Elephants and Jackasses...

I will maintain that lack of care by many in the general public does not equate to lack of importance. I don't have much faith in the general populace as they are the one who got us here in the first place.

 

I'm thinking basically the exact opposite of clutch. That of everyone I interact with on a daily basis, I'd wager at least 75% know who Cohen is if I mention just his last name. I honestly don't know how you could avoid knowing about him, unless you just don't consume any news media whatsoever.

 

If I were to randomly walk up to some person, there’s a decent chance they don’t know who Cohen is. It really depends on what’s happening in their lives I guess. I have the luxury of being able to have the time to devote to caring about the goings-on in politics.

My conservative, Trump-supporting family knows who Cohen is because they were very quick to regurgitate whatever talking points they were told by whatever pundit or Jim Jordan said against him.

In my personal circle, everyone knows all the major players in this. I tend to dig pretty deep so I know who a lot of Russian actors are as well.

 

You should share that information with congress.

 

I know you like being snide on here, but it’s people who have been indicted already or people who trump was known to associate with.

 

Well, that's a wide net.

 

It’s because this is a fucking big deal and this level of criminality has never been seen in American politics before. It involves multiple countries and many people. This is the kind of shit seen with corrupt dictatorships where there is no rule of law. Half the country voted for a fraud and a con artist. Some regret it, but others think Hillary would have somehow been worse.

 

Which countries are involved and what are they trying to do?

 

Might Sean Hannity be forced to testify?

Just the idea of it is both hilarious and interesting (/smart) at the same time.

 

I don't know why you ask these questions.

You clearly aren't interested in the answers.

Aren't you supposed to be out campaigning for Sanders? You had an unending amount of support for him after Hillary won the democratic nomination.

Or were you just screaming "buuuuuttttt Beeeerrrrrrnnnnnnniiiieeeeee" to hide your support for Trump?

 

I honestly don't know which countries are supposed to be involved beyond America and Russia. Do you know the answer? Does asking it make you uncomfortable to the point I must be in love with Trump?

 

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1051501994232430593.html

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1079514265902567426.html

https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&sou...aw2xpF04G6IlKs01ztL_923L&ust=1551543341262821

That’s a terrible link to a New Yorker article.

Basically, it’s Israel, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Russia, and obviously the USA.

People like to shit on Abramson but he’s pretty intelligent. All of his information is sourced from real news sources around the world.

I’m happy to engage on this topic with you, but I’d like you to take the time to look into how deeply complex the situation is. It’s much more than just possible election rigging or whatever other overly simplistic way pundits like to boil it down to.

Even if we don’t have publicly all of the information to satisfy anyone’s curiosities, there are a lot of charges against people related to all of this.

If you look at it from the perspective of winning the presidency as the ultimate goal instead of just being a part of the process, I think you might be missing the point. To us Americans, the America-centered perspective can lead you down the wrong path. There is a much bigger criminal situation here which is why this is taking a long time.

 

Where these threads posted lack much in the way of detail beyond saying meetings happened and things were discussed or other nebulous links between the dots, my assumption is there are articles out there with agendas for these meetings or interviews with people who attended? Or is this supposition from unnamed sources passed as fact?

Also, this grand bargain, what evidence is there that this is an actual thing? Some of this rings of diplomacy - third party intermediaries discussing potential for closing diplomatic rifts is kind of how international politics works, isn't it? Am I missing something here? Should we not be talking to North Korea, Iran and Russia or is the ultimate goal something else? If it is something else what is it? Are we going to perform regime change or go to war with them?

This would have been covered by Mueller, right? If what is written in these threads is true then it will be interesting how this is addressed.

 

There's a lot there, and I finally had the time to read through it. The problem I've had with the Russia conspiracy theories from the beginning is that they necessitate the involvement of so many, but at the same time can't. To fit that mold Abramson breaks them down into separate criminal entities with divergent goals. I'm not seeing how he's linking all of this to a Russia/election collusion plot. Abramson's theory reeks of someone who started with the premise and then used that lens to ham-fist all interactions between the alleged players to fit into that mold. He pretty much says so himself.

And there's nearly endless examples of proof, but what is this actually proof of?

Except this isn't even a coincidence. Why is he linking these events at all? Because his theory already said they were linked? And one of the actors here isn't even part of Abramson's disparate organizations. Where does Greece play into all of this and Abramson first insists the list of co-conspirators is small and then they randomly bring this guy in on it? Why would they do that? It contradicts his own theory of how the various parties are conducting themselves.

I'm not going to comment on every bullet point the guy posted, but it's full of stuff like this. How this even relates to the overarching theory often isn't explained, or he's simply inserting his theory without apparent reason and ignoring entirely the already apparent reasons certain meetings took place. The underlying motives and goals of the countries allegedly involved are mostly accurate, but Trump didn't create that. He inherited it from the Obama regime, and the world at large. The talks Abrahamson frequently references are real, but they aren't evidence of a grand collusion plot.

I know you give this guy a lot of credence and I'm not just going to quote mine him so I'll try to look at his theory holistically. In the first link he's all over the place, much like the second one, but it's more or less focused on the Khashoggi murder. Some of his basic facts are wrong, and although the article was written 5 months ago these were well known at the time. It's true Khashoggi was critical of Trump at times, and unless we're being so generous with the term as to include people like Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh you would be hard pressed to find a journalist who hasn't been. However, Khashoggi didn't allege this 6 nation bargain deal, nor did he direct the bulk of his criticism towards Trump. The criticism Abramson references was 2 years before he was murdered, and although 'real world news organizations' reported he had been banned from Saudi Arabia as a result that wasn't the case. He got kicked off twitter. The exile was self imposed so he could have an outlet to encourage democratic movements and openly criticize the royal family, and existing political structure.
There was a cover up, that fell apart almost immediately. The motives for the murder are much more obvious than Abramson insinuates and are much more in line with how the Saudi government has treated political dissidents for decades rather than a '6 nation grand bargain'. The reason his death was so well covered is because he was a contributor at outlets like the Washington Post and the Saudi government was stupid enough to carry out the murder at a consulate of all places. There's a basic outline included in this article, or you can read the stuff that Khashoggi wrote himself.

Abramson seems very sure of himself, but the fatal misstep he alludes to isn't unique to Khashoggi, nor does it line up with the time frame. The choice to single out Khashoggi is odd, unless you already start with the premise that it happened as a result of this 6 nation bargain. Abramson simply ignores the obvious, well known explanations, as well as ignoring how the Saudi Arabian government has dealt with political dissidence within living memory.

He never even comes close to proving this. He just slaps meetings and interactions between the alleged conspirators and makes the claim. His 'proof' basically boils down to this bullet point.

Where is his evidence that they're discussing murdering Khashoggi at any of these meetings? He's straight up pulling that out of his ass, and forcibly inserting a Trump involvement motive narrative. There's a well known public explanation of the murder that makes perfect sense and lines up with how the Saudis have always operated. To connect it to a grandiose scheme involving multiple countries you have to take some giant leaps and Abramson certainly does.

What first struck me about the second link is that this guy is a columnist for Newsweek, and does analysis for CNN and BBC. For someone so experienced within media the way he presents his self described primer is an incoherent mess. At one point he's all the way back to 2002 where Trump is rigging the Miss Universe pageant at the behest of Putin, and in the next he's talking about Trump cabinet members lying about Russia meetings. I can't tell if he thinks Sessions is one of the Russia actors or not. At another bounce there is a very poorly explained connection between Israeli technology and Russian disinformation campaigns taking place in London and then he's off to golf courses funded by Russian banks. At no point does he slow down to explain how he knows all of his assertions are true, and only very rarely does he bother to connect these sprawling accusations to his overall theory.

Does this guy think it's even possible for these countries to meet and exchange dialogue without it being part of this 6 nation bargain deal? I've heard theories somewhat similar to what Abramson is suggesting and whenever the involved parties act in opposition to the theory it's usually to "throw the public and investigators off their scent". That's a damn piss poor explanation if you ask me.

The competing goals between the supposed nations involved are very much a real phenomena on the geopolitical stage, much like they were during the Obama presidency, but they're still spinning their wheels in the mud throughout the negotiation process. For a deal that has been years in the making they sure are taking their sweet time in implementing it.

I do agree with you to extent that real criminality is going to emerge with the Mueller report, although my expectations are somewhat more mundane. I'll come back to that in a later post.

 

Trump wants executive order requiring free speech on college campuses

With the caveat that I haven't seen the actual executive order proposed, I at least agree with the idea. If you don't like something, don't listen. This "safe space" and "I'm offended" crap is maddening to me.

 

That's a pretty bad commentary on society. College is supposed to be where you go to be exposed to new ideas and thoughts. For so many students now it seems to be a place they go to plug their ears and violently attack anyone with either an opposing opinion or what they may think might be an opposing opinion. I saw a banner at Berkeley a couple of years ago, some students were pissed off that Ben Shapiro was going to be speaking...the banner read "Nazi go home." I somehow think the person that hung that sign didn't even have a rudimentary grasp of history and yet they were a student at one of the supposedly top colleges in the country.

 

Isn’t that sign part of free speech too?

 

Sure it is. Did I say it wasn't?

If you read that I thought the banner shouldn't be allowed, you misinterpreted my meaning. I was using that as an example of someone who was unable to think for themselves or allow any opposing thought....kind of like the Nazis did. Ironic isn't it?