A notable aspect of the Poopship guilty plea is that he apparently was arrested in late July and plea filed early in October. Yet not leaked. Seems to be a tight ship for now*.
*Which was the rep that the MSM fuckholes touted for Ken Starr when they knew he was leaking like a sieve.
My memory is long and my rage is wide and deep.
My favorite paragraph in the P. statement is 9, which places Trump himself at a meeting discussing P.'s attempts to set up meetings with the Russian government. No possibility that this was just some guy off on his own frolic, he's putting Trump literally in the room.
Will bringing down Manafort not be a case of "Parturient montes, nascetur ridiculus mus" unless other, bigger fish follow in close order?
1* -- I thought at the time that it was the FBI leaking, because they hated Clinton. They don't hate Trump, so no leaks. Hey, the same motivation applies to the owners of the big media corporations.
3: Yes, that's implicit or explicit in pretty much everything I'm reading.
I'm afraid the trailing "Enjoy!" has now been ruined for me.
I'm moderately happy. Obviously what really matters on the investigative side is whether this continues to roll up people toward the top; and on the political side, activism is needed to make the investigation's findings have any real force, whether that's impeachment or neutering. But on the former, I'm reading analyses that suggest this is precisely what we'd see if they were working to flip more people and end up with Trump. This is the campaign manager rather than some barely-in-the-loop wannabe like Carter Page, which I worried it might be, Manaford can be directly linked to advocacy on Russia's behalf, and of course there's the Papadopoulos plea which is directly about colluding with Russia. Serious potential to keep on chipping at that bubble (which I guess is glass in this metaphor rather than soap or rubber).
Oh, and I like the speculation that Mueller wrongfooted the Evil Empire by letting them be leaked about the Manafort indictment so they could spend the preceding days spinning that like crazy, then have ready on the same day with no warning "And one of your guys has pled guilty".
"I choose now to live as a gay man."
"I should say this--that Melania doesn't have a mink coat. But she does have a respectable Republican ermine and Mexican-day laborer coat. And I always tell her that she'd look good in anything!"
9: I overheard that joke in the men's room this morning, except that it was Manafort admitting to treason, and also revealing that he's gay.
What was Manafort doing in an Ohio restroom?
The Russian guy in the next stall had a wide stance.
12: Sorry, that's protected by attorney-client privilege.
I'd be really surprised if Mueller doesn't have Flynn dead to rights.
Looks like Mueller might have quite a few people dead to rights. This is going to be interesting to watch.
Currently my two favorite points-
- Unindicted co-conspirator "Campaign Supervisor" is most likely Sessions- he was in charge of policy and on the nominal org chart P reported to him.
- It's twitter where everyone claims to know everything, but:
Papadopoulos is described as "proactive cooperator." Former prosecutor tells me that sometimes means "wore a wire."
Although now another story says the two higher-ups in the plea deal are Sam Clovis and Manafort.
19: Yes, in the one instance at least unattributed words* from an email in a footnote in the plea are the same as attributed to Manafort in a WaPo story from August.
It is to Paragraph 19, so Manafort would be "another highranking
Campaign official".
*Let[']s discuss. We need someone to communicate that OT is not doing these trips.
If you assume that everyone who had contact with the Russians lied like hell about it, that goes right into Trump's family. His reaction to those indictments will be priceless.
So there is also an original "High-Ranking Campaign Official" and "Campaign Supervisor" mentioned in that part of the plea for a total of 3 at least, so Session still possibly one of them.
WH schedule had Trump, Pence and Session having lunch today. Good day to be a fly on that wall. Maybe Pence was wearing a wire ..
Pence was supposed to wear a wire, but they couldn't find an FBI agent who could safely touch him and his wife couldn't make the tape stick.
Maybe if he took off the latex bodysuit?
On examination, I guess it's faulty character recognition of DT, on Politico's website.
2: My favorite paragraph in the P. statement is 9, which places Trump himself at a meeting discussing P.'s attempts to set up meetings with the Russian government.
That is almost certainly this meeting as highlighted by DJT on twitter at the time. Poopy is 3rd from left (Sessions is far left, just part of why I am sure that meeting today was a hell of a thing).
19, 22.1.last: Apparently Clovis is specifically supposed to be the Supervisor. So third is probably someone other than Sessions.
It's certainly plausible that Sessions was too focused on the racism to become involved with the financial corruption.
This would be the Russia corruption. Please try to keep up.
Anyone here with appropriate PACER access to get to this doc? I think it is a transcript of the Plea Bargain hearing (or something like that).
And it's not like he's opposed to treason, provided it's advancing the cause of racism.
31, 34. Sessions is a starry-eyed idealist.
34: Don't forget Poland the fight against Reefer Madness!
31. Do not think so. Sessions met privately in his office with Kislyak, no plausible way that was official business.
Ben Wittes swims in the Mueller/Comey sea, so this analysis seems worthwhile.
33: That is what it is, but not a question of appropriate access unfortunately. For reasons that have never been clear to me, it's standard practice in federal courts to make transcripts publicly available only at the clerk's office or for purchase for the first 90 days, then they go up on PACER.
40: Presumably to protect court reporters' livelihoods?
Seth Abramson has a long series of tweets today about the implications of today's indictments and the guilty plea.
(Noted in the comments over at Shakesville).
43: Can someone explain to me again why Twitter is better than blogging?
45: For this kind of thing, it's not, not inherently, but it's where people are doing their reading, so.
I think trump is mainly concerned about them looking into his shady business dealings rather than the russia thing.
"Trump has become increasingly concerned that the Mueller probe could be moving beyond Russia to an investigation into his personal dealings, two people familiar with the president's thinking said. "
https://apnews.com/3d045c83c28545b98239d595df55c4a1
Manafort's lawyer aggressively talking to the "audience of one" (and it ain't his client). Leads his statement with a bombastic:
"President Donald Trump was correct. There is no evidence the Trump Campaign colluded with the Russia government.
Do people compose these epic tweet storms in a word processor first? And then copy paste all 80 sentences over one at a time?
Seth Abramson is not a reliable source or analyst. Good rule of thumb -- never read Twitter.
Can someone explain to me again why Twitter is better than blogging
Reach. The format sucks, but there is a whole lot more potential to get your thing seen.
Yeah, people seem okay with 1-sentence posts as norm and longer posts as cumbersome exception on Twitter. It's a matter of habituation at this point.
51: I don't know him from Adam, but why? (if you've got a moment)
Also I realize the Twitter question was rhetorical, but it's so exciting to be able to explain things! I am an expert on why the Twitter! Christ almighty, fitting ending to the day of shit.
There are apparently apps that break up the tweets for you, should you wish to thread a longer bit of writing. But a lot of it, especially shorter conversational threads, read like they're written as they're posted. It doesn't take many words to get to 5+ tweets.
Because I'm petty, I've been waiting for responses to the indictments from leftish people I follow on twitter who've repeatedly declared the Russia stuff a distraction from the True Way to advocate for social and economic reform. Haven't seen anything yet.
33: I'm on a phone, haven't looked at the docs, but this may be the whole docket:
https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/6182316/united-states-v-papadopoulos/
49: But playing for a pardon looks pretty iffy. He's under house arrest, has to assume that Mueller is listening whenever he talks to anyone, and can't assume that any potential messenger to Trump isn't working for Mueller. How does he go about assuring himself that he can get a better deal from Trump than from Mueller?
53 - well, he admitted previously to widely disseminating false facts (about the primary) while justifying it as "experimental journalism" or a form of "performance art," to seek attention, so there's that. But more importantly he's neither a former federal prosecutor nor an experienced journalist in the area. He should be taken about as seriously on Twitter as some random cousin with no expertise known to have a penchant for making stuff up. I have no idea why I chose to comment on this issue, but there you go.
And there are lots of quite good places to get real analysis. I like Lawfare or Josh Marshall on these issues, your tastes may vary, but no need to go full unreliable dude on twitter.
39- Dude's got some big hands, no wonder Trump is scared. (Mueller, not Wittes)
And what particular value do the women in the class bring to that?
They're really good at breaking lobsters open.
Agree 100% with 51. I remain convinced that my quick-and-dirty method for determining reliability (never ever trust people who put NAMES in ALL CAPS in their tweets) is outstanding at weeding out dreck and very rarely has false positives.
I still use twitter a lot, almost entirely for the community of people there who are in my line of work, and it continues to surprise me even though it shouldn't that some people somehow get big followings despite having no background, expertise, or insight, simply because they once threw up a long thread that sounded like detailed analysis and then, context-free, it went viral.
57: Yes that does look to be it. Thanks!
From the motion to sea (filed 7/28, so day after arrest):
Premature disclosure Of the fact Of the defendant's arrest and the nature Of the charges against him is likely to substantially prejudice both the defendant and the government. Defendant has indicated that he is willing to cooperate with the government in its ongoing investigation into Russian efforts to interfere in the 2016 presidential election. Public disclosure of the defendant's initial appearance, however, would significantly undermine his ability to serve as a proactive cooperator. In addition, public disclosure Of defendant's arrest and the accompanying criminal charges may alert Other subjects to the direction and status Of the investigation. Once alerted to this development, potential targets may be prompted to destroy or conceal incriminating evidence, including evidence that the government may be pursuing imminently pursuant to judicial authorization.
Ah, but the transcript which is probably only place there might be new info is still "buy on PACER." Presumably some news org will do so and summarize if anything of interest?
Does the initial letter "o" have some legal significance?
I think just bad OCR which I did not correct.
That may be the correct answer, but it's not the entertaining one.
Facebook figured out what bar I'm in. Is that legal?
Do you have a restraining order against it?
According to T/yler C/owan on twi/tter*, 73 should read:
"The printing press figured out what bar I'm in"
*I don't follow him, muted his account as soon as I saw someone highlight a tweet from him to make fun of it.
75 Incunabula are anything posted on your Wall before the IPO.
54: It was rhetorical, but only because I didn't realize that there was a good answer. As a non-Twitter person, I had no idea. Now I know.
On the subject of unreliable dudes on twitter, I don't get what Glenn Greenwald's deal is, what with the sometimes seeming like the smart liberal attack dog we'd all like to see more of, and other times seeming like a proper crank with a shady ulterior motive. If anyone has insight on this I'd be interested.
