That smell is the UCMJ and SOFA agreements going up in smoke.

Trump is probably thinking couple years in a white collar jail won't be that bad for Roger. I think he pardons Stone, either before or lets say 2 months into his jail term.

Roger Stone was found guilty. Now all eyes turn to Trump. - POLITICO

It's guaranteed if he loses in November.

He doesn't look as if he can survive that long even in a white collar prison.

My daughter does little kid gymnastics. Was talking with a couple parents while she was there today, turns out the guy I was sitting next to served with Lorance, and served under his CO in the exact same location.

Got a very different story from him than what the media gives.

Nine members of Lorance's platoon testified against him and not a single member testified for him. I'm comfortable letting the military justice system make a determination of what happened and what punishment was warranted.

Never Trumpers.

Would be curious to hear more

Short-ish version, from what I gathered. And I will also note, this is one person talking, and this isn't someone I know even remotely well, but it was interesting.

1) The CO of that unit was and still is *hated*. He was described to me as a self serving CYA officer, whose MO was to immediately blame a subordinate if one of his decisions turned out to be wrong. (His almost exact words - if he is told one thing, disagrees and decides another thing, if he's proven wrong, he blames the guy who told him the 'right' thing.)

2) This leads to how this went down (and I will point out, guy I spoke to agrees the guy fucked up, but disagrees the guy deserved the punishment he got). He (guy I talked to) summed it up like this: "He (Lorance), screwed up. But he called those guys were going to attack us, he warned his CO, and he turned out to be right.".

3) Which leads to the impression of why the hammer came down, in this guy (parent)'s eyes: Lorance screwed up, but his assessment of the incoming attack was dead on. Heat came on the self-serving CO, who basically decided Lorance was going to go down hard. Lorance's platoon effectively were told how this was going to play out, and played ball.

TLDR - According to one person I barely know, but says he plays in the same pond as many of the principles, he got railroaded by a carreerist superior officer (who is now a general) who needed someone to go down hard for this. Too many eyes.

edit: There's a lot of pronouns here. I apologize. I'm exhausted right now. Rough week.

Trump went, unannounced, to Walter Reed. The WH is saying he went to get a head start on his physical. They also released a statement verifying how healthy and strong he is.

Very odd.

Even if that was true, this WH lies so often that it doesn’t really matter what they say the reason is/was.

We’ll never know.

But I for one always go to the hospital, on a Saturday, 3 months prior to a scheduled physical when nothing is wrong with me.

Interesting thought in a very close election that I saw on twitter, would Edwards have won if LSU had lost to Alabama?

I wonder if this is true

Trump Chest Discomfort Claim After Walter Reed Visit | Heavy.com

Dems win another electon-this time the Louisiana Governor race. Curious as to why the election was held on a Saturday though?

Because that's what Louisiana's Election Code calls for.

Gubernatorial primaries and general elections are held on Saturdays. Everything else is Tuesdays.

Putin has run easily the greatest intelligence operation in history. Is there a country in the West that the Russians haven't interfered with top political leadership?

BREAKING: Boris Johnson flew to Italy without his security detail & met ex-kGB agent 2 days after NATO summit to discuss Russia sanctions. New from me & @TownsendMark https://t.co/bqifjUyWUo

— Carole Cadwalladr (@carolecadwalla) November 17, 2019

Thanks Sack, just seemed odd it was on a Sat.

It's no surprise that the Brexit (break up of the EU) and Trump election interference (pro-Russian slant) and activities in the Middle East (ceding control to Russia), Ukraine military aid hold up (pro Russian), G7 controversy to add Russia back in under Trump (pro Russian) all align nicely with Putin's silent war on the west. He's winning by allowing cancer to eat western democracy and alliances to be eaten from within.

When someone wants to tell me that Trump has Freedom of Speech and that they steadfastly support it...

Meaning what?

Should somebody be forced to hire him?

The Trump Presidency – 2016
 

Meaning some people felt that Colin needed to shut up and play even going so far as to saying he was anti patriotic for taking a knee in silent protest

Now let’s see those same people fawning over freedom of speech rights for an American who happens to be the president


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I've been thinking a lot about how different things may look politically in twenty or thirty years. With the GOP going all in on shrinking demo groups and the Dems pulling in a lot of former GOP moderates in the suburbs, I can see a future where the parties are very different ideologically than they are currently. I could see a future where the Dems are a Euro like right-center party and a new party emerges for the left. Meanwhile the GOP shrinks to the point of irrelevance.

NK sure has the measure of Trump. After Trump nearly begged for a new meeting, NK issued a statement that says they won't meet until they get something first.

So much winning.

I thought Trump reach out to NK was worth the gamble but you are right, nothing much has come of it.

Haven't heard much from Trump on HK either. Its understandable we wouldn't jeopardize foreign and trade policy on HK (blame the Brits for where they are now) but a nice "measured" statement of support would be nice.

Still hoping for a breakthrough on China. I read an article that they may want to deal with Trump as Warren may be tougher on them. My guess is a rollback on tariffs some but nothing else until after 2020 is settled which means 2 years of ups-and-downs and uncertainty for not much to show for it.

The first two parts I agree with are inevitable but not sure we can declare the far right dying yet.

I'm not sure any of it will happen, that's just a possibility that I see.

dola

The Fed. Chair certainly implies that Trump and Mnuchin leaned on him to change policy.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/doug-ma...ion-uncovered/

Why not a new scandal?

It would be fun to see/hear Trump testify.

First off, the way he did it was absurd. Saying " talk to you soon" at the end of a tweet. Can he be anymore embarrassing?

Second, there is zero reason for us to reach out to NK. All it does is legitimize them. Trump has been played over and over by them, and he comes off looking even weaker in this.

I thought this was pretty standard. Ambassadorships are mostly given out to big money supporters. Obama, Bush, etc did the same.

I guess this is different because instead of doing it without an implicit directive, this one was out in the open. But I guarantee behind the scenes this stuff takes place all the time.

And that's not to say it's right. I personally believe that you should not be given a post if you've donated to a candidate.

https://www.npr.org/2014/12/03/36814...ps-critics-say

That's because you live in Illinois :p

I thought it seemed like a nothingburger too.

A. Appointees to locations like that are often political supporters and donate large sums.

B. Campaigns always ask for more. And when you've already donated a million, what's the hurt asking for more.

That's nothing. Why worry about it when there's so much more actually on the record that is worrying?

I agree. It seems like the kind of non-scandal that the GOP would be pushing the media to discuss so they can use it as "proof" that everything is a nothingburger and everyone is just out to get Trump.

It's Ambassador to the Bahamas, for crying out loud. If you're not selling that, I don't even know what to say. I know this is jaded-insider talk, but come on.

Some people say they are worried that trump is ill and hiding his illness in order to fool the American public! Well, I don't know, but they do! Because they are people who know things, and they know that a sick president is a weak president. So for the good of the country, donald, come out to the world and tell us what your hiding!

Apparently we walked out of talks today with the Koreans...the South Koreans.

WTF?

Hey, you'd be upset too, if you raised my prices by 500%. I am so ungrateful.

Right?

Well the left (and some libertarians) always wanted to remove overseas bases that form our American Empire right?

Who is hungry for some Gym Jordan word salad!

Jennifer Williams looks hung over. Maybe she was hanging out with Brett Kavanaugh last night. Beer!

whoever that is

More of the same crap from Nunes. It is amazing almost half the country can't see through this nonsense.

Media is bad!

It's amazing that the GOP (Ron Johnson now & Trump) will literally set fire to anyone that doesn't drink the kool-aid and push everyone else to hold the line...

Who will be the last one set on fire? Pence?

I'd say no, but then I remembered despite being left overall, foreign policy is one of the areas I take a neorealist conservative view.

And again Nunes starts questioning with speculation about Hunter Biden. How about a defense of Trump, or questions relevant to the impeachment.

Isn't that the GOP defense right now though? That Trump was simply trying to root out corruption and therefore it was reasonable to withhold the money until Ukraine took actions against said corruption.

I don't buy it personally but I imagine it would sell well to the base.

They have 5 or 6 defenses floating around out there at the moment and that is one. The problem is that he only specifically mentioned Biden and the DNC server nonsense and the server thing is probably the dumbest conspiracy they could have come up with but I guess if you don't understand servers and have no idea at all of how digital forensics work then it sounds exciting.

They're also claiming that since it's Trump just being himself there's nothing wrong with it. Another is that since the quid pro quo failed its all good.

And SK announces they are developing new security ties with China.

So, so much winning.

You are just missing the long game.

NFL players can't kneel for the flag if the United States ends up as a vassal state of China/Russia with no flag of its own.

Getting our ass kicked in foreign policy is simply another way to own the libs.