @Diego Pasta , @elpablo21 , dwalk31 , @fargin , @Based Jesus , @nawghtyhare , Etc. for making this happen. NT used to be a liberal paradise for hyperbole and innuendo, all funded by Soros and the globalists, but now we have turned the tide back in the direction of truth, honesty, and pride. ROLL COAL! CHOOOO CHOOOO!!!!!

Choo CHOOO CA CHOOO COMRADE. #SMASHMOUTHPOLITICS

 

[Arthur Shelby]

 

[whywesteppin]

Can't believe we elected that kid. He looks 30 years older now.

 

[aepps20]

10 years ago Bluffington went from being the coal capital of the midwest to the dust bowl after Obummer's executive order shut down the honker burger.

 

[Belgium]

Note that House Republicans have blocked all motions to send transcripts to the special counsel, not just Stone's testimony.

https://www.theatlantic.com/politic...r-stones-murky-relationship-wikileaks/574852/
Roger Stone’s Shifting Story Is a Liability
The longtime Trump confidant could face federal charges if Special Counsel Robert Mueller determines he lied to Congress about his contacts with campaign officials and WikiLeaks.

Roger Stone can’t seem to get his story straight. In 2017, the political world’s most well-known “dirty trickster” denied ever having a direct line to WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, as he repeatedly boasted during the 2016 election. Now, in light of new emails showing that he communicated WikiLeaks’s pre–Election Day plans to at least one senior Donald Trump–campaign official in the weeks before the election, his recollection is changing yet again.

Even before the latest email revelation, Stone, a longtime friend and confidant of President Trump, was in hot water with the House Intelligence Committee. Since his September 2017 hearing before the panel, he’s amended his testimony three times as new reports have emerged about his contacts with Russian nationals, the extent of his interactions with WikiLeaks, and his conversations with Trump-campaign officials. Despite those changes, the question of whether he perjured himself before the committee still stands—and is reportedly being examined by Special Counsel Robert Mueller.

“Roger Stone had a chance, under oath, to tell the House Intel Committee about his contacts with Russians and WikiLeaks during the 2016 campaign,” Democratic Representative Eric Swalwell of California, who sits on the panel, told me. “He misled us and has repeatedly—three times now—amended his testimony to fit new press reporting.” Swalwell noted that the committee’s Democrats voted to send transcripts related to its Russia investigation to Mueller, but Republicans resisted. “The special counsel should see Stone’s transcripts and the accounts of all witnesses,” he added.

Mueller, who is investigating whether the Trump campaign conspired with Russia to win the 2016 election, has been interviewing Stone associates and senior campaign officials in recent weeks—including campaign CEO Steve Bannon and the former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort. He’s reportedly trying to determine whether Stone coordinated the release of hacked emails from a senior Clinton-campaign official, John Podesta, to distract from the damaging Access Hollywood tape, which showed Trump making vulgar comments about women. The tape was released just minutes before the email dump. Stone has long denied that he discussed WikiLeaks’s plans with Bannon or any other campaign official. “There are no such communications, and if Bannon says there are he would be dissembling,” Stone told The Washington Post as recently as Tuesday.


But emails from Stone made public Thursday belie that claim. On October 4, 2016, three days before the Podesta emails were published, Stone emailed Bannon predicting “a load” of new WikiLeaks disclosures “every week going forward.” According to Swalwell, Stone “had an opportunity” to tell the committee about his WikiLeaks-related conversations with Bannon, but “he didn’t.” (Stone told the Post on Thursday that he “was unaware of this email exchange until it was leaked,” adding that “we had not turned it up in our search.”)

It isn’t clear whether the panel’s Democrats plan to bring Stone back in for further questioning if they retake the House majority and assume subpoena power. But, like Swalwell, a Democratic aide on the committee emphasized the importance of getting Stone’s full transcript to Mueller to determine whether he committed perjury. “We’ve repeatedly urged the majority to provide the special counsel with access to Roger Stone’s transcript, among others, both for the evidence they offer and to determine whether witnesses have committed perjury,” said the aide, speaking on the condition of anonymity. “This is a particular concern with Roger Stone, especially after the publication of these emails.” Stone didn’t immediately return a request for comment.


Former federal prosecutors told me that inconsistencies between Stone’s testimony and what Mueller has learned could hypothetically lead to federal charges. If Mueller were to determine that Stone lied to the panel, “I think he would just charge Stone with perjury” rather than refer the matter to the committee for further review, said Dan Goldman, a former federal prosecutor in the Southern District of New York who specialized in organized crime. “If, for some reason, he didn’t think he had a perjury case but believes Stone misled the committee,” Mueller may notify lawmakers anyway, he said.

Stone’s conflicting statements have been material to both federal and congressional investigators, who want to know whether Stone served as a conduit between the campaign, WikiLeaks, and Russia. Despite telling the committee that he never “had any communication with any Russians or individuals fronting for Russians, in connection with the 2016 presidential election,” Stone later acknowledged meeting with a Russian man named Henry Greenberg in May 2016 to obtain dirt on Hillary Clinton. With regard to Assange, Stone told the House Intelligence Committee that they spoke only through an intermediary, but Twitter direct messages show Stone communicating with the WikiLeaks Twitter account in October 2016. It’s widely understood that Assange is that account’s primary administrator.

Elie Honig, who was also a federal prosecutor in the Southern District, largely agreed with Goldman’s assessment. “If Stone lied to the House committee, that certainly could give rise to criminal charges for false statements and obstruction of justice,” Honig, who prosecuted mob cases, said. “Mueller could charge simply on the basis of Stone’s testimony and the evidence proving that testimony to be knowingly false.”

The content of the newly revealed email with Bannon doesn’t prove that Stone had advance knowledge of WikiLeaks’s roll-out plan for the Podesta emails; Assange had already told reporters that morning that there would be a disclosure every week until the election. And WikiLeaks could easily have decided on its own, without the urging of anyone associated with the Trump campaign, that the best way to deflect attention away from the Access Hollywoodtape was to give the world some stolen emails to sift through. But Stone seemed to know well in advance that WikiLeaks was planning something big—and that it concerned Podesta.

“It will soon [be] Podesta’s time in the barrel. #CrookedHillary” Stone wrote in a now-famous tweet on August 21, 2016. (Stone told the House Intelligence Committee that the tweet was prompted by the resignation of his “boyhood friend and colleague, Paul Manafort” over his ties to Ukraine. He said that he “thought it manifestly unfair” that Podesta, Clinton’s campaign chairman, was not “held to the same standard” due to his own foreign business dealings.)

On October 2, 2016, Stone told the far-right talk-radio host Alex Jones that he had been “assured that the mother lode” was coming. The next day, he tweeted that he had “total confidence that @wikileaks” and his “hero Julian Assange” would come through.

On October 7, WikiLeaks began publishing the contents of Podesta’s inbox, which had been infiltrated by Russian hackers seven months earlier. Stone told The Daily Caller on October 12 that Assange had delayed the email dump on purpose: “I was led to believe that there would be a major release on a previous Wednesday,” October 5, he said. Despite his public statement in August that he’d been speaking directly to Assange, he denied that he had been given “advance knowledge of the details” of WikiLeaks’s release and maintained that he was in touch with Assange only indirectly.

WikiLeaks has downplayed its relationship with Stone, and asked him in private messages that I obtained to stop making “false claims of association” with the organization. That was in October 2016. But it reopened its line of communication with Stone in November. “Happy?” WikiLeaks wrote to Stone, the day after Trump won the election. “We are now more free to communicate.” Fourteen months later, Stone visited the Ecuadorian embassyin London, where Assange has been holed up for more than five years.


“There is no doubt that WikiLeaks, controlled by known foreign citizens, tried to influence the election,” Goldman said. “But the question for Mueller is whether Stone knew about it or whether he assisted it in any way. If he encouraged Assange to release the emails, or advised him on the timing or strategy of doing so, that would be enough [to charge him with a crime]. But the emails released in [The New York Times] only shows knowledge, not coordination.”

“It is very difficult—not impossible, but difficult—for Stone to walk the fine line between intermediary and co-conspirator,” Honig said. But given what is known about how Russian intelligence illegally hacked the emails of both Podesta and the Democratic National Committee; how those hackers used both WikiLeaks and a Russian intelligence officer with the nom de guerre Guccifer 2.0 to disseminate the stolen materials; and how Stone had direct contact with WikiLeaks, Guccifer 2.0, and Bannon, that line seems to be blurring rapidly.

“If Stone knew or should have known that the emails were illegally obtained … and took some step either to disseminate those stolen emails, or to encourage the hackers to continue their illegal work, or to assist in the overall effort to steal and disseminate the stolen emails,” Honig said, “then he likely crosses over into criminal co-conspirator or accomplice territory.”

 

[youngogjosh]

Damn, feel old as ****, was in the 6th when we watched him be sworn in.

 

[Belgium]

Damn, feel old as ****, was in the 6th when we watched him be sworn in.

There were celebrations over here too. Man was practically a saint here.

 

[rexanglorum]

Second to last especially

 

[kdawg]

Wow.

 

[green rhino123]

Every individual aligned with the right in this country fall into one of three groups:

1) Open white supremacist (vile racists)
2) Conscious but discreet white supremacist (vile racists, and cowardly)
3) Subconscious white supremacist (Apathetic to racism, unless they are accused of being a racist, can't stand for that, but actual racism and harm to minorities OK)

Those are opinions and not facts and therefore I hope you do not immediately dismiss anything someone else says solely on if they differ with those opinions.

I disagree with point #3. Ain’t no subconscious white supremicast among the deplorables. They’re all racist sons of *******....

 

[tomdiginson]

I do not support pedophiles. What in the world are you talking about?

Don't play coy. You support Trump and all his lackeys. One of them(Roy Moore) happens to be a known pedophile. Hence your support of pedophiles.

 

[frenchbreadbuilds]

Every individual aligned with the right in this country fall into one of three groups:

1) Open white supremacist (vile racists)
2) Conscious but discreet white supremacist (vile racists, and cowardly)
3) Subconscious white supremacist (Apathetic to racism, unless they are accused of being a racist, can't stand for that, but actual racism and harm to minorities OK)

We may not have seen the exact same level of grotesque violence and terrorism from white conservative males in the eight years we had a black president but it hurt conservatives deeply, and we absolutely saw open racism in mainstream conservative thought and rhetoric get ratcheted up multiple levels.

For a generation Republicans have championed implicit xenophobia, bigotry, and racism (and covert classism), eight years of Obama caused it to fester, then Trump came along and explicitly paraded their racist and bigoted identity with pride and bravado.

Respect to all the former Republicans who can admit that the party went rogue racist a looooooong time ago, who can admit that they either didn't seen it or outright accepted it from the party, but who have grown into decent human beings who reject it disavow the party now.

And let’s be clear about what white supremacy and racism is in the social and politics sense in 2018. Because seems like people don’t get it. White supremacy and racism aren’t simply/exclusively cross burning and hating a race. Its a complex system and it’s about keeping certain people in power, it’s about distribution and access to resources, it’s about society’s perception of certai groups of people and how those perceptions are reinforced and perpetuated.

 

[IATT]

 

[gry60]

I sort of agree with northoaklandfc in light of what the conservative movement has been about since the end of the civil war (and maybe before): maintain the status quo.

The system we have was largely built upon rules and customs that benefited the white majority. For two periods in history (reconstruction and post civil rights act), we were able to temper the most insidious pillar that supported the establishment of many American laws: the belief that White people are inherently superior to other races. The belief is still there, and it is used in various forms by the right to justify the current state of minorities in this country.