Lachlan Murdoch is allegedly wary of having his network seen as the president’s personal Soviet-style Pravda
Category: Trumpland Revealed
Trump condemned the violence at Charlottesville but later soft-pedaled that denunciation, assigning blame to “both sides” and arguing that the group of white nationalist rallygoers included “some very fine people.”
via Fewer Than 20 Percent Of Americans Say Trump Opposes White Nationalism | HuffPost Australia
Expressing deep frustration and anger over President Donald Trump’s ongoing refusal to unequivocally condemn white nationalism, critics on Sunday pushed back against the White House’s dismissal of reports that the suspect in last week’s Christchurch mosque attacks admired the president—even as Trump once again expressed support for white supremacist views.
In the wake of the shooting, writer and illustrator Eli Valley tweeted that while Trump will likely continue to deny his responsibility for emboldening white supremacists, the press and other government leaders must commit to telling the truth about the president or risk being complicit in attacks like those in New Zealand.
Trump sounds like Brenton Tarrant in NZ (ODT)
In an interview with Breitbart News published on Wednesday, Trump noted: “I have the support of the police, the support of the military, the support of the Bikers for Trump – I have the tough people, but they don’t play it tough – until they go to a certain point, and then it would be very bad, very bad.”
In case you missed it, “they” are Trump’s political opponents, including House Democrats and the mainstream media. And the “certain point” could be impeachment but is more likely to be reached if the House investigations reveal crimes Trump committed both before and after he became president.
Trump has given cover to some of the most vile bigots in America. As he grows desperate, he is giving them encouragement
“I actually think that the people on the right are tougher,” Trump warned in the same interview. “But the left plays it cuter and tougher. Like with all the nonsense that they do in Congress … with all this invest[igations] – that’s all they want to do is – you know, they do things that are nasty.”
Here we have it, in a nutshell. In Trump’s mind, congressional investigations that could cause him shame and humiliation, and quite possibly result in a prison sentence, will be countered by forces loyal to him: the police, the military, and vigilante groups like Bikers for Trump.
What is the best way shallow thinkers and Right-Wing Nut Jobs can deflect blame for the awful things their words and deeds have wrought? Why, blame the Left, of course! We’re so awful, just trying to distribute power and wealth more evenly and fairly in our society, and all.
via Right Wingers Flail About Trying To Blame Democrats For New Zealand Shooting | Crooks and Liars
Donald Trump has issued the first veto of his presidency, rejecting a resolution that would have stopped him from funding a wall on the US-Mexico border without the approval of Congress.
On Thursday, local time, 12 Republican senators sided with Democrats to reject Trump’s declaration of a national emergency on the southern border.
Trump said that the nation’s “immigration system is stretched beyond the breaking point” and that only a physical barrier could stop drugs and dangerous people entering the country.
Democrats have accused Trump of manufacturing a border crisis in order to fulfil a campaign promise to build a wall.
via ‘Dangerous and reckless’: Trump issues first veto of presidency
Key points:
Manafort faced up to 10 years in prison, on top of an earlier four-year sentence
Mueller’s Russia probe exposed Manafort’s covert lobbying for pro-Kremlin politicians in Ukraine
Manafort apologised to the court, which heard Manafort “engaged in crime again and again”The possibility of a presidential pardon — a prospect Trump has not ruled out — will likely continue to hang over the Manafort situation, lawyers said.
The sentence handed down by Judge T.S. Ellis to Paul Manafort is shockingly light. Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman was convicted of various financial crimes and could have ended up with 25 years in prison. Instead, Judge Ellis sentenced him to 47 months. To add insult to the overall injury, Ellis opined that Manafort had lived “an otherwise blameless life” as part of the justification for the light sentence.
Judge Ellis handed down a fundamentally biased sentence. Law Twitter is right about that, and rightly inflamed. Ellis is the same judge who gave former Louisiana congressman Bill Jefferson a 13-year sentence following conviction on corruption charges. It’s the longest sentence ever handed out to a member of Congress. (Jefferson was released after serving only four years, when Ellis accepted a Jefferson plea deal in light of the Supreme Court’s decision in McDonnell v. United States, which redefined our understanding of bribery of public officials.) This seems like a good time to mention that Jefferson is an African American while Manafort is an otherwise blameless white man.
via The Manafort Sentence Is a Lesson in White Privilege | The Nation
The show goes on Sine wasn’t sacked he didn’t resign he was shifted sideways to deflect attention that from the fact that Murdoch runs the White House.(ODT)
Trump reportedly “feels he was sold a bill of goods by Hannity” about Shine’s abilities, “but Trump needs Hannity and so he will never attack him publicly”
Former Fox News executive and Roger Ailes’ “right-hand man” Bill Shine has left his job as White House communications director to join President Donald Trump’s 2020 re-election campaign as a senior adviser — despite reported complaints from the president about Shine’s poor performance.
The Goose locked out Journalists from his events and claims entitlement for the tactic. The Gander isn’t inviting the FOX into their party. Factless politics and crocodile tears is Trump’s strategy and style. Fear before Reason his tactic. (ODT)
via Democrats bar Fox News from political debates over Trump ties
This is the $70,000 check from a Trump trust to Michael Cohen written during the Trump presidency, February 14th, 2017. Happened to be Valentine’s Day. And what it shows is that on this score, the documentary financial evidence corroborates Michael Cohen’s account that Donald Trump was paying him while president for a confessed election crime.”
via SCOOP: Michael Cohen Got A Payoff Check After Trump Was In White House | Crooks and Liars
Trying to portray Democrats as out of step with ordinary Americans, Vice President Mike Pence said in a speech Friday at the Conservative Political Action Conference that the choice in the next election is “between freedom and socialism, between personal responsibility and government dependence.”
via Eyeing 2020, White House Steps Up ‘Socialism’ Attack on Dems | RealClearPolitics
Democrats, he said, are “embracing open borders, socialism and extreme late-term abortion.” Around minute 75, Trump seemed to realize he’d already said too much. “I’m going to regret this speech,” he said, leaning into the microphone. “This speech should have been delivered one year from now—not now, damn it.”
via “All of a Sudden They’re Trying to Take You Out With Bullshit.” – Mother Jones
Brian Williams didn’t hide the snark on Wednesday’s 11th Hour show. Trump used a video showing Army Corps of Engineers repairing an extension of an existing border fence in New Mexico, touting it as “new” wall construction.
He really does think his base are idiots.
PS Trump’s fake national “emergency” actually takes money from the Army Corps of Engineers.
via Trump Uses Old Video To Pretend ‘New Construction’ On Wall | Crooks and Liars
Dark Money is the scourge of American Democracy, Controlling the narratives and creating Chaos will be the American Nightmare. (ODT)
Researchers and others interviewed for this story say they cannot conclusively point to the actors behind the coordinated activity. It’s unclear if they are rogue hackers, political activists or, as some contend, foreign state actors such as Russia, since it bears the hallmarks of past foreign attacks. One of the objectives of the activity, they say, is to divide the left by making the Democratic presidential primary as chaotic and toxic as possible.
Research by the pro-democracy tech firm Guardians.ai found that Sens. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), and Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) as well as former Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-Texas)—who has not formally announced his candidacy for president—appear to be the top targets.
It also has no chance of becoming law, not while Republicans control the Senate and climate change denier Donald Trump resides in the White House.
Question to edicated and semi-Educated Americans still believe this bunk? The “we” is bad and the “me” is good? (ODT)
The President faces an uphill battle – his poll numbers are some of the worst in history and he faced a drubbing in November’s midterm election. One way to boost Trump’s prospects is to shift the focus from his turbulent tenure to his eventual opponent and his frightful portrayal of that alternative.
via Trump begins Democrat insults by brandishing the ‘S’ word – socialism
How tight are Murdoch’s strings on Trump? (ODT)
The world can be divided into those who build walls and those who build bridges. There is no doubt which side Trump is on.
I8 year loss language is being renegotiated to claim a 2019 WIN. After a loss on a wall language is being renegotiated to claim a 2019 WIN. The Art of the deal is changing the Language. POTUS no longer needs an Administration just a mega-media giant. News Corp and Sinclair have provided that.(ODT)
via After 18 Years of War, Taliban Has the Upper Hand in Afghanistan Peace Talks
Simply because he’s stacked the SCOTUS with Republicans. This all about the Great Fence of Trump turning America an isolationist invader of other nations. 164 of which have an American military presance today. 59,000 military personnel remain unaccounted for in any records they are being paid and aren’t dead. Then there’s the private mercenary contractors who remain invisible as well. So yes there is a national emergency and it is American. (ODT)
Mr Trump is confident he will win any court challenge
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Some conservatives admit Trump’s emergency declaration will allow future action on climate change or gun violence
research February 14, 2019 6:15 PM EST
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On February 14, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders confirmed that President Donald Trump will “sign the government funding bill, and as he has stated before, he will also take other executive action – including a national emergency” to build a wall on the southern border.
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Fox host: “Let’s dismiss this idea that declaring a national emergency is a big deal. We do it all the time”
video February 14, 2019 5:36 PM EST
“Calling it a national emergency is a bit overstating it” Fox News is Murdoch Media
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Right-wing media figures line up to defend Elliott Abrams, a Trump appointee complicit in crimes in Latin America
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Abrams was a key figure in the Iran-Contra scandal, the Reagan administration’s secret funding of right-wing rebel groups and anti-communist death squads known as “Contras” in Nicaragua via revenue from illegal arms sales to Iran. Abrams was convicted of withholding information from Congress “about secret government efforts to support the Nicaraguan contra rebels during a ban on such aid,” though he was eventually pardoned by President George H.W. Bush.
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“Why Should we believe anything You Say?” How Ilhan Omar Nailed Elliot Abrams for Iran-Contra Lies
She isn’t asking for a revolutuionbut a rebalance in the system yet the GOP see it as a Socialist Revolution heading their way (ODT)
via 400 Richest Americans Own More Than 150 Million Of The Nation’s Poorest: Study | HuffPost
In an effort to encourage defections from Venezuela’s elected President Nicolas Maduro, the Trump administration is reportedly holding secret talks with members of the Venezuelan military as top U.S. cabinet officials continue to issue aggressive threats and push for regime change.
According to Reuters, which cited an anonymous senior White House official, the U.S. “is holding direct communications with members of Venezuela’s military urging them to abandon President Nicolas Maduro and is also preparing new sanctions aimed at increasing pressure on him.”
“The Trump administration expects further military defections from Maduro’s side,” Reuters reported, “despite only a few senior officers having done so since opposition leader Juan Guaido declared himself interim president last month, earning the recognition of the United States and dozens of other countries.”
via Urging Defections, Trump Administration Reportedly Holding Secret Talks With Venezuelan Military
With the Murdoch Party’s help dividing the nation in every ‘fearful’ way brings on Conservative support (ODT)
Some democratic policies look like socialism to the Trump base In his remarks, Mr Trump was targeting the liberal policies of the likes of Elizabeth Warren, Kamala Harris, Bernie Sanders, and newly minted Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (who’s not running for President but is an “influencer”).They’re promoting: universal healthcare subsidised tertiary education big taxes on the rich pro-environment initiatives in the form of a “New Green Deal” to reduce the use of fossil fuels It’s a weird thing living in America coming from a country like Australia where Medicare and heavily subsidised education are taken for granted.To us, their policies are not quite radical. Fuel for valid political debate and prioritisation of public funds to be sure, but to suggest the United States might imminently turn into Venezuela seems like a big leap. And it is.Universal healthcare and subsidised education are hardly precursors to state control and the death of the American free market.But in the post-truth era, the target audience doesn’t care about the fine details.Some Americans would be literally reaching for their guns and gathering the militia at the very suggestion that the federal government might try to interfere in their existence. Mr Trump proved in 2016 that he’s excellent at creating villains.Remember lyin’ Ted, little Marco, low-energy Jeb, Pocahontas (aka Elizabeth Warren) and all the others who were publicly belittled by then-candidate Trump as he carved a path to the White House?Now we have the “socialists”.
The House Ways and Means Oversight subcommittee is holding a potentially explosive hearing on the tax returns of President Trump and VP Pence. Donald Trump was the first major-party presidential candidate to not disclose his taxes in over 40 years, despite saying he would do so. Rep. Richard Neal (D-MA), House Ways & Means chair, has the power to review any individual’s tax returns.
LIVE NOW: House Hearing On Trump’s Tax Returns | Crooks and Liars
and
https://crooksandliars.com/2019/02/trump-has-cheated-his-taxes-and-we-can
ISIS is a US creation. So are al-Qaeda, its al-Nusra offshoot, and other terrorist groups – used by the Pentagon and CIA as proxy troops.
Trump claiming “(w)e’re knocking the hell out of ISIS…We have defeated ISIS in Syria” are Big Lies. Earlier he boasted that he “know(s) more about #ISIS than generals do…”
By Stephen Landman
The Trump regime, in cahoots with designated usurper in waiting Juan Guaido and likeminded extremist elements in the country, aim to deliver Trojan horse humanitarian aid – a likely scheme to try smuggling in weapons for greater violence, casualties and chaos than already.
via US Humanitarian Invention in Venezuela? – Stephen Lendman
Americans have learned through experience to disregard most of what President Donald Trump says. The days of Trump snookering most of the people most of the time are over.
Donald Trump says his State of the Union address on Tuesday evening will be about “unification”. But Trump discussing the state of the union is like pyromaniac discussing lighter fluids. His goal is, and has always been, disunion.
Trump: I ‘set the table beautifully’ for next border wall fight with Democrats
Read moreThe man thrives on divisiveness. It’s how he keeps himself the center of attention, fuels his base and ensures that no matter what facts are revealed, his followers will stick by him.
There’s another reason Trump aims to divide – and why he pours salt into the nation’s deepest wounds over ethnicity, immigration, race and gender.
He wants to distract attention from the biggest and most threatening divide of all: the widening imbalance of wealth and power between the vast majority, who have little or none, and a tiny minority who are accumulating just about all.
A Washington Post ad narrated by Tom Hanks celebrated American journalism with the pointed line, “Knowing keeps us free.”
Since the election, Bezos has become the world’s richest person, his net worth swelling by $US66.2 billion ($91.7 billion) through Friday, surpassing the gains of the world’s second-fastest riser during that period, French luxury-goods tycoon Bernard Arnault, by 50 per cent. Bezos’s wealth was valued at $US134.8 billion, making his fortune a third bigger than Bill Gates’s, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
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via Jeff Bezos has been the biggest winner from the Trump presidency
“Wow and this whole time I thought he was diligently looking through policy proposals and carefully deciding a course for the country.”
Somebody inside the Trump White House leaked three month’s worth of the president’s daily schedule, which Axios published on Sunday afternoon, and the internet quickly took up the cause by ridiculing the nation’s chief executive for the amount of time he reportedly spends holed up in his private residence each day watching television, reading newspapers, sending bizarre tweets, and making phone calls.
Termed “Executive Time” by his former chief of staff John Kelley, the #ExecutiveTime hashtag was given new life on Sunday.
via #ExecutiveTime Takes Off on Twitter After 3 Months of Trump’s Daily Schedules Leaked
“I think God calls all of us to fill different roles at different times and I think that He wanted Donald Trump to become president,” Sanders told CBN News.
via Sarah Sanders: ‘God Wanted Donald Trump To Become President’ | Crooks and Liars
On December 11, 1981 in El Salvador, a Salvadoran military unit created and trained by the U.S. Army began slaughtering everyone they could find in a remote village called El Mozote. Before murdering the women and girls, the soldiers raped them repeatedly, including some as young as 10 years old, and joked that their favorites were the 12-year-olds. One witness described a soldier tossing a 3-year-old child into the air and impaling him with his bayonet. The final death toll was over 800 people.
The next day, December 12, was the first day on the job for Elliott Abrams as assistant secretary of state for human rights and humanitarian affairs in the Reagan administration. Abrams snapped into action, helping to lead a cover-up of the massacre. News reports of what had happened, Abrams told the Senate, were “not credible,” and the whole thing was being “significantly misused” as propaganda by anti-government guerillas.
This past Friday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo named Abrams as America’s special envoy for Venezuela. According to Pompeo, Abrams “will have responsibility for all things related to our efforts to restore democracy” in the oil-rich nation.
Elliott Abrams Isn’t Going to Bring “Democracy” to Venezuela
Members of a militia group, whose alleged leader applied to build Donald Trump’s border wall, pleaded guilty Thursday to bombing a mosque in an effort to frighten American Muslims into leaving the country.
via White Terrorists who Pled Guilty to Bombing Minnesota Mosque Wanted to Build Trump’s Wall
“The U.S. had been planning this coup in Venezuela. It was the Trump administration that told the little-known opposition leader Juan Guaidó to declare himself (unelected) ‘president.'”
via Confirming US Orchestration, Report Details Pence’s Key Phone Call to Venezuelan Opposition Leader
They did it in Iraq so what’s the surprise? Senor Trump just jumped his wall and gone South announced himself President of Venezuala and appointed an interim de facto in his place. (ODT)
It’s what Washington does, what imperialism is all about, wanting all nations everywhere subjugating their sovereignty to its interests – dominance sought through wars, color revolutions or old-fashioned coups.
Venezuela is a prime US target because of its world’s largest oil reserves, as well as the threat of a good example Bolivarian social democracy represents – serving all Venezuelans equitably, not just its privileged few the way America and other Western nations operate.
Washington under Republicans and undemocratic Dems have sought to topple its government since Hugo Chavez’s election over two decades ago replaced fascist tyranny with social democratic rule – an anathema system to bipartisan US dark forces, strongly against governance of, by, and for everyone equitably at home and abroad.
The Trump regime launched the latest US attempt to oust democratically elected Nicolas Maduro. Everything ongoing is orchestrated by Washington, including the selection of National Assembly head Juan Guaido as designated puppet president.
Coup d’etat steps taken include the following so far:
via Trump Recognizes Opposition Leader as (Illegitimate) Interim Venezuelan President
This Don is more Mafia than POTUS (ODT)
Michael Cohen, President Trump’s former personal lawyer, will not testify before Congress next month, one of his attorneys said on Wednesday.
Lanny Davis, an attorney for Cohen, said in a statement: “Due to ongoing threats against his family from President Trump and Mr. [Rudolph] Giuliani, as recently as this weekend, as well as Mr. Cohen’s continued cooperation with ongoing investigations, by advice of counsel, Mr. Cohen’s appearance will be postponed to a later date.”
Cohen delays testimony after ‘threats against his family’ from Trump
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