W. Niederhut

It seems like 70% or more of this thread in recent months has been dedicated to people reading and then correcting Mathew Koch and Ben Cole's misconceptions about Russiagate, Trump's J6 coup attempt, and, now, Trump's Ukraine-gate/Zelensky extortion scandal in 2019. A big part of the problem is that Mathew and Ben never studied or listened to the damning evidence in the cases of Russia-gate, Ukraine-gate, or J6-- i.e., the Mueller and Senate Intel Reports, the Ukraine-gate impeachment testimony, or the J6 Committee testimony. Rather, they have misinterpreted these Trump scandals on the basis of disinformation and false alternate narratives in the MAGA-verse media. I have already posted references and summaries of the Russia-gate and J6 evidence for Ben and Mathew. Here is a good summary of the damning Ukraine-gate impeachment testimony against Trump and Giuliani, by members of Trump's own administration-- including Trump's former EU Ambassador Gordon Sondland, former Ukrainian Ambassador Marie Yovanovich, and Trump's former NSC Russia expert, Dr. Fiona Hill. I'll wager that Ben and Mathew never watched the Ukraine-gate impeachment testimony in the House. Key players in the Trump impeachment probe and what they testified to Congress - ABC News (go.com) December 4, 2019

Paul, Guyenot is a genius-- a real polymath. He has a background in engineering, anthropology, and history from the Sorbonne.

Ron, I'm visiting my in-laws in Denton, Texas this week. We had to cancel our flight back to Denver today (from Love Field) because I-35 is too icy for the drive to Dallas. No power outages here so far. I hope you and your family are o.k.

Indeed, Mark, and religious tolerance/freedom is a very old American ideal, appearing originally in Roger Williams' charter for the Rhode Island and Providence Plantations colony in the 1630s. Williams advocated religious tolerance and freedom in response to the rigid Puritan theocracy in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. (Which is why the oldest synagogue in the U.S. is Newport, Rhode Island's Tauro Synagogue.) The ideal of religious tolerance and freedom-- and the separation of church and state--was later championed by Thomas Jefferson and our Enlightenment era Founding Fathers, many of whom were Deists. So, it is, indeed, a myth that the U.S. was founded on Christianity-- although the Puritan Bay Colony had been.

Correct.

Paul, Laurent Guyenot is a Sorbonne graduate, a serious scholar, whose work has little to do with anti-Semitic tropes about "Jewish bankers," etc. As an example, he has written in considerable detail about the history of James Angleton's close ties to the Mossad.* Most of us agree that the CIA was involved in JFK's assassination. So, is it really a stretch to theorize that the Mossad may have collaborated with Angleton and the CIA in some fashion? The issue for JFK and Ben Gurion was Dimona, Israeli survival, and nuclear proliferation. Another possible Israeli angle in the JFK assassination was Jack Ruby's association with L.A. mobster Mickey Cohen, who was, in turn, an associate of Irgun leader Menachem Begin. * Angleton, Mossad, and the Kennedy Assassinations, by Laurent Guyénot - The Unz Review

Yes, Chris it's amusing to read about how our American political leaders in the early 19th century agonized over their tiny Federal budgets and debts at that time in history. The U.S. debt in the post-Reagan era is truly gargantuan in comparison. What we are dealing with in modern U.S. history is the Republican "Starve-the-Beast" strategy; 1) cut taxes for the wealthiest 2%, then 2) balance the budget by cutting Federal spending on the 98%-- on Medicare, Social Security, education, healthcare, etc. This is happening currently with Kevin McCarthy's GOP Sedition Caucus in the U.S. House-- although it sounds like Trump has convinced McCarthy to stop talking about using the debt ceiling negotiations to force cuts in Social Security and Medicare funding. The line in the sand for the Republicans-- as in 2011-- is to refuse to increase their historically low tax rates for billionaires.

And, right on cue this morning, here's Robert Reich talking about FDR's 90% top tax rate and the Reaganomic tax cuts that created our national debt... The biggest story you've never heard about today's federal debt (substack.com) January 31, 2023

John, I agree that the Democrat Party in the U.S. has not done enough for the poor, but the Republicans have done nothing. Their policies have consistently focused on enriching the rich. Recall that our Democratic President Franklin Roosevelt raised the top income tax rate dramatically during the Great Depression, (to 90%) while establishing our Social Security retirement system. It is true that JFK, a Democrat, lowered the top tax rate (from 90% to 70%) in the early 60s, but Reagan and the Republicans have lowered it far more dramatically during the past 40 years. (See the graph below.) Also, the Democrats established Medicare, Medicaid, and Obamacare, which have greatly benefited the poor. Republicans opposed all three healthcare initiatives.

Kirk, I think you would agree that, in reality, Trump was always a pseudo-populist. As a Trump Organization mogul, he hired non-union workers-- including illegal aliens. He always despised poor people. Obviously, he was able to convince a lot of poor, angry, white people to vote for him in 2016 and 2020, but he never had their best interests in mind-- just the opposite. He even slipped up in a December 2017 Fox interview with Maria Bartiromo by admitting, "I represent rich people," and bragging that his tax cuts would, "make a lot of people richer." As for "populism," David Axelrod pointed out that Trump was the (Hegelian) Anti-Obama in 2016-- the Great White Birther candidate for the NOBAMA-ers who wanted to Put Whitey Back in the White House. But, in economic policy matters, Trump was always another Koch/GOP Trojan Horse. He cut more taxes for billionaires, approved the Keystone Pipeline for Big Oil, and tried to sabotage Obamacare. IMO, DeSantis will use the same pseudo-populist strategy of Anti-Woke-ism going forward.

I read Piper's book Final Judgment a few years ago. It was heavy on allegations and thin on evidence, IMO-- mainly focused on JFK's Dimona conflict with Ben Gurion, and the thesis that Meyer Lansky was the de facto head of the Mafia in the U.S. If I recall correctly, Piper also theorized that Jack Ruby was working for Lansky, Micky Cohen, Menachem Begin, et.al.

John, The subject of why Hillary won in 2016 by 3 million votes, but lost the Electoral College tally by a combined 80,000 votes (in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania) is complex. One professor in Wisconsin later estimated that roughly 23,000 legitimate Democratic ballots had been "disqualified" in metropolitan Milwaukee alone. Democratic Detroit had a similarly low tally. And we know that the Russian GRU hacked voter registries in multiple states. The Democrats established the first framework for universal healthcare coverage in U.S. history in 2009. Republicans repeatedly voted to de-fund it, after 2009, and damaged it in 2017 with a rider in their Trump/GOP Tax Cuts For Billionaires Act. Where are you getting the notion that Democrats "betrayed" the working class? (From Benjamin Cole?)

Phillip Nelson?

John, My responses to your post are in blue (below.) John wrote: Thanks for that, William, though a link to the article would have sufficed. Mathew Koch explicitly requested a summary, in lieu of my link to the Mueller Report. There seems to be some ambiguity about the whole matter as suggested in the following extract from Wikipedia: "The (Mueller) report concludes that the investigation 'did not establish that members of the Trump campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.'" "Did not establish" is the key phrase here, John, and it is misleading in that Mueller did not establish Trump's innocence in Russiagate. Trump and his campaign staff, including Paul Manafort, repeatedly lied to Mueller's investigators about their 2016 campaign contacts with Russian assets--including GRU agent Konstantin Kilimnik-- and/or refused to answer questions. (Trump, himself, repeatedly claimed he "couldn't recall" details in his written response to Mueller's questions.) Trump also obstructed/stonewalled the Mueller investigation by floating pardons to Flynn, Manafort, Gates, and others, during the investigation. And, in fact, Trump pardoned Manafort and Stone after they were both convicted of felonies (which were prosecuted in an effort to get at the suppressed facts about Russian collusion with the Trump campaign.) But Mueller explicitly stated that his investigation did NOT exonerate Trump in the Russiagate scandal, and that, in fact, Trump had repeatedly engaged in obstruction of justice-- for which Mueller was not allowed to indict him. It's also worth noting that on 1st December 2020 Attorney General William Barr stated, "FBI and Justice Department investigators found no evidence of irregularities that would have changed the outcome of the presidential election". Bill Barr is a former CIA lawyer who was the mastermind of the Reagan/George H.W. Bush Iran-Contra scandal cover up. After his narrow, party-line Senate confirmation as AG in 2019, Bill Barr lied about a great many things. He shut down Mueller's investigation of Russiagate, then redacted and misrepresented Mueller's Report publicly to create the false impression that Trump and his campaign associates had been exonerated. Here's the latest on Bill Barr's imploding campaign to rehabilitate his reputation. Bill Barr's 'hollow and self-serving' image rehabilitation tour shredded in scathing NYT editorial - Raw Story - Celebrating 18 Years of Independent Journalism While it certainly seems there was much sculduggery going on, it remains the case that the main reason the Democrats lost the 2016 election was, as I've already said repeatedly, their chronic betrayal of of those who Hillary Clinton called the "deplorables". Not accurate at all, John. Hillary Clinton was systematically smeared by the U.S. mainstream media in the weeks and months leading up to the 2016 election, as described by subsequent media studies from the Harvard University Berman Center and the prestigious Columbia Journalism Review. She was also smeared by endless Republican "investigations" of the Benghazi pseudo-scandal, from 2012-16. As for alleged "betrayal" of the American working class by the Democrats, recall that the Republican Party has repeatedly cut taxes for billionaires during the past 40 years, (largely creating the U.S. national debt) while simultaneously trying to sabotage and de-fund healthcare legislation benefiting American workers-- Medicare, Medicaid, and Obamacare.

French historian Laurent Guyenot has published a lengthy essay this month about JFK-Destiny Betrayed, which also includes some commentary about the recent interview of Oliver Stone and James DiEugenio by Canadian journalist Eloise Boies. Guyenot has high praise for James DiEugenio and JFK-Destiny Betrayed. His only criticism is focused on some questions about LBJ's putative role in the murder plot, and the Israeli/Dimona nuclear proliferation angle. JFK and America’s Destiny Betrayed, by Laurent Guyénot - The Unz Review January 21, 2023

Joe, Just to clarify, Mathew Koch was the guy who posted the comment, "I'm starting to consider you mentally ill," in response to my post summarizing the Mueller Report, which Mathew had requested (above.)

As people age, and lose frontal lobe gray matter, their personality disorders often become more obvious... 🤥 Trump Likens Himself to Late, Great Gangster Al Capone (mediaite.com)

Mathew, It's often difficult to decipher your gibberish and YouTube video concept of "dialogue" here. This will be my last post to you. On review, I had posted some comments about the J6 Committee, (above) and, in response, you posted a video of Adam Schiff, (apparently, talking about Russiagate?) When you then asked for a summary of the"report," I thought you were referring to the J6 Committee Report, which Adam Schiff was involved with, and so I took the time to summarize that evidence for you (above.) When I learned (from Chris and John) that you had, most likely, requested a summary of the Mueller Report, I then took the time to post an excellent summary for your perusal (above.) If you read the summary, you will learn that; 1) Russia actively interfered in our 2016 election on Trump's behalf, 2) Trump's 2016 campaign staff had numerous contacts with Russian assets, 3) Trump's campaign associates repeatedly lied about their Russian contacts, 4) Trump floated pardons for his former campaign associates during Mueller's investigation, and committed multiple other acts of obstruction of justice-- for which Mueller was not permitted to indict him. 5) Mueller, quite explicitly, did NOT exonerate Trump in his Russiagate investigation, and was repeatedly stonewalled by Trump, Paul Manafort, and others about details of their 2016 contacts with Kremlin assets. 6) Newly-appointed Attorney General Bill Barr aborted Mueller's investigation, then redacted the Mueller Report and lied about Mueller's findings-- part of an extensive public relations effort to mislead the public about Trump's Russiagate scandal.

Got it. You didn't read the Report or the summary that you, yourself, requested. You are a useful example of how Trump and his Fox echo chamber have succeeded in promoting "alternate facts" and alternate versions of reality in the Trump cult since 2016.

In 2010, Mathew? Please let Monsieur Payette answer the question. He's the buglioser who referred to my post (above) about Sunstein's "cognitive infiltration" proposal as "nonsense."

Bunk. It's hardly a nothing burger, Mathew. It's a very specific, detailed summary of the Trump campaign's involvement with Russian interference in our 2016 election, and of Trump and Manafort's efforts to conceal the evidence. You requested a summary, and I posted it for you. Now you refuse to face the facts, just as you have refused to read the Mueller Report and the Senate Intel Report on Russiagate-- opting, instead, to believe the false alternate narratives in the MAGA-verse. And, BTW, Trump, Bill Barr, Rupert Murdoch, Breitbart, Kremlin propagandists, et.al., have invested a great deal of time and resources in promoting false narratives about Russiagate. John Cotter's misleading Wikipedia quote (above) is one example. Anyone interested in the subject should take a few minutes to review the summary of the Mueller Report findings that I posted above-- which Mathew Koch erroneously calls a "nothing burger."

I'm still waiting for our buglioser, Lance Payette, to answer my question. No more bugliosing, Payette. Which anti-government conspiracy theory forums did Sunstein want the government to "cognitively infiltrate" in 2010? Any thoughts or brain farts?

Where are Mathew Koch and Chris Barnard today? Weren't you two asking yesterday for a summary of how the Mueller Report implicated Trump in his Russiagate scandal-- since Mathew refused to read the Mueller Report? Geez... John, the reason I posted the summary-- instead of the link-- is that Mathew and Chris explicitly requested a summary statement, instead of a mere link.

John, I asked Mathew Koch which of three "reports" he was referring to-- the Congressional J6 Report, Mueller Report, or U.S. Senate Intel Report. He didn't specify, so I briefly summarized the damning evidence in the J6 Report. Here is a fairly concise summary of the damning evidence in the (redacted) Mueller Report. Since Mathew never reads the reference links I post, I'll print this out for him. KEY FINDINGS FROM THE MUELLER REPORT The Special Counsel investigation uncovered extensive criminal activity •The investigation produced 37 indictments; seven guilty pleas or convictions; and compellingevidence that the president obstructed justice on multiple occasions. Mueller also uncovered and referred 14 criminal matters to other components of the Department of Justice. •Trump associates repeatedly lied to investigators about their contacts with Russians, and President Trump refused to answer questions about his efforts to impede federal proceedings and influence the testimony of witnesses. •A statement signed by over 1,000 former federal prosecutors concluded that if any other American engaged in the same efforts to impede federal proceedings the way Trump did, they would likely be indicted for multiple charges of obstruction of justice. Russia engaged in extensive attacks on the U.S. election system in 2016 •Russian interference in the 2016 election was “sweeping and systemic.” (1) •Major attack avenues included a social media “information warfare” campaign that “favored” candidate Trump (2) and the hacking of Clinton campaign-related databases and release of stolen materials through Russian-created entities and Wikileaks. (3) •Russia also targeted databases in many states related to administering elections gaining access to information for millions of registered voters. (1) SPECIAL COUNSEL ROBERT S.MUELLER,III, U.S. DEP’T OF JUSTICE, REPORT ON THE INVESTIGATION INTO RUSSIAN INTERFERENCE IN THE 2016 ELECTION Vol. I, 1-5 (2019). (2) Id. at Vol. I, 1-4, 14-35. (3) Id. at Vol. I, 1-5, 36-50. (4) Id. at Vol. I, 50-51. The investigation “identified numerous links between the Russian government and the Trump Campaign” and established that the Trump Campaign “showed interest in WikiLeaks's releases of documents and welcomed their potential to damage candidate Clinton” •In 2015 and 2016, Michael Cohen pursued a hotel/residence project in Moscow on behalf of Trump while he was campaigning for President. (5) Then-candidate Trump personally signed a letter of intent. •Senior members of the Trump campaign, including Paul Manafort, Donald Trump, Jr., and Jared Kushner took a June 9, 2016, meeting with Russian nationals at Trump Tower, New York, after outreach from an intermediary informed Trump, Jr., that the Russians had derogatory information on Clinton that was “part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr. Trump.” (6) Special Counsel Mueller explicitly declined to exonerate President Trump and instead detailed multiple episodes in which he engaged in obstructive conduct •The Mueller Report states that if the Special Counsel’s Office felt they could clear the president of wrongdoing, they would have said so. Instead, the Report explicitly states that it “does not exonerate” the President (10) and explains that the Office of Special Counsel “accepted” the Department of Justice policy that a sitting President cannot be indicted. (11) •The Mueller report details multiple episodes in which there is evidence that the President obstructed justice. The pattern of conduct and the manner in which the President sought to impede investigations—including through one-on-one meetings with senior officials—is damning to the President. •Five episodes of obstructive conduct stand out as being particularly serious: In June 2017 President Trump directed White House Counsel Don McGahn to order the firing of the Special Counsel after press reports that Mueller was investigating the President for obstruction of justice; (12) months later Trump asked McGahn to falsely refute press accounts reporting this directive and create a false paper record on this issue–all of which McGahn refused to do. (13) After National Security Advisor Michael Flynn was fired in February 2017 for lying to FBI investigators about his contacts with Russian Ambassador Kislyak, Trump cleared his office for a one-on-one meeting with then-FBI Director James Comey and asked Comey to “let [Flynn] go; ”he also asked then-Deputy National Security Advisor K.T. McFarland to draft an internal memo saying Trump did not direct Flynn to call Kislyak, which McFarland did not do because she did not know whether that was true. (14) In July 2017, the President directed former campaign manager Corey Lewandowski to instruct the Attorney General to limit Mueller’s investigation, a step the Report asserted “was intended to prevent further investigative scrutiny of the President’s and his campaign’s conduct.” (15) In 2017 and 2018, the President asked the Attorney General to “un-recuse” himself from the Mueller inquiry, actions from which a “reasonable inference” could be made that “the President believed that an un-recused Attorney General would play a protective role and could shield the President from the ongoing Russia Investigation.” (16) The Report raises questions about whether the President, by and through his private attorneys, floated the possibility of pardons for the purpose of influencing the cooperation of Flynn, Manafort, and an unnamed person with law enforcement. (17) (10) Id. at Vol. II, 8. (11) Id. (12) Mueller Report at Vol. II, 77-90. (13) Id. at Vol. II, 113-18. (14) Id. at Vol. II, 40-44. (15) Id. at Vol. II, 319-25. (16) Id. at Vol. II, 319-25. (17) Id. at Vol. II, 332-45. •Beginning in June 2016, a Trump associate “forecast to senior [Trump] Campaign officials that WikiLeaks would release information damaging to candidate Clinton.” (7) A section of the Report that remains heavily redacted suggests that Roger Stone was this associate and that he had significant contacts with the campaign about Wikileaks. (8) •The Report described multiple occasions where Trump associates lied to investigators about Trump associate contacts with Russia.Trump associates George Papadopoulos, Rick Gates, Michael Flynn, and Michael Cohen all admitted that they made false statements to Federal investigators or to Congress about their contacts. In addition, Roger Stone faces trial this fall for obstruction of justice, five counts of making false statements, and one count of witness tampering. •The Report contains no evidence that any Trump campaign official reported their contacts with Russia or WikiLeaks to U.S. law enforcement authorities during the campaign or presidential transition, despite public reports on Russian hacking starting in June 2016 and candidate Trump’s August 2016 intelligence briefing warning him that Russia was seeking to interfere in the election. •The Report raised questions about why Trump and associates repeatedly asserted Trump had no connections to Russia. (9) (5) Id. at Vol. I, 67-80. (6) Id. at Vol. I, 110-20. (7) Id. at Vol. I, 5. (8) Id. at Vol. I, 51-54. (9) Id. at Vol. II, 18-23. Congress needs to continue investigating and assessing elements of the Mueller Report •The redactions of the Mueller Report appear to conceal the extent to which the Trump campaign had advance knowledge of the release of hacked emails by WikiLeaks. For instance, redactions conceal content of discussions that the Report states occurred between Trump, Cohen, and Manafort in July 2016 shortly after Wikileaks released hacked emails; (18) the Report further notes,“Trump told Gates that more releases of damaging information would be coming,” but redacts the contextual information around that statement. (19) •A second issue the Report does not examine is the fact that the President was involved in conduct that was the subject of a case the Special Counsel referred to the Southern District of New York–which the Report notes “ultimately led to the conviction of Cohen in the Southern District of New York for campaign-finance offenses related to payments he said he made at the direction of the President.” (20) •The Report also redacts in entirety its discussion of 12 of the 14 matters Mueller referred to other law enforcement authorities. (21) •Further,the Report details non-cooperation with the inquiry by the President, including refusing requests by the Special Counsel for an interview; providing written responses that the Office of the Special Counsel considered “incomplete” and “imprecise” and that involved the President stating on “more than 30 occasions that he ‘does not recall’ or ‘remember’ or ‘have an independent recollection.’” (22) (18) Id. at Vol. I, 53. (19) Id. at Vol. I, 54. (20) Id. at Vol. II, 77, fn. 500. (21) Id. at Vol. II, Appendix D. (22) Id. at Vol. II, Appendix C

You want a 5-10 line summary of the copious evidence for guys like Mathew Koch, who adamantly refused to watch the Congressional J6 Committee hearings? 1) Trump planned even before the November 2020 election to declare himself the winner, and claim that the election was stolen, in the event that he lost. (Source: Steve Bannon) 2) He then tried to organize slates of false electors in several states that he lost, including Arizona, (per Rusty Bowers) and Georgia (per Brad Raffensperger.) 3) He refused to concede after the state electors had been certified in December of 2020, and opted, instead, to summon his supporters to Washington D.C. to disrupt the January 6th certification of Biden's election-- with the encouragement of his Willard Hotel coup co-conspirators, including Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman, Sidney Powell, Mike Lindell, Michael Flynn, Roger Stone, Steve Bannon, and members of Congress. (Source: Twitter, Cipollone, Hutchinson) 4) He urged his armed J6 mob to "march down to the Capitol" and "fight like hell"-- knowing that members of his angry mob were armed. When informed that they were armed, Trump said, "Take down the magnetometers. They're not here to harm me." (Source: Cipollone, Hutchinson) 5) He and John Eastman repeatedly pressured Mike Pence to refuse to certify the election results on January 6th, then Tweeted to the mob that Mike Pence had betrayed the country. (Source: Marc Short) 6) Trump did nothing to protect Congress for three hours, while gleefully watching the violent attack on the Capitol, and dispatching Secret Service agents to remove Pence from the Capitol before the election could be certified. (Source: Twitter, Cipollone, Hutchinson) There are your 15 lines...