President Trump Fires FBI Director Comey

Lock him up.

From an article posted by debater above:

President Trump revealed highly classified information to the Russian foreign minister and ambassador in a White House meeting last week...

​It's possible that even some dyed-in-the-wool Republican Trump supporters may abandon him for this breach. I mean, all along Trump has been levelling the accusation at Clinton that she revealed confidential information, and should  be charged, tried and imprisoned. He hasn't responded to this accusation yet. I guess we'll have to wait until 3:00 o'clock tomorrow morning to get the tweeted response.

​Meanwhile, Keith Spicer is refusing to answer questions as to whether Comey's conversations with Trump were recorded. So do start taking bets as to how many more days of the Trump administration?

​It's a bit hard to say because, like a person who buys a lemon car, it takes a while before they 'fess up to having made an error. No one likes looking stupid. But there's gotta be a point where Republican Representatives and Senators realize that continued support for Trump may cost them the majority in the Senate, and seats in the House.

Josh:  Gotcha.   Opinion noted.

Here's a nice Chomsky article on Watergate.   I do believe his conclusion is applicable to today's situation as well:

https://chomsky.info/19730920/

And a more recent quote:

To consider the Watergate affair as a triumph of democracy is an error, in my opinion. The real question raised was not: Did Nixon employ evil methods against his political adversaries? but rather: Who were the victims? The answer is clear. Nixon was condemned, not because he employed reprehensible methods in his political struggles, but because he made a mistake in the choice of adversaries against whom he turned these methods. He attacked people with power.

The telephone taps? Such practices have existed for a long time. He had an “enemies list”? But nothing happened to those who were on that list. I was on that list, nothing happened to me. No, he simply made a mistake in his choice of enemies: he had on his list the chairman of IBM, senior government advisers, distinguished pundits of the press, highly placed supporters of the Democratic Party. He attacked the Washington Post, a major capitalist enterprise. And these powerful people defended themselves at once, as would be expected. Watergate? Men of power against men of power."

Rev, I would be happy if the Trump administration ended tommorrow, but I'll take your bet.    The administration has the ability to change the agenda, and Trump personally seems to have a talent for it.  

As for Republicans, well, Trump delivered them a result they could not have dreamed of at the start of the campaign.   I think he's got some credit with them, even if it is grudging.

Why are we still talking about Clinton? She lost the election, didn't she? Whether you think she was guilty of something (what crime would that be, anyway?) or not, the case wasn't prosecutable. As she's now a private citizen, using her own server is unlikely to be an issue in future. Perhaps we could move on and drop the topic of her alleged but unproven crimes in favour of the head of the U.S. government nattering blithely about classified material to foreign officials? 

I'm getting old, and my memory ain't what it used to be, but that's a slip not just in name, but in time as well.

Well, actually, I thought it demonstrated a pretty GOOD memory to mix up Sean from the 2010s with Keith from the 1970s. Whereas more temporally-bound people would have called Trump's press secretary Sporty Spicer or something.

Though, it should be said that Keith's career extended a bit past the decade of bell bottoms. He headed that Citizens' Forum of Mulroney's between Meech and Charlottetown, and(this I had forgotten) he was apparently the head of the CRTC until 1997.

One of those guys who always just seemed to be around everywhere in Canadian government for a period. Kinda like Don Harron was with media.  

Timebandit wrote:

Why are we still talking about Clinton? She lost the election, didn't she? Whether you think she was guilty of something (what crime would that be, anyway?) or not, the case wasn't prosecutable. As she's now a private citizen, using her own server is unlikely to be an issue in future. Perhaps we could move on and drop the topic of her alleged but unproven crimes in favour of the head of the U.S. government nattering blithely about classified material to foreign officials? 

The media noise about Clinton's mail server was typical U.S. trash talk and misdirection.

Likewise for the shocking horrifying news that Trump revealed "classified information" to some Russian or other.

In both cases, it's scandal-mongering to achieve politicial advantage. In both cases, it's screaming about irrelevancies in order to avoid talking about the real crimes of the very same political and economic system that both Clinton and Trump serve and represent. The media were shocked about Clinton's inattention to security of some emails - not about her refusal to support single-payer health care (that's not, like, treason after all), nor her non-stop statements in debates and elsewhere about how she would "stand up" to Russia and Putin, nor about her approval of drone attacks and assassinations.

Likewise for Trump - fill in the real crimes, if you have enough space and time.

Instead, we see intelligent and progressive babblers weighing the criminality of Clinton and Trump based on... wait for it... which one they consider a better or worse choice for president. That's the only explanation I can fathom for even joining in the debate about "classified information".

Would folks here be showing the same level of outrage if Putin were alleged to have blurted out some classified information to the U.S. ambassador? Let me provide my personal response. In all the above cases: Who actually gives a shit? How does any of this matter? Except in terms of the internal dogfight between mostly indistinguishable factions of the U.S. ruling class.

It isn't about which is worse, Unionist. But having a president who is so clueless and unfit for the job that he would leak classified information from sensitive sources should be distressing, when you consider how much power he has in other things.

Same goes for the fact he would resort to obstruction of justice without even considering what he was doing. This isn't about what  Hillary or the Democrats might have done. It is about what he did.

I don't care if he did. 

This wasn't "lesser fish."  This was the secretary of state with the highest clearance possible.  She made a mistake, I guess.  And no harm resulted.  The whole controversy was, and remains, ridiculous.

quizzical wrote:

does Trump even need a in home server?

nothing in his behaviour makes an impression he does. he never actually works.

he just needs his android and a twitter account.

This is true.  Besides, it would cut down on his golf time.

6079_Smith_W wrote:

It isn't about which is worse, Unionist. But having a president who is so clueless and unfit for the job

I'm not saying you're necessarily wrong, but I hope you can at least admit that this is subjective opinion and not objective fact.

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that he would leak classified information from sensitive sources should be distressing,

I'm not saying he did or didn't, but you don't know if this is true or not, you just assume it is because you don't like him and you trust "unnamed sources"

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when you consider how much power he has in other things.

Like immigation policy, where for better or worse a single judge anywhere in the country has the power to stop his executive orders

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Same goes for the fact he would resort to obstruction of justice

So was Comey specifically the one doing the investigating? I guess if Trump was actually literally compromised by Russia, and some other agent(s) besides the director was doing the investigating, then those agents would still continue their investigation. And if a new director said "stop investigating our head of state being a plant for a Russian intelligence," I guess that either there is an agent ethical enough to leak the existing evidence (if any evidence exists), or if no agents are conscientious enough then those agents probably weren't going to release the evidence anyway.

Trump firing Comey won't make the investigation go away. If there is anything to it then the information will get out, or the information was never going to get out anyway.

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without even considering what he was doing.

How do you know???

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This isn't about what  Hillary or the Democrats might have done. It is about what he did.

Which is what, exactly?

When it's your team, it's not even a question of what they "might" have done (as you say) but whether they had intent or were "just" extremely reckless and incompetent. But when it's the other team there is no "might." It's what he did. And he's the clueless and incompetent one who doesn't consider what he does because...why again?

The entire point of this post is not to defend Trump or take shots at Hillary or Comey or whatever. I'm just trying to point out how unbelieveably unconvincing the current rhetoric is with respect to Trump. You (and I'm primarily referring to the DNC and the DNC's media surrogates) are making assumptions and arguments based on a partisan view of reality that is not shared by people who are not part of the bubble.

Trump is clueless? How the hell did he win the election then? Did his Russian friends mind control 64 million Americans, or just the ones in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan?

I remember the entire election cycle hearing about how Trump had 70 staff and Clinton had 700. Clinton had the ground game and the whole DNC behind her while Trump spent as much time fighting the GOP as he did fighting Clinton. Clinton had roughly 5 times the money to spend. The popular sitting president actually campaigned for Clinton. Hollywood endorsed Clinton unanimously. Clinton has 30 years of experience in politics and more than 60 if you add in Bill's experience. Newspapers endorsed Hillary Clinton 500 to 27. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newspaper_endorsements_in_the_United_State...) .

Clinton had every advantage and you say Trump is clueless? Do you understand why anyone who is not already a hard partisan might just be a little bit skeptical of that claim? Do you understand why "Russiagate" might not be taken quite so seriously by people who don't have to protect a worldview that is out of touch with reality?

Do you understand how absurd it looks when the same people who said, re: Clinton's email server, which nobody disputes existed, "nothing to see here folks no need for a special prosecutor", but when it comes to allegations against Trump that have no credible evidence "we need a special prosecutor impeach him noooooow!"

Really, the most compelling evidence for Russiagate is the "fact" that Trump is an imbecile who can't tie his own shoes in the morning and couldn't have possibly won on his own merits.

And I wouldn't care if it was just about Trump. But it's not just about Trump. People are watching the shitshow that is coverage and analysis of Trump and faux outrage about the fact that he got two fucking scoops of ice cream and it's making them question everything. The same people who push "Trump is a buffoon" and "Russia hacked the election" are the traditional promoters and defenders of climate change science, equality of the races, equality of the sexes, LGBT rights, and other important issues. As they lose credibility with respect to Trump, they enable those who would work to stop or even reverse progress on these other issues. After all, if the default assumption is that anything the media promotes about Trump is either false or insignificant, then what else that the media promotes might be false or insignificant?

Cody wrote:

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when you consider how much power he has in other things.

Like immigation policy, where for better or worse a single judge anywhere in the country has the power to stop his executive orders

Funny, because elsewhere on this thread, someone else who shares your view that this is all a red-herring argues that the REAL issue here is that the POTUS has too much power, "an absolute monarchy[is I believe the term]", and that the people mad about Trump personally should instead focus on that.

But apparently, we don't need to worry about what he does, because the American courts can easily rein him in anytime they want.

The email server existed, so what?  It was inconsequential.  No harm, no foul.  In this instance, the DNC was hacked and its information disseminated.  The evidence indicates that it was the Russians who did this, and that the Russians wanted to defeat Clinton.  Meetings were held between Trump associates and the Russians.  Trump is know to have business relationships with the Russians, and has derived income from that relationship, but whether he received loans from the Russians, and for what, as suspected, cannot be determined because Trump won't release his tax returns.  Trump fires the head of the FBI because he won't quash the investigation.  Trump the gives the Russian top secret information.

Yes, nothing to see here.

Cody - I agree 1000% and you said it better than my previous attempts.   Thank you.

Cody:

"Do you understand how absurd it looks when the same people who said, re: Clinton's email server, which nobody disputes existed, "nothing to see here folks no need for a special prosecutor", but when it comes to allegations against Trump that have no credible evidence "we need a special prosecutor impeach him noooooow!"

Really, the most compelling evidence for Russiagate is the "fact" that Trump is an imbecile who can't tie his own shoes in the morning and couldn't have possibly won on his own merits.

And I wouldn't care if it was just about Trump. But it's not just about Trump. People are watching the shitshow that is coverage and analysis of Trump and faux outrage about the fact that he got two fucking scoops of ice cream and it's making them question everything. The same people who push "Trump is a buffoon" and "Russia hacked the election" are the traditional promoters and defenders of climate change science, equality of the races, equality of the sexes, LGBT rights, and other important issues. As they lose credibility with respect to Trump, they enable those who would work to stop or even reverse progress on these other issues. After all, if the default assumption is that anything the media promotes about Trump is either false or insignificant, then what else that the media promotes might be false or insignificant?"

I guess me and that other poster agree that this is a red herring, but don't agree that POTUS has the power of a monarch. Its almost as though two people don't need to agree on absolutely everything to have some common ground. Fascinating concept.

Well, you don't have common ground if you agree that it's a non-issue, but for diametrically opposed reasons. 

If the TV station's morning weather forecaster says that it won't rain tomorrow, instead it's gonna be scorching hot, and the evening weather forecaster says it won't rain tomorrow, because we're gonna have freezing hail, I don't think the station can wish away the inconsistency by saying "Well, they don't have to agree on everything to have common ground!"

Anyway, obviously no one is obliged to agree with anyone else. But, just to be clear, there is no commonality between the position that the POTUS has absolute power, and the position that he governs at the mercy of the courts.

Cody, Trump admitted himself (contradicting his spokespeople) that he gave sensitive information to Lavrov. Technically it was no longer classifed once he shared it, because as president, he has that power. But all indications are it was information so sensitive it may put sources at risk, and make allies think twice about sharing similar information with the U.S.

Which will make him blind as well as stupid.

And Trump also admitted that he fired Comey in part because of the Russia investigation.

So these are not unnamed sources.

..i chose this version because of the audience.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3QJcypTivZo

From a geopolitical point of view, I certainly don't hope that Trump ever decides that Russia is his next favourite bone to chew on.  But it would be interesting to see whether the flow of Trump-Love coming from parts of the left might slow to a trickle. 

Because most of the planet seems to see him as an arrogant, impetuous, juvenile, priveleged buffoon.  But I guess he does have two things going for him.

1.  He's not Hillary Clinton, and it's even more urgent and important to slash Clinton in the ass now that she's a private citizen, or something.  If we wait too much longer, the public may start to forget about the past, and lose their appetite for revenge.

2.  He seems cozy with Russia.  So let's give the man a chance to lead!  Maybe the grabbing by pussies and talk of "the blacks" and LGBT rights and stuff isn't what it looks like but gosh, isn't his Russophilia a breath of fresh air that the whole world needs right now?

so a Comey memo has surfaced about the Donald trying to interfluence the Flynn investigation.

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Would someone please post the transcripts so that we know for sure that no POTUS ever shared classified info with the Saudi's or Israeli's.

That's not how it works.

If you have some evidence, no matter how thin, that a previous POTUS shared classified information with this or that other state, then it's up to you to tell us.  It's not up to anyone else to prove to you that it never happened.

Don't you have a legal background?  I've, honest-to-Gord tried to acknowledge that at times, out of respect, but if you're asking us all to prove a negative (to your satisfaction) then what am I acknowledging?

If Trump tried to get Comey to drop the Flynn investigation, that is a classic effort to obstruct justice.  Nearly identical to what Nixon did, the revelation of which forced him to resign.  Don't need to establish that he fired Comey because of that.  Besides he already admitted he fired a Comey because Comey would not drop the Russian investigation.

Charlie Pierce has a piece up about the Comey/Flynn memo. He points out a particular sentence from the original NYT story.

New York Times wrote:

The memo was part of a paper trail Mr. Comey created documenting what he perceived as the president's improper efforts to influence a continuing investigation. An F.B.I. agent's contemporaneous notes are widely held up in court as credible evidence of conversations.

Pierce concludes with this.

Charles P. Pierce wrote:

You just know there are more memos. There are probably dozens of them. And you know that Comey and his minions know precisely the order in which to dole them out.

NorthReport wrote:

The tiny difference being, during Watergate the Democrats controlled Congress. Does anyone think for second that Ryan or McConnell are going to confront Trump? Trump is now basically above the law and is probably untouchable. 

There are two special elections coming up in Republican held seats.  If they lose either one, you'll start seeing Tepublicans jump ship.  If they lose both, they'll be a stampede for the exits.