Starting with the scandals, then North Korea nuclear updates, plus a different VORACS format….
The North Korea nuclear story is heating up, but I can’t help myself always starting off with Trump scandals. Plus there’s no separate section for Related Articles at the bottom. With the overwhelming amount of circumstantial evidence that keeps being revealed, it is so abundantly clear something was going on between the Trump campaign & the Russians: Jason-Sattler-in-USA-Today-If-
The Democratic National Committee filed a multimillion-dollar lawsuit Friday against the Russian government, the Trump campaign and the WikiLeaks organization alleging a far-reaching conspiracy to disrupt the 2016 campaign and tilt the election to Donald Trump. The complaint, filed in federal district court in Manhattan, alleges that top Trump campaign officials conspired with the Russian government and its military spy agency to hurt Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton and help Trump by hacking the computer networks of the Democratic Party and disseminating stolen material found there.
“During the 2016 presidential campaign, Russia launched an all-out assault on our democracy, and it found a willing and active partner in Donald Trump’s campaign,” DNC Chairman Tom Perez said in a statement. “This constituted an act of unprecedented treachery: the campaign of a nominee for President of the United States in league with a hostile foreign power to bolster its own chance to win the presidency,” he said. The suit asserts that the Russian hacking campaign — combined with Trump associates’ contacts with Russia and the campaign’s public cheerleading of the hacks — amounted to an illegal conspiracy to interfere in the election and caused serious damage to the Democratic Party. Senate investigators and prosecutors for special counsel Robert S. Mueller III are still looking into whether Trump associates coordinated with any Russian efforts.
If this goes to a jury trial, it could get very interesting, putting this crime under a microscope: trump-lawsuit-russ
Mark Zaid, a Washington DC-based attorney who has worked extensively on national security matters, told The Independent the lawsuit was an “extraordinary effort to expose alleged misconduct, lawbreaking and a direct attack upon the fundamental democratic notions that underlie the US political system”. He noted that “the mere filing of the lawsuit is a victory for the DNC, regardless of the ultimate outcome” in part because “perception alone could be devastating”.
In another recent headline, this was an interesting report that came out where Sessions threatened to fly the coop should Rosenstein get fired. That would prompt the constitutional crisis I’ve been warning about, along with nationwide protests. This excerpt comes from sessions-may-resign-if-ro
Attorney General Jeff Sessions told the White House he might resign if President Trump fires the deputy attorney general overseeing the investigation into Russian election meddling, according to The Washington Postand The Wall Street Journal, each citing unnamed sources. According to media reports, Trump discussed the possibility of firing Rosenstein with senior administration officials because Rosenstein approved the April 9 raids. Sessions did not mean to raise the possibility of his resignation as a threat, but “rather wanted to convey the untenable position that Rosenstein’s firing would put him in,” a source told the Post.
Here’s a report on the same story from a conservative publication attorney-general-j
Attorney General Jeff Sessions told the White House last weekend that he would quit if President Donald Trump fired Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who is overseeing the Russia probe headed by special counsel Robert Mueller, The Washington Post reported Friday. The Post cited “people familiar with the exchange,” saying that Sessions disclosed his position in a telephone call to White House counsel Donald McGahn. However, “another person familiar with the exchange said Sessions did not intend to threaten the White House but rather wanted to convey the untenable position that Rosenstein’s firing would put him in.” Trump has regularly attacked Sessions, 71, a former five-term Alabama Republican senator, since recusing himself from the Russia investigation last year. Rosenstein’s status remained uncertain on Friday, but more than 800 former Justice Department employees have called on Congress in an open letter to “swiftly and forcefully respond to protect the founding principles of our Republic and the rule of law” if Trump fired him or Mueller, the Post reported.
The Mueller team seems amused the new Trump lawyer Giuliani has stated he wants to negotiate a wrap-up to the investigation in a couple weeks. As new evidence opens up new avenues for special counsel to explore, it just adds to their investigative workload & drags out the probe that much longer. So we need to learn the truth no matter how long it takes. So Rudy can’t up the timetable. The article robert-mueller-rudy-giuliani-r
Rudy Giuliani said he joined President Donald Trump’s personal legal team to bring an end to the Russia probe, but special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigators are said to be “amused” by the former New York City mayor’s objective. “If Rudy comes to Mueller trying to negotiate anything short of a presidential guilty plea, he will likely be met by deaf ears,” a lawyer following the case told Fox Business for a Friday report. Mueller’s team has signaled that its investigation into possible meddling by Moscow in the 2016 election is “exploring new avenues presented by at least two cooperating witnesses” — according to the report — and Giuliani can do little to force the special counsel’s hand.
Rubin chimes in from are-trumps-lawyers-sellin
President Trump is so unwilling to accept reality, and his advisers, even his lawyers, may be afraid of telling him the truth. Either Trump misunderstood what they’ve told him or his lawyers are making stuff up to pacify him:
*Ty Cobb said the special counsel investigation would be over last Thanksgiving. Then by the end of the year.
*Rudolph W. Giuliani tells him he’s going to get the Russia investigation to wrap up in the next week or so.
*One of his lawyers seems to have told Trump he’s in no danger if he is not a “target” of the investigation.
*Trump seems to think everything in Michael Cohen’s office and whatever they talked about fall into the category of attorney-client privilege.
*Trump’s lawyers act like it is their decision whether Trump will have to give testimony to special counsel Robert S. Mueller III.
These are false, in fact so preposterous that non-lawyers can tell they are nonsense.
In other Russian scandal & political updates in general coming from Trump world, we see how the prez is quite worried about what will be found in the treasure cove of info taken from lawyer Cohen, plus the real prospect Cohen could flip, as seen in the-white-house-cant-hide-trum
International Dangers & North Korea nuclear program news
These two videos from Fareed Zakaria’s show are worth watching. In Fareed’s Take he explains there is a deep state, which far from perfect, is nonetheless indispensable for our safety & security. When the corrupt ones can be accurately identified, it’s good to show the door to those bad apples who’ve let governing power get into their heads. But as a whole we should be extremely grateful for the deep state, since without them our constitutional democracy could face impending collapse & we could easily fall prey to wanna-be dictators: https://www.youtube
On the potential North Korea nuclear talks with Trump, maybe we’ll get more clues on the prospects for those talks when the South Korean president meets with Kim Jong Un soon. I’ve maintained the growing North Korea nuclear program that’s been accelerated in recent years is a dire situation, making these talks at least worth a shot. Trump waffles back & forth from saying North Korea is willing to de-nuke, while next saying it’s a long process & he’ll walk away from the table if talks don’t go well. A couple factors in our favor that offer at least a modicum of optimism, one being the sanctions are taking a toll & North Korea is especially not getting the oil imports needed to power their country. The other motivator for Jong Un is the perception of the mad man theory, since he may perceive Trump as mad & ready to conduct bombing missions. Now that John Bolton has come aboard as National Security Advisor, that can be seen as doubling-down on the mad man theory.
So against all odds there could be a chance Trump can pull off a denuclearized Korean Peninsula, although his dealmaking skills would be put to the ultimate test. With nukes giving Jong Un the identity, attention, leverage, notoriety & power he craves, it would take a lot to convince him to give those up. In these excerpts from greet-warmly-but-test-rigorous
Imagine if President Obama had agreed to meet with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, after sending his CIA director to Pyongyang to meet secretly with officials there. Now imagine further that North Korean officials subsequently declared that they no longer needed to test nuclear weapons or intercontinental ballistic missiles and would close a major nuclear testing site. I suspect that there would be howls of apocalyptic protest from the right and nominations for a second Nobel Peace Prize for Obama from the left. So let’s suspend our respective pavlovian reflexes and agree that Kim’s announcement is a positive development. The legitimate question, of course, is how much of a development?
If Kim’s overtures are legitimate this time, it’s because current global sanctions are biting in ways that concern him directly. On its own, North Korea has half the petroleum it needs to fuel its entire fleet of automobiles. Military units are reportedly using ox-driven transportation. For the thousands of political and military elites surrounding Kim, the sanctions are widely considered to be barely impactful, although some analysts suggest that sanctions may finally be affecting the wealth and comfort of the elites at long last. For 22 million other North Koreans, the sanctions are ruinous. In this geopolitical chess match, the White House has one option: Greet Kim’s proclamations warmly and test them rigorously. The “art of the deal” may be reaching a new art form viewed by the entire world. That might explain why Trump and Kim, neither of whom has ever been shy about attention, have agreed to meet in the first place.
It’s somewhat encouraging Jong Un has agreed to stop his nuclear & missile testing ahead of the talks, presumably a gesture of goodwill, but it probably amounts to little more than posturing going into the negotiations. He & his generational leadership over the decades have proven repeatedly they are not to be trusted. President Clinton struck a deal with daddy-Jong Un over his North Korea nuclear program, but they repeatedly cheated until ultimately the deal crumbled. So even if a deal is consummated, there are the concerning/difficult issues of compliance & verification. Consider the coming talks if they do happen in the next month or two, with Trump & Jong Un going eyeball-to-eyeball, both being temperamental, volatile, egomaniacal, vengeful & proven pathological liars who happen to preside over nuclear missiles, what could possibly go wrong? They are also going at these talks with exact opposite polarizing agendas & interests. But other than scandals potentially bringing Trump down, these talks could define his presidency:
So please check out articles like north-korea-kim-jong-un-t
When President Trump announced March 8 his intention to meet with Kim Jong Un, I wrote that the leaders of South and North Korea had “snookered the credulous American president into a high-profile summit that is likely to end in disaster one way or another.” A lot has happened since. Kim has let it be known that he is willing to discuss denuclearization and a peace treaty to end the Korean War — without insisting on a pullout of U.S. forces. CIA Director Mike Pompeo has journeyed to Pyongyang to meet with Kim. And on Friday Kim announced that he will end nuclear and missile tests and shut down the site where the nuclear tests have been conducted. In light of all this news, a reader writes to ask: “Just wondering if you are going to update your March 8 ‘snooker’ piece.” Yes, I am. Here’s the update: Kim is a more adept con man, and Trump an easier mark, than even I had imagined.
These are not “breakthroughs” signaling peace in our time. These are indications of how skillfully Kim is maneuvering to preserve his nuclear program while relaxing international sanctions and dissipating Trump’s “fire and fury.” Trump is the one who has made a significant concession by becoming the first sitting U.S. president willing to meet with the leader of North Korea — an act that will inherently legitimize the ruler of the world’s most despotic regime and feed its propaganda that even the world’s sole superpower feels compelled to bow before its mighty nuclear arsenal. What is Trump getting in return? So far, not even freedom for the three American hostages in North Korea — although Kim hints that this small concession will come.
Trump seems to think that much bigger concessions are on the way, too. On Wednesday he tweeted: “Mike Pompeo met with Kim Jong Un in North Korea last week. Meeting went very smoothly and a good relationship was formed. Details of Summit are being worked out now. Denuclearization will be a great thing for World, but also for North Korea!” In reality, as numerous experts have pointed out, “denuclearization” doesn’t mean the same thing to Kim that it does to Trump. For Kim, it’s a code word for the United States withdrawing its security guarantee from South Korea, allowing the North to bully and possibly even swallow its neighbor. A “peace treaty” would advance this goal. Why would the United States need to protect the South if it’s “at peace” with the North? None of this Kabuki theater means that Kim is about to give up a nuclear weapons program his family has spent decades and precious billions of dollars developing. Kim saw that the United States overthrew Moammar Gaddafi and Saddam Hussein after they gave up their weapons of mass destruction.
Another critical international scenario revolves around whatever happens to the Iran deal, with a deadline coming up in a couple weeks. I don’t have the knowledge or expertise to know whether the original Iran deal signed was a good or bad deal, but I do believe Iran becoming a nuclear power would represent the gravest threat to America, Israel & the whole world’s security, particularly with the radical views of Iran’s ruling clerics & associations with terrorist organizations. The thought of Iran possessing nuclear missiles is even more terrifying than North Korea having them, & could provoke a nuclear arms race throughout the Middle East. So I don’t exaggerate when I say the prospect of nukes in Iran & spreading to the rest of the region could become nothing short of the most dangerous threat in the history of the world. In light of that, doesn’t it seem absurd the United States & Russia would be competing to bid on constructing nuclear power plants in Saudi Arabia? I’ve posted the conclusion to this article in washington-and-moscow-should-f
Why, then, would anyone in the Middle East bother to build a large reactor? Increasingly, the unspoken rationale is to gear up to develop a nuclear weapons option. Israel used its nuclear plants to make bombs. Syria, Iraq and Iran have all been suspected of having planned to do likewise. Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman recently announced that the Kingdom would get nuclear weapons “as soon as possible” if Iran does. Certainly, working with large reactors and their related fuel systems gives states a leg up to do so. What, then, should Russia and the United States do? Two things. First, it would be nice if Washington and Moscow could coordinate their energy policies in the Middle East. For the moment, however, this is unlikely. What is totally feasible, however, is that the two states could refocus their current energy competitions in the region to secure nonnuclear contracts rather than nuclear ones. Competing in this sector would not only be safer for the region, it would help push both the American and Russian energy sectors focus on promising energy technologies for themselves.
Second, it would be useful for the two countries to compete limiting the most dangerous of nuclear activities — enrichment and reprocessing, which can bring states within weeks of acquiring nuclear explosives. Russia already takes back spent fuel after several years on the understanding that the client state has no need to recycle spent fuel. The United States leads in once-through nuclear technologies, including dry cask spent fuel storage, which makes reprocessing unnecessary and less economical. So, there is a bit of healthy competition already. Both countries, however, could be more firm in requiring all Middle Eastern non-weapons states under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty not to reprocess or enrich. It’s unclear how well these more benign proposed competitions might go but they certainly would make more economic and security sense than pushing nuclear power in the Middle East. Also, there’s one other advantage to the proposed competitions: Both would be more likely, eventually, to lead to cooperation.
Trump Chaos & Despicable Personal Traits
This is a strange tale how Trump once fooled Forbes Magazine reporter-recalls-trum
According to Greenberg, Trump, as Barron, said he owned much of the family’s business and that he should be called a billionaire. Even then, Greenberg wrote, he thought some of this wasn’t true. “But it took decades to unwind the elaborate farce Trump had built to project an image as one of the richest people in America,” he wrote. “Nearly every assertion supporting that claim was untrue.” He and his colleagues at Forbes believed that Trump was merely embellishing, not saying “outright fabrications.” “We were so wrong,” he wrote. Greenberg contended that Trump has continued to do this, eventually leading to the highest office in the land. “This was a model Trump would use for the rest of his career, telling a lie so cosmic that people believed that some kernel of it had to be real,” he said. “The tactic landed him a place he hadn’t earned on the Forbes list — and led to future accolades, press coverage and deals. It eventually paved a path toward the presidency.”
With Trump’s deplorable personal traits of dishonesty, bullying & self-centeredness among many others, he’s serving to make America a far lesser place. He’s made us even more polarized & bitterly divided, while shrinking our influence around the world as a protector of freedom & human rights. Plus his attacks on the foundations of democracy could put our own freedoms & human rights at stake. Trump has certainly made all his predecessors look a whole lot better by comparison, as seen in these excerpts from i-dont-just-miss-obama-i-
However, what might be most disturbing about Trump, in contrast to his modern-day predecessors, is his lack of any concern that many of his words and deeds are beneath the dignity of the office he now holds. To be sure, Carter, Reagan, the Bushes, Clinton and Obama held disparate views on domestic and foreign policies. They were tried-and-true partisan politicians, and in the cases of Carter and Reagan, and the elder Bush and Clinton, were political rivals for the White House. But the six leaders had one thing in common: respect for the presidency. The esteem in which they held the White House came through in the way they behaved. All the presidents, Democrat or Republican, showed class, civility and maturity when in the public eye. Their language was measured and respectful. They exercised good manners.
And listen to Obama’s take on the United States’ role in the world, as opposed to Trump’s claimed foreign policy prowess. Said Obama: “No other country in the world does what we do. On every issue, the world turns to us, not simply because of the size of our economy or our military might but because of the ideals we stand for, and the burdens we bear to advance them.” Trump, asked on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” whom he talks with about foreign policy, responded, “I’m speaking with myself, number one, because I have a very good brain and I’ve said a lot of things.” Presidents from Carter to Obama stood up for what they believed, unlike Trump, whose chief belief is in the importance of promoting himself, often at the expense of others. So yes, I miss Obama. And I would trade Trump for any of those other presidents in a heartbeat.
As Bugs Bunny might say, sorry, that’s all folks. I normally have tons of links for the numerous relevant articles from the newsfeeds the past few days. But my blogmaster recommended I take those out. Something about the search engine algorithms can pick up such a large number of outbound links as spam, negatively impacting our search engine rankings. I trust you’ll still find the commentaries & links/excerpts within the text informative. And please do share The Voracs. A strong America requires a viable conservative party, not the cluster-mess the GOP has become.
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