***Official Political Discussion Thread***

[Wargames]

Just so everyone is clear

 

[gry60]

https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/412345-alaska-governor-walker-suspends-reelection-campaign

Alaska governor Walker suspends reelection campaign

 

[gry60]

Despicable people

https://thehill.com/homenews/campai...rty-sent-thousands-of-voters-false-info-about

Missouri GOP acknowledges false absentee ballot info was sent to thousands of voters

 

[Belgium]

I have added an October 7th WSJ article specifically about GOP operative Peter Smith, who was found dead in his hotel with a note stating "NO FOUL PLAY WHATSOEVER".
I would recommend giving that article a look first.


https://www.wsj.com/articles/muelle...rvative-activists-1539978208?mod=hp_lead_pos3
Mueller Probes WikiLeaks’ Contacts With Conservative Activists
Ties between the website and Roger Stone, Peter W. Smith get a closer look
Special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation is scrutinizing how a collection of activists and pundits intersected with WikiLeaks, the website that U.S. officials say was the primary conduit for publishing materials stolen by Russia, according to people familiar with the matter.

Mr. Mueller’s team has recently questioned witnesses about the activities of longtime Trump confidante Roger Stone, including his contacts with WikiLeaks, and has obtained telephone records, according to the people familiar with the matter.

Investigators also have evidence that the late GOP activist Peter W. Smith may have had advance knowledge of details about the release of emails from a top Hillary Clinton campaign official by WikiLeaks, one person familiar with the matter said. They have questioned Mr. Smith’s associates, the person said.

Right-wing pundit Jerome Corsi was also questioned by investigators about his interactions with Mr. Stone and WikiLeaks before a grand jury in September, according to a person familiar with the matter. Mr. Corsi declined to comment. A lawyer for Mr. Stone said he hasn’t been contacted by the special counsel. Mr. Smith died last year.

Mr. Mueller’s office declined to comment.

Throughout 2016, Messrs. Stone, Smith and Corsi, who long worked on the margins of Republican politics, tried to dig up incriminating information about Mrs. Clinton, the Democratic nominee for president, according to emails and some public comments. A lawyer for President Trump didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

Sam Nunberg, a former Trump campaign staffer who interacted with Mr. Stone, said he also was questioned by Mr. Mueller’s team about communications he had with Mr. Stone regarding WikiLeaks. New York radio host Randy Credico also said the special counsel asked about his communications with Mr. Stone and WikiLeaks. Mr. Credico interviewed WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in 2016 and has known Mr. Stone for years.

The role WikiLeaks and Mr. Assange played during the 2016 election as the chief publisher of stolen Democratic emails has been of enduring interest to investigators probing Russian election interference in 2016 and whether there was collusion with Trump associates. President Trump has denied collusion, and Moscow has denied meddling in the election. The Mueller probe has resulted in more than two dozen indictments as well as guilty pleas by five Trump associates.

Mr. Mueller’s office has begun shedding staff and has indicated that key witnesses are ready to be sentenced, a sign that their cooperation is no longer needed.

It couldn’t be determined whether WikiLeaks or Mr. Assange are targets of the probe or if investigators are primarily interested in those who interacted with the organization. As Mr. Mueller focuses on hacking and Russian interference, individuals or groups who may have been involved could be exposed to charges such as conspiracy to aid in a hacking operation.

A July indictment of 12 Russian military intelligence officers that derived from the special counsel’s investigation alleged that WikiLeaks obtained stolen material from Russian military intelligence through an online persona known as Guccifer 2.0. Much of that material was hacked in the spring of 2016, according to the special counsel.

WikiLeaks didn’t respond to a request for comment. Mr. Assange has said that Russia wasn’t the source of the emails.

The scrutiny of activities related to WikiLeaks suggests investigators believe the organization’s importance to the Russia probe may extend beyond its dealings with Guccifer 2.0. A list of questions Mr. Mueller wanted Mr. Trump to answer and gave to the president’s legal team earlier this year included one about the president’s knowledge of communication between Mr. Stone, his associates and WikiLeaks, The Wall Street Journal has reported.

According to the July indictment, WikiLeaks received an encrypted attachment from Guccifer 2.0 on July 14, 2016, that held “instructions on how to access an online archive of stolen DNC documents.” More than a month earlier, on June 12, Mr. Assange said during an interview with a British television station that he had obtained Clinton-related emails that were pending publication.

That claim came three days before the Guccifer 2.0 persona appeared online, raising the possibility that there may have been another channel that served as a conduit for Clinton-related emails. In the weeks before the election, WikiLeaks released emails belonging to John Podesta, the chairman of Mrs. Clinton’s campaign.

The person familiar with Mr. Smith recalled him repeatedly implying that he knew ahead of time about leaks of Mr. Podesta’s emails. The Journal previously reported that in the fall of 2016, Mr. Smith told friends and wrote in an email that he directed hackers to give emails from Mrs. Clinton’s private server to WikiLeaks. It is unclear whether hackers ever obtained the emails belonging to Mrs. Clinton, which she had said were deleted because they were deemed personal. Those emails have never been made public.

In August 2016, Mr. Stone told Alex Jones, a right-wing provocateur who runs the website InfoWars, that he had a “foreshadowing” of the material that would be released by WikiLeaks. Days later, Mr. Stone tweeted that it would soon be “the Podesta’s [sic] time in the barrel.” Several days before WikiLeaks began to post the hacked material from Mr. Podesta’s email account, Mr. Stone tweeted that he had “total confidence” that WikiLeaks would “educate the American people soon.”

Mr. Stone has since said the messages were “benign” and that he had no advance notice of the website’s plans. He also has said his tweet referencing “the Podesta’s” was about the lobbying activities of Mr. Podesta and his brother, Tony.

It isn’t clear to what degree, if any, Mr. Stone’s and Mr. Smith’s efforts were connected. Messrs. Smith and Stone had mutual associates in Mr. Corsi as well as former Wall Street financier Charles Ortel, who was researching the Clinton Family Foundation, emails and public comments show. Mr. Stone said he wasn’t aware of Mr. Smith’s work. Mr. Ortel said he wasn’t aware of a relationship between Mr. Stone and Mr. Smith.

Mr. Smith referred to his project as the “Clinton Email Reconnaissance Initiative.” He compiled a long list of businessmen, activists, lawyers, researchers and Trump campaign officials who he wanted to work with to obtain Mrs. Clinton’s 33,000 emails. While many people on that list say they never gave Mr. Smith permission to use their names, some were copied or named in emails circulated by Mr. Smith in 2016. Others got unsolicited approaches from Mr. Smith they say they never responded to.

Additional article that I mentioned at the top of this post and 2 excerpts:
Excerpt:
The email, dated Oct. 11, 2016, in the “Robert Tyler” account, included the subject line “Wire Instructions—Clinton Email Reconnaissance Initiative” and was addressed to Mr. Smith. The writer, who identified himself as “ROB, ” said: “This $100k total with the $50k received from you will allow us to fund the Washington Scholarship Fund for the Russian students for the promised $150K.” The Journal couldn’t determine if such a fund actually exists.

“The students are very pleased with the email releases they have seen, and are thrilled with their educational advancement opportunities,” the email read. Because multiple people had access to the “Robert Tyler” email account, it couldn’t be determined who sent the email to Mr. Smith.
The email about obtaining the pledges came just days after WikiLeaks and the website DCLeaks began releasing emails damaging to Mrs. Clinton’s campaign and four days after the U.S. government publicly warned that Russia was attempting to interfere in the U.S. election through the hacking and release of stolen emails and doing so at the direction of the Kremlin’s “senior-most officials.”


Excerpt 2:
The focus from investigators on Mr. Smith’s quest to obtain Mrs. Clinton’s emails may be especially significant because Mr. Smith had implied in conversations with people in his circle and others he tried to recruit to help that he was working with retired Lt. Gen. Mike Flynn, at the time a senior adviser to then-candidate Donald Trump, the Journal has reported.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/gop-op...0-000-in-search-for-clinton-emails-1538913614
GOP Operative Secretly Raised at Least $100,000 in Search for Clinton Emails
Opposition researcher’s efforts are of intense interest to investigators probing Russian election interference

A veteran Republican operative and opposition researcher solicited and raised at least $100,000 from donors as part of an effort to obtain what he believed to be emails stolen from Hillary Clinton, activities that remain of intense interest to federal investigators working for special counsel Robert Mueller’s office and on Capitol Hill.

Peter W. Smith, an Illinois businessman with a long history of involvement in GOP politics, sought and collected the funds from at least four wealthy donors as part of the plan to obtain Mrs. Clinton’s stolen emails from hackers just weeks before election day in 2016, according to people familiar with the matter and documents reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.

Mr. Smith’s effort to find what he believed were some 33,000 deleted emails Mrs. Clinton said were personal was first reported by the Journal in a 2017 story, but the extent of his planning went far beyond what was previously known. Mr. Smith died 10 days after describing his efforts to a reporter for the Journal.

The documents and people familiar with the matter depict a veteran political operative with access to wealthy donors and deep connections in Republican politics on a single-minded quest to find incriminating information about Mrs. Clinton even after government officials warned of Russian involvement in U.S. politics. People familiar with the investigations described Mr. Smith’s activities as an area of expanding interest.

Mr. Smith went to extraordinary lengths to ensure the privacy and secrecy of his projects, according to emails and court records reviewed by the Journal and a person familiar with the matter.
One email showed the anti-Clinton funds referenced as donations that were to be sent to a Washington, D.C.-based scholarship fund for Russian students.

Mr. Smith often communicated with associates using a Gmail account under the name “Robert Tyler” that both he and several others had access to, according to emails and a person familiar with the matter. He sometimes asked associates to communicate with him by writing a note and saving it the draft folder of the account, according to correspondence reviewed by the Journal.

He also had one phone number that he used for sensitive matters and a commercially available encrypted email account. Hard drives that Mr. Smith’s estate turned over to federal investigators were also encrypted, according to people familiar with the matter.

According to an email in the “Robert Tyler” account reviewed by the Journal, Mr. Smith obtained $100,000 from at least four financiers as well as a $50,000 contribution from Mr. Smith himself. People familiar with Mr. Smith’s financial transactions confirm there were donations.

The email, dated Oct. 11, 2016, in the “Robert Tyler” account, included the subject line “Wire Instructions—Clinton Email Reconnaissance Initiative” and was addressed to Mr. Smith. The writer, who identified himself as “ROB, ” said: “This $100k total with the $50k received from you will allow us to fund the Washington Scholarship Fund for the Russian students for the promised $150K.” The Journal couldn’t determine if such a fund actually exists.


“The students are very pleased with the email releases they have seen, and are thrilled with their educational advancement opportunities,” the email read. Because multiple people had access to the “Robert Tyler” email account, it couldn’t be determined who sent the email to Mr. Smith.

The email about obtaining the pledges came just days after WikiLeaks and the website DCLeaks began releasing emails damaging to Mrs. Clinton’s campaign and four days after the U.S. government publicly warned that Russia was attempting to interfere in the U.S. election through the hacking and release of stolen emails and doing so at the direction of the Kremlin’s “senior-most officials.” Russia denies interfering in the election.

The activities of Mr. Smith—who died in May 2017 at 81—remain an active area of interest to investigators, according to people familiar with the investigation. An autopsy report said he had killed himself in a Minnesota hotel room.Mr. Smith left behind carefully prepared documents including a statement, which police deemed a suicide note, that read: “NO FOUL PLAY WHATSOEVER,” according to the Chicago Tribune.

In addition to giving hard drives to the House and Senate intelligence committees, which are also investigating election interference by Russia, Mr. Smith’s estate has given documents to Mr. Mueller’s team, people with the matter said. Associates of Mr. Smith have been interviewed by investigators or summoned before a grand jury as recently as this summer, according to documents and people familiar with the matter. BuzzFeed has also reported that Mr. Smith’s bank transfers are under scrutiny.

John Szobocsan, a business associate of Mr. Smith, appeared before a federal grand jury in August, according to one person familiar with the matter. Mr. Szobocsan, who emails show was involved in Mr. Smith’s pursuit of Mrs. Clinton’s emails, also was interviewed by Mr. Mueller’s team three times earlier in the year, according to court records that were reviewed by the Journal.

Mr. Szobocsan is seeking repayment from Mr. Smith’s estate for the legal costs he has accrued, according to court records. He and an attorney representing him didn’t respond to requests for comment.

The focus from investigators on Mr. Smith’s quest to obtain Mrs. Clinton’s emails may be especially significant because Mr. Smith had implied in conversations with people in his circle and others he tried to recruit to help that he was working with retired Lt. Gen. Mike Flynn, at the time a senior adviser to then-candidate Donald Trump, the Journal has reported.

Mr. Flynn pleaded guilty last December to lying to investigators about his calls with Russia’s ambassador a month before Mr. Trump’s inauguration. Prosecutors said at the time Mr. Flynn was cooperating with their investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election and possible links to the Trump campaign.

After an extended period in limbo, prosecutors said last month they were ready for a federal judge to sentence Mr. Flynn and the court has scheduled proceedings for Dec 18. An attorney for Mr. Flynn didn’t respond to requests for comment.

Mr. Trump has repeatedly denied collusion between his campaign and Russia.

Retired Wall Street financier Charles Ortel said he spoke with Mr. Smith on the phone in the hours before his death about a new project to brief the Obama Foundation and warn its leaders against the mistakes they believed were made by the Clinton Foundation. According to Mr. Ortel, Mr. Smith sounded excited, and he began brainstorming who to contact and how to proceed.

“I came away from that conversation saying this is great. We’re going to make progress,” said Mr. Ortel, who had previously communicated with Mr. Smith about efforts to obtain Clinton’s emails but was not one of the four people named in the email account as financial contributors. He said he was stunned when news outlets reported that Mr. Smith had taken his life shortly after their conversation.

 

[IATT]

 

[blastercombo]

it's a damn day later and i still can't stop watching this gif
it's an amazing combo: 1) right hook to the nose 2) elbow to the cheek 3) backfist to to the temple

They can’t help but abuse women. It’s just a natural reflex

 

[blastercombo]

Just so everyone is clear

Yes vote, but if they pop up on the street talking crazy to you put them on their ***

 

[boris]

If someone in this topic said something like this, I bet dwalk would pop in to say "yikes".

 

[AEA18]

Just days before she resigned as UN Ambassador, Nikki Haley delivered a private speech to the Council for National Policy, a secretive group of influential right-wing figures. Journalist Max Blumenthal obtained exclusive access and reveals shocking details -- including Haley's admission that she threatened the Chinese ambassador with a US invasion of North Korea.

 

[boris]

Not sure if this was posted already.
https://www.sfgate.com/politics/art...s-middle-class-working-class-GOP-13321493.php

 

[whywesteppin]

**** up some commas, let's **** up some commas yeah
Let's **** up some commas, let's **** up some commas yeah
Forty thou to a hunned thou
A hunned thou 'nother hunned thou
Three hunned thou, five hunned thou
A milli y'all let's have a money shower

 

[blastercombo]

Case closed, says so right there. Proof. Just gotta wait

 

[IATT]

 

[stuntman mike]

more believable: blasey ford or the saudi explanation? hmmmmm.... .

 

[IATT]

 

[Nike Jordan]

a "Beto" victory would be good for Texas, not only because of his skills, both personal and political, but also because of the manifest inadequacies of the man he would replace.

 

[Nike Jordan]

Has Ben Sasse ever picked up a history book?

We're the biggest war mongers on Earth.

 

[whywesteppin]

more believable: blasey ford or the saudi explanation? hmmmmm.... .

What reason would the Saudis have to lie though? What could they possibly gain?

 

[DADDYFATSACKS]

If the Dems don’t atleast take over the house they’re beyond washed.

 

[Armada]

Man if there is one silver lining of the current climate of this country is the amount of people i know personally who are interested in becoming more aware about politics and more active in voting, it's really encouraging to see. I've always done what I can to stay well read on candidates and amendments locally but I can't ever remember a time before hearing about my parents tell me they are printing out the info on the local amendments that are about to be voted on and reading up on em. Friends reaching out to me asking questions about politics they never cared to ask before and where they can get information from to read up and make informed decisions themselves.

 

[gry60]

I guess we should thank the Spaghetti Monster for easy access to credit for maintaining the illusion of stability...

 

[Wargames]

 

[whywesteppin]

I voted for Donald Trump because he is really really super rich and doesn't need or want anymore money so no way he would ever be compromised by a foreign entity like Russia or Saudi Arabia.

I am a super-duper smart independent.

edit: I was just looking this up -- the journalist who lost the fist fight is the nephew of Adnan. Adnan's other nephew was Dodi Fayed, the one who was killed along with Princess Diana in a car accident.

He is also connected to a certain stable genius Donald Trump, you know, the guy who is super-good at making business deals:

"After Khashoggi ran into financial problems he sold the yacht to the Sultan of Brunei, who in turn sold it for $29 million to Donald Trump, who sold it for $20 million[12] to Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal as part of a deal to keep his Taj Mahal casino out of bankruptcy."

 

[blastercombo]

I voted for Donald Trump because he is really really super rich and doesn't need or want anymore money so no way he would ever be compromised by a foreign entity like Russia or Saudi Arabia.

I am a super-duper smart independent.

“I voted for trump becuase he was smart enough to start his own business from nothing with absolutely no help. If he can do that he can run this country like a business. I didn’t read this anywhere I just kinda .......... assume that’s the story”


- idiot

 

[Nike Jordan]

Jesse Jackson's 1988 campaign is doing numbers right now in South Korea, for some reason.

https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2018/...ackson-1988-campaign-shirts-korea-japan-china