A new Gallup poll shows Donald Trump’s presidential job-approval rating hitting at 46 percent. While one can fairly note that the popularity is still lagging considerably behind a booming economy, it is also notable that President Barack Obama was at 44 percent in Gallup polling at this time in his presidency.
The polling shows a couple things that I find fascinating about this presidency. First, there remains a sharp disconnect between the views of journalists and activists in the Beltway and the just of the country. When you travel outside of the city (or most major cities), there is considerable support for Trump. This leads to the same anti-establishment dimension that led to the last election surprise.
The second issue is more difficult for Trump. Despite leading a huge economic growth period, Trump remains below 50 percent. More importantly, polls show people hardened on both ends on Trump. There is now a huge group of voters committed to voting against him. This figure has been tracked in the 40 and even 50 percentile. Ironically, it was the problem that Hillary Clinton had in her election. The Democrats nominated the least popular Democrat in the country — and the ultimate embodiment of the Washington establishment. She began with a significant number of people who would not vote for Clinton under any circumstances. Trump’s confrontational approach has appealed to his base for the primary while alienating the swing voters in the general election.
Trump is now facing a rock hard opposition that means that he has to virtually sweep the table to win again. Nevertheless, this poll shows that he is not nearly as unpopular outside Washington as he is inside it.
https://www.westernjournal.com/dick-morris-rain-ruin-descend-fbi-doj/
All hell is about to break loose for the Obama-era FBI and Department of Justice.
Now the wheels of justice, led by Attorney General William Barr, are going to grind up the likes of John Brennan, former CIA director, James Clapper, former Director of National Intelligence, James Comey, former head of the FBI, and James Baker, former FBI General Counsel.
The years of 2017 and 2018 were dominated by Russia Collusiongate — a scandal that never happened.
But, in the aftermath of the Mueller report, our politics now will revolve around finding out who was behind the hoax.
Having defeated the allegation of collusion, it is now time to round up and shoot the alligators.
Former U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia and former legal counsel to the FISA Court Joe DiGenova warns Democrats that the jig is up.
In an interview on Fox News last week, he pointed out that the FISA Court has “already communicated with the Justice Department … its findings that there was an illegal spying operation going on by FBI [private] contractors — four of them — to steal personal information, electronic information about Americans and use it against the Republican Party.”
DiGenova predicted “there are going to be indictments. There’s going to be grand juries.”
DiGenova explained that “it has been evident from day one that there was a brazen plot to exonerate Hillary Clinton [over the secret server scandal] and then, if she lost the election, to frame Donald Trump.”
DiGenova explains — as Eileen and I said in our book, “Rogue Spooks: The Intelligence War on Donald Trump” published two years ago — that the Steele dossier “was a knowing part of that. It was created by Hillary Clinton [and by] John Brennan as part of a scheme to … harm Donald Trump.”
The American Spectator summarized what will happen, predicting a “rain of ruin” for the FBI and the DOJ.
This investigation will be like the Iran-Contra probe of 1987 on steroids.
The hunting season will begin when DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz releases his findings on whether former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates and former Assistant Attorney General John Carlin lied to the FISA Court in seeking warrants to spy on Trump campaign officials.
DiGenova said that Chief Judge of the Court Rosemary M. Collier “has already ruled that the FBI broke the law and that the people at the head of the Obama Justice Department all knew about it and lied to the FISA Court about it”
This scandal goes to the very core of American democracy. It will expose how political appointees in key positions used the apparatus of government to spy on and cripple not just a candidate, but an incoming president.
It should all be very interesting — riveting — to watch as it unfolds.
There are several weekend bloggers. Perhaps they could assist Darren Smith with his apparently distressing and overwhelming “duties.”
https://jonathanturley.org/weekend-bloggers/
What a nasty and insulting person you are.
I imagine Darren’s had her wandering from one Starbucks to another to use IP addresses which haven’t been banned yet.
They are like sewer rats. Seal one sewer and they go to the next.
And now Moe has weighed in, as well.
Wow! I am stupid. I should watch what I say.
What Trump says in these two tweets is undisputable:
Donald J. Trump
Verified account
@realDonaldTrump
May 8
More
Real estate developers in the 1980’s & 1990’s, more than 30 years ago, were entitled to massive write offs and depreciation which would, if one was actively building, show losses and tax losses in almost all cases. Much was non monetary. Sometimes considered “tax shelter,” ……
22,819 replies 18,551 retweets 88,278 likes
Reply 23K Retweet 19K Like 88K Direct message
Donald J. Trump
Verified account
@realDonaldTrump
Follow Follow @realDonaldTrump
More
….you would get it by building, or even buying. You always wanted to show losses for tax purposes….almost all real estate developers did – and often re-negotiate with banks, it was sport. Additionally, the very old information put out is a highly inaccurate Fake News hit job!
Trump followed laws created by Democrats!!!
In 1990 and 1991 he had losses of over $250 million a year — “more than double those of the nearest taxpayers in the I.R.S. information for those years.”
Since Trump was not the richest man in America, or even close to that, showing the worst losses of anyone by a factor 2 is not explainable as SOP for real estate investors. He was either a colossal loser, a colossal tax cheat, or some combination of both.
PS We already know he was a tax cheat. Many have suspected he was also a loser. His describing not paying taxes as “sport” should be very inspiring for his followers who are already happy to pass on the bill for his tax cuts and “the wall” to our kids and grandkids. Add in Fatso’s share of taxes.
“We already know he was a tax cheat.”
You are a liar. It’s hard for a sane person to make such a claim when the individual involved was audited by the IRS.
You are a typical loser who can’t back up his claims and libels anyone he doesn’t like.
Take note that once again Anon ran away from the discussion of Obamacare with Karen.
Anon shoots blanks.
Happy to talk the ACA with Karen. Where is it?
Karen had three consecutive quotes on this or the prior blog. Do a search and it will be there.
Trump family tax cheats documented
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/10/02/us/politics/donald-trump-tax-schemes-fred-trump.html
You mean you and the Sulzberger Birdcage Liner‘s population of English majors and J-school alums understand Fred Trump’s legal obligations better than (1) his accountants and (2) the IRS?
i remember that one. had a lot of legit planning techniques called cheating for those who dont know better. FLPs were multipurpose entities which allowed fractional discounts and were widely used even for small millionaires back in the estate taxes days. not cheating at all, perfectly lawful
Garbage, Anon. Neither you nor the NYTimes has provided proof. Go ahead and copy two or three statements that prove cheating occurred. It is now time for you to turn around and show your back.
You obviously don’t know what you are talking about. That is the nature of risky businesses so don’t complain when someone gets rich. Envy doesn’t make you look good.
I have been in a risky business for over 30 years and so far have made payroll every Friday and have not had a losing year.
No one knows you’re a pig on the internet.
No doubt a source of comfort for you absurd, but just a helpful tip – yeah, anyone can tell
And yet, in your case, we do know.
lol
oh brother
there is the entertaining component of hitting them but….they feed off of the attention. They are intensifying their strikes since Darren threw down the hammer.
sick puppies just like their master David Brock
“…intensifying their strikes since Darren threw down the hammer.” This said by Estovir.
Ah, if you only had the ability to see yourself as others do.
You are dealing with peanuts where you can have a subchapter S and do your own taxes. You consider your type of contracting risky business? You don’t know what you are talking about.
“Allen, everyone here accuses the other of being a paid troll. But Estovir is the mother of all trolls! Estovir is completely incapable of engaging in real debates. So to compensate he buries each thread under tons of extraneous posts. Which makes it difficult to follow the real debates. No random reader is going to bother reading between all the crap Estovir posts.”
Peter, it takes two to debate. You don’t do that. What do you think your news articles do. They bury the truth.
“We are just trying to get to the truth”.
It sounds like Natacha already “knows” the truth.
The question is whether her knowledge of “the truth” could cost Trump Natacha’s vote in 2020.
It looks like she may not vote for him again.
it is quitting time for the David Brock trolls. Shift change.
They will be back unless if Darren blocks their IP address
Just saying
😉
Turley wrote: Civility and Decorum Policy:
This blog is committed to the principles of free speech and, as a consequence, we do not ban people simply because we disagree with them. Indeed, we value different perspectives and do not want to add another “echo chamber” to the Internet where we each repeat or amplify certain views. However, the Turley blog was created with a strong commitment to civility, a position that distinguishes us from many other sites. We do not tolerate personal attacks or bullying.
Estovir trolls, projects, and plays amateur shrink.
“Just saying
😉”
The Dems in the US House are bereft of any intelligent ideas so they use what all communists have done…..use emotions to manipulate the people.
Thankfully Americans are exhausted of Democrats theatrics. Echo, echo, echo chamber
Nadler the drama queen
——
Nadler: ‘We are now in a constitutional crisis’
After voting to hold Attorney General William Barr in contempt of Congress Wednesday, House Judiciary Chair Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) declared that the nation is in a “constitutional crisis” as the Trump administration digs in against Democrats’ attempts at congressional oversight.
“We’ve talked for a long time about approaching a Constitutional crisis. We are now in it,” Nadler said in an afternoon press conference.
“Now is the time of testing whether we can keep a republic, or whether this republic is destined to change into a different, more tyrannical form of government,” he added “We must resist this.”
https://thehill.com/homenews/house/442795-nadler-we-are-now-in-a-constitutional-crisis
Steele’s stunning pre-FISA confession: Informant needed to air Trump dirt before election
If ever there were an admission that taints the FBI’s secret warrant to surveil Donald Trump’s campaign, it sat buried for more than 2 1/2 years in the files of a high-ranking State Department official.
Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Kathleen Kavalec’s written account of her Oct. 11, 2016, meeting with FBI informant Christopher Steele shows the Hillary Clinton campaign-funded British intelligence operative admitted that his research was political and facing an Election Day deadline.
And that confession occurred 10 days before the FBI used Steele’s now-discredited dossier to justify securing a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant to surveil former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page and the campaign’s ties to Russia.
Steele’s client “is keen to see this information come to light prior to November 8,” the date of the 2016 election, Kavalec wrote in a typed summary of her meeting with Steele and Tatyana Duran, a colleague from Steele’s Orbis Security firm. The memos were unearthed a few days ago through open-records litigation by the conservative group Citizens United.
Kavalec’s notes do not appear to have been provided to the House Intelligence Committee during its Russia probe, according to former Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.). “They tried to hide a lot of documents from us during our investigation, and it usually turns out there’s a reason for it,” Nunes told me. Senate and House Judiciary investigators told me they did not know about them, even though they investigated Steele’s behavior in 2017-18.
One member of Congress transmitted the memos this week to the Department of Justice’s inspector general, fearing its investigation of FISA abuses may not have had access to them.
Nonetheless, the FBI is doing its best to keep much of Kavalec’s information secret by retroactively claiming it is classified, even though it was originally marked unclassified in 2016.
The apparent effort to hide Kavalec’s notes from her contact with Steele has persisted for some time.
State officials acknowledged a year ago they received a copy of the Steele dossier in July 2016, and got a more detailed briefing in October 2016 and referred the information to the FBI.
But what was discussed was not revealed. Sources told me more than a year ago that Kavalec had the most important (and memorialized) interaction with Steele before the FISA warrant was issued, but FBI and State officials refused to discuss it, or even confirm it.
The encounter, and Kavalec’s memos, were forced into public view through Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) litigation by Citizens United. Yet, all but a few lines have been redacted after the fact. Officials are citing as the reason national security, in the name of the FBI and a half-century-old intelligence law.
David Bossie, head of Citizens United and an informal Trump adviser, said the documents suggest there was an illegal effort to “frame” the future president with bogus Russia collusion allegations. “This new information proves why the attorney general must conduct a thorough investigation of the investigators,” he said.
Sources tell me there also are handwritten notes from the meeting, with information about Steele’s political ties, that have not been given to Congress. “There’s a connection to Hillary Clinton in the notes,” said one source who has seen them.
Perhaps those will come to light soon.
The mere three sentences that the FBI allowed State to release, unredacted, show that Kavalec sent an email two days after her encounter with Steele, alerting others.
“You may already have this information but wanted to pass it on just in case,” Kavalec wrote in the lone sentence the FBI and State released from that email. The names of the recipients, the subject line and the attachments are blacked out.
Interestingly, one legal justification cited for redacting the Oct. 13, 2016, email is the National Security Act of 1947, which can be used to shield communications involving the CIA or the White House National Security Council.
The three sentences visible in her memo show that U.S. officials had good reason to suspect Steele’s client and motive in alleging Trump-Russia collusion because they were election-related and facilitated by the Clinton-funded Fusion GPS founder, Glenn Simpson.
“Orbis undertook the investigation into the Russia/Trump connection at the behest of an institution he declined to identify that had been hacked,” Kavalec wrote.
At the time, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) was the highest-profile victim of election-year hacking.
“The institution approached them based on the recommendation of Glenn Simpson and Peter Fritsch (specialists in economic crime, formerly of the WSJ) and is keen to see this information come to light prior to November 8,” Kavalec wrote. “Orbis undertook the investigation in June of 2016.” Steele’s firm Orbis was a subcontractor to Fusion GPS, and WSJ refers to The Wall Street Journal.
Everything else in the memo was redacted. The FOIA notes contain this explanation for the redactions: “Classified by FBI on 4/25/2019 — Class: SECRET.”
In other words, the FBI under Director Christopher Wray classified the document as “secret” just a few days ago. To add injury to insult, the FBI added this hopeful note: “Declassify on 12/31/2041.” That would be 25 years after the 2016 election.
Despite the heavy redactions, Kavalec’s notes have momentous consequence.
For the first time, we have written proof the U.S. government knew well before the FBI secured the FISA warrant that Steele had a political motive and Election Day deadline to make his dossier public.
And we know that information was transmitted before the Carter Page FISA warrant to one or more people whose job is so sensitive that their identity had to be protected. That means there is little chance the FBI didn’t know about Steele’s political client, or the Election Day deadline, before requesting the FISA warrant.
Documents and testimony from Department of Justice official Bruce Ohr, whose wife Nellie worked for Fusion GPS, show he told the FBI in August 2016 that Steele was “desperate” to defeat Trump and his work had something to do with Clinton’s campaign.
Kavalec’s notes make clear the DNC was a likely client and the election was Steele’s deadline to smear Trump.
Likewise, there is little chance the FBI didn’t know that Steele, then a bureau informant, had broken protocol and gone to the State Department in an effort to make the Trump dirt public.
That makes the FBI’s failure to disclose to the FISA judges the information about Steele’s political bias and motive all the more stunning. And it makes the agents’ use of his unverified dossier to support the warrant all the more shameful.
Kavalec’s notes shed light on another mystery from the text messages between the FBI’s Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, which first revealed the politically-biased nature of the Trump collusion probe.
Strzok, the lead FBI agent on the case, and Page, a lawyer working for the FBI deputy director, repeatedly messaged each other in October 2016 about efforts to pressure and speed the review of the FISA warrant.
For instance, on Oct. 11, 2016, Strzok texted Page that he was “fighting with Stu for this FISA,” an apparent reference to then-Deputy Assistant Attorney General Stu Evans in DOJ’s national security division.
A few days later, on Oct. 14, Strzok emailed Page he needed some “hurry the F up pressure” to get the FISA approved.
If the evidence is good and the FISA request solid, why did the FBI need to apply pressure?
The real reason may be the FBI was trying to keep a lid on the political origins, motives and Election Day deadline of its star informant Steele.
And that would be the ultimate abuse of the FBI’s FISA powers.
https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/442592-steeles-stunning-pre-fisa-confession-informant-needed-to-air-trump-dirt
Nancy Pelosi articulates how the Dems are playing.
Video captures a scattered Pelosi, cogwheel neurological functioning, grim presentation. Plastic surgery is keeping her face emotionless
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KX0SPEPKs64&app=desktop
“We have to make sure that the Constitution wins the next presidential election.”
(momentary neurological paralysis)
“We can’t be worrying about how long is this going to take or that, it will take as long as it does. And we will press the case so that in the court of public opinion, people will know what is, uh, is right. But we cannot accept a second term for Donald Trump if we are going to be faithful to our democracy and to our constitution of the United States,” she warned.
“And that is just a fact,” Pelosi said to a smattering of applause. “So we have to operate on many fronts. We have to operate in the Congress, in the courts, and in the court of public opinion, and we must win the next election,” she said.
sorry but facebook sucks
https://news.avclub.com/report-everyones-using-facebook-less-probably-because-1828825490
Hey, remember that time the biggest social media platform in the world was breached by a data harvesting company headed by Steve Bannon, leading to the private information of 50 million people being used for information warfare to get Trump elected, and Facebook knew about it for two years and did nothing?
As it turns out, Facebook is really, really hoping you don’t recall that particular travesty of security and privacy—it’s spending shitloads to remind you how much fun you could be having on its site!—but it might be a case of too little, too late. According to a new Pew Research Center Survey, a huge percentage of Facebook users are scaling back the amount of time they spend on the site, or at the very least, fixing their security settings to make it a little more difficult for the site to profit off of the exploitation of your information. And while Pew doesn’t explicitly give the reasoning behind these actions, let’s just go ahead and assume it’s because Facebook sucks ass. (In unrelated news, Facebook has a stranglehold on the livelihood of many of us in digital media. Fun! I wonder if this story will show up in your Facebook news feed.)
Pew statistics show that more than half of all U.S. Facebook users 18 and older have tightened their security settings in the past 12 months. Nearly half of them—42 percent, or four in ten—report having “taken a break from checking the platform for a period of several weeks or more.” And greater than a fourth of all U.S. adults (26 percent) have deleted the Facebook app from their cellphones, which, yeah, we joined that club awhile back. Combined, that makes for 74 percent of all adult users taking one or more of these actions since summer 2017.
Interestingly, this data is split equally between Republicans and Democrats, despite Republicans overwhelmingly believing social media platforms censor political speech they find problematic. (Of course, many leftists these days seem to want social media sites to censor speech they’ve deemed problematic. Fate, it seems, is not without a sense of irony.) Roughly identical percentages of both political affiliations still use Facebook, with these leanings having no bearing on whether they tightened security and/or use the site less often.
Conversely, it’s mostly young people who are realizing just how much Facebook blows, with almost half of users aged 18 to 29 deleting the app from their phones, a rate four times that of those 65 and older. The senior citizen crowd has also adjusted their privacy settings much more infrequently, perhaps because Facebook, until quite recently, intentionally tried to make that shit as confusing as possible. However, age is nothing but a number when it comes to taking a break from the social media platform, with equal numbers taking a break from using it. And while the company continues to care way more about its image regarding security as opposed to actual security, here’s a few more statistics we just made up to convey people’s thoughts about Facebook:
37 percent of all Facebook users say if they ever see the phrase “The answer might surprise you” again in a “news story” that appears in their feed, they will fucking scream
24 percent of all users report Facebook being “total garbage” they mostly only keep around to appease family members living in other states, and also to keep checking to see if bad things have happened to the mean kids from high school
89 percent of everyone on the planet says a small prayer before falling asleep consisting of the words, “And almighty God, if I wake up in the morning and it’s like Facebook never existed, I will never stop praising your holy name. Amen.”
Bernie Sanders understood that mass media is against the people. About his old cable access show:
https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2019/05/03/bernie-sanders-burlington-tv-show-video-2020-226761
People are interested in what Farrakhan and Jones have to say., I have watched them both plenty. They are both entertaining if at times a little crazy. But I am ok in spite of it. Facebook is a boring and unfair medium which should be rejected by its users. If you are still using Facebook in spite of how they deeply surveil you, then you are a fool.
Drop Facebook !
The plot thickens. What will Nadler do to outmaneuver Executive Privilege for Barr?
Intriguing …
——
Barr may seek executive privilege over Mueller report in face of contempt vote
The Justice Department informed the House Judiciary Committee late Tuesday that Attorney General William Barr is not intimidated by a contempt of Congress vote.
Justice Department staff and the panel met Tuesday afternoon regarding a subpoena for access to special counsel Robert Mueller’s full report and underlying evidence. Chairman Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y. walked away from the meeting to say his committee is “still scheduled” to vote on contempt Wednesday morning.
In response, Assistant Attorney General Stephen Boyd wrote to Nadler that the committee had responded to their “accommodation efforts by escalating its unreasonable demands,” which included allowing all 41 members of the Judiciary and Intelligence committees and additional staff to read Mueller’s findings. The department offered to allow 12 top members in both parties access to a less-redacted version of the report.
The letter warns Nadler that Barr “will be compelled to request that the President invoke executive privilege” if the panel moves forward with the contempt process.
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/barr-may-seek-executive-privilege-over-mueller-report-in-face-of-contempt-vote
Watergate Articles Of Impeachment
http://watergate.info/impeachment/articles-of-impeachment
Full text of the Watergate Articles of Impeachment as passed by the US House of … Article 1. RESOLVED, That Richard M. Nixon, President of the United States, …
L4D excerpts Article 3 of the Nixon Impeachment Articles linked above:
In his conduct of the office of President of the United States, Richard M. Nixon, contrary to his oath faithfully to execute the office of President of the United States and, to the best of his ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States, and in violation of his constitutional duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed, has failed without lawful cause or excuse to produce papers and things as directed by duly authorized subpoenas issued by the Committee on the Judiciary of the House of Representatives on April 11, 1974, May 15, 1974, May 30, 1974, and June 24, 1974, and willfully disobeyed such subpoenas. The subpoenaed papers and things were deemed necessary by the Committee in order to resolve by direct evidence fundamental, factual questions relating to Presidential direction, knowledge or approval of actions demonstrated by other evidence to be substantial grounds for impeachment of the President. In refusing to produce these papers and things Richard M. Nixon, substituting his judgment as to what materials were necessary for the inquiry, interposed the powers of the Presidency against the the lawful subpoenas of the House of Representatives, thereby assuming to himself functions and judgments necessary to the exercise of the sole power of impeachment vested by the Constitution in the House of Representatives.
In all of this, Richard M. Nixon has acted in a manner contrary to his trust as President and subversive of constitutional government, to the great prejudice of the cause of law and justice, and to the manifest injury of the people of the United States.
Wherefore, Richard M. Nixon, by such conduct, warrants impeachment and trial, and removal from office.
Jerry Nadler at his finest
That was before Emmett Flood wrote his very snitty letter to AG Whitewash Barr. Flood now wants to assert executive privilege retroactively over pretty much everything in the way of “raw, investigative materials” that Mueller put in the report that Barr transmitted to Congress. Poor Whitewash has to find some way to put the horse back in the barn before Flood closes the door on Barr’s previous waiver of executive privilege over all of that raw, investigative material.
Contributed by The L4D–I Don’t See How He’s Going To Do It Without Getting Trump Impeached–Project
Too late for Whitewash. Emmett Flood retroactively asserted executive privilege over the entire Mueller report right before The House Judiciary Committee held AG Whitewash Barr in Contempt of Congress.
[repeated for emphasis with paraphrase from Article III of the Nixon Impeachment Articles:
In refusing to produce these papers and things Donald J. Trump, substituting his judgment as to what materials were necessary for the inquiry, interposed the powers of the Presidency against the lawful subpoenas of the House of Representatives . . .
Contributed by The L4D–Trump Actually Wants To Be Impeached–Project
Oky, another Phrack Poll, I’ve got it. Moving along…
& Hillary well still win 100 mill to nothing! LOL:)
Ya Right!!!
Watchdog Probes FBI Reliance on Dossier in Surveillance of Trump Aide WSJ
Justice Department official looks at handling of Christopher Steele’s dossier in applications to surveil Carter Page
The Justice Department’s internal watchdog, close to concluding its inquiry into steps the FBI took in its probe of Trump campaign associates and Russia beginning in 2016, is homing in on whether the agency continued surveillance of one associate despite questions about a key source’s credibility, according to people familiar with the matter.
In the closely watched probe of the counterintelligence inquiry that later morphed into special counsel Robert Mueller’s examination of Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, the department’s inspector general has been asking witnesses about the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s treatment of information in a dossier provided by Christopher Steele, a former British intelligence officer.
The findings of Mr. Steele, whose work was financed by Democrats to investigate President Trump’s ties to Russia, was included in an application for a warrant from a secret court to eavesdrop on Carter Page, who briefly served on the Trump campaign as a foreign-policy adviser. The surveillance of Mr. Page, who has denied wrongdoing and hasn’t been charged with any crime, began in October 2016, shortly after he left the campaign. The warrant was renewed three times through much of 2017.
The FBI didn’t use Mr. Steele’s research to open its broader investigation in July 2016. That came after the Australian government tipped off the U.S. that another foreign policy adviser to the Trump campaign appeared to have foreknowledge of the release of hacked material by Russia, which has denied interference in the election.
But Mr. Steele’s information was a factor in the investigation of Mr. Page, who also had contacts dating back several years with people known to be Russian intelligence agents, including one who pleaded guilty to conspiring to act in the U.S. as an agent of Russia in March 2016.
Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s team has been asking why the FBI continued to cite Mr. Steele as a credible source in the renewal applications, the people said. In particular, they asked about a news report cited extensively in the applications that appeared to bolster Mr. Steele’s credibility. The report said U.S. intelligence officials were investigating allegations similar to those Mr. Steele had raised.
In the last application, the FBI said it didn’t believe that Mr. Steele directly provided the information in the Yahoo News article, even though Mr. Steele had admitted in U.K. proceedings in spring 2017 that he had briefed the reporter.
Investigators have also asked about an internal FBI evaluation of Mr. Steele’s credibility that found his reporting had been “minimally corroborated,” even as it also said he had provided information “of value” to the U.S. intelligence community. The evaluation was reflected in a “human source validation report” written by a unit of the FBI after the bureau cut off its relationship with Mr. Steele in October 2016. It did so because of his disclosures to the media about his work for the FBI.
In the last renewal application, dated June 2017, the FBI continued to state that it believed Mr. Steele’s information “credible,” given that his “previous reporting” had been “corroborated and used in criminal proceedings.”
The use of Mr. Steele’s information as part of a secret surveillance warrant was among the most controversial actions taken by the FBI during the 2016 campaign. It was the subject of dueling partisan memos by members of the House Intelligence Committee last year—with Republicans alleging that the electronic eavesdropping on Mr. Page was improper, and Democrats saying the surveillance was based on real concerns and allowed investigators to collect “valuable intelligence,” the details of which are redacted. Renewals are often based on whether the earlier surveillance was productive.
An attorney for Mr. Steele declined to comment. The FBI declined to comment, as did the inspector general’s office.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/watchdog-probes-fbi-reliance-on-dossier-in-surveillance-of-trump-aide-11557275757
Trump can declassify anything at anytime for any reason or for no reason at all. Trump hasn’t declassified the un-redacted memo and notes in question because there is nothing useful to Trump behind those redactions and there is probably something harmful to Trump behind those redactions. Such is the same with all of Trump’s threats to investigate the investigation and the investigators. The only person who would stand to gain anything from the counter-investigation is Vladimir Putin of the Russian Federation, who would still like to know more about how his people got caught in 2016. If Trump lends aid and comfort to Putin now . . . Nope. Trump cannot possibly be that incomparably . . . ______?
Contributed by The L4D–Distemper Is Bad For Your Complexion–Project
A Not-So-Great Businessman
Trump Lost Millions Every Year For A Decade
Mr. Trump was propelled to the presidency, in part, by a self-spun narrative of business success and of setbacks triumphantly overcome. He has attributed his first run of reversals and bankruptcies to the recession that took hold in 1990. But 10 years of tax information obtained by The New York Times paints a different, and far bleaker, picture of his deal-making abilities and financial condition.
The data — printouts from Mr. Trump’s official Internal Revenue Service tax transcripts, with the figures from his federal tax form, the 1040, for the years 1985 to 1994 — represents the fullest and most detailed look to date at the president’s taxes, information he has kept from public view. Though the information does not cover the tax years at the center of an escalating battle between the Trump administration and Congress, it traces the most tumultuous chapter in a long business career — an era of fevered acquisition and spectacular collapse.
The numbers show that in 1985, Mr. Trump reported losses of $46.1 million from his core businesses — largely casinos, hotels and retail space in apartment buildings. They continued to lose money every year, totaling $1.17 billion in losses for the decade.
In fact, year after year, Mr. Trump appears to have lost more money than nearly any other individual American taxpayer, The Times found when it compared his results with detailed information the I.R.S. compiles on an annual sampling of high-income earners. His core business losses in 1990 and 1991 — more than $250 million each year — were more than double those of the nearest taxpayers in the I.R.S. information for those years.
Over all, Mr. Trump lost so much money that he was able to avoid paying income taxes for eight of the 10 years. It is not known whether the I.R.S. later required changes after audits.
Since the 2016 presidential campaign, journalists at The Times and elsewhere have been trying to piece together Mr. Trump’s complex and concealed finances. While The Times did not obtain the president’s actual tax returns, it received the information contained in the returns from someone who had legal access to it. The Times was then able to find matching results in the I.R.S. information on top earners — a publicly available database that each year comprises a one-third sampling of those taxpayers, with identifying details removed. It also confirmed significant findings using other public documents, along with confidential Trump family tax and financial records from the newspaper’s 2018 investigation into the origin of the president’s wealth.
Edited from: “Decade In The Red: Trump Tax Figures Show Over $1 Billion In Business Loses”
This Evening’s “New York Times”
Link To Above Article
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/05/07/us/politics/donald-trump-taxes.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage
You don’t have to be a genius to figure how heavily Trump leaned on his inheritance to stay afloat during the decade in question.
So living off of one’s inheritance is a bad thing now? Seriously?
Envious much?
Yet US Secretary of State “pay for play” Hillary Clinton was a great thing. Or were you effusive with praise for Bill and Hillary when they lied about being dirt broke after leaving the White House, then suddenly being obscene millionaires years later? Fancy Bill’s speaking fees?
Get a grip
Of course the point is that Trump has been bragging about both how rich he is and how successful he’s been at business. Given that he lies and brags about anything and everything, this won’t be a surprise to anyone except the marks that support him, including wanting to buy his wall. The previous in depth NYTs article on his father’s propping him up while cheating on taxes goes hand in hand with this one.
As to the Clintons, who have provided their tax returns:
“Bill Clinton has been paid $104.9 million for 542 speeches around the world between January 2001, when he left the White House, and January 2013, when Hillary stepped down as secretary of state, according to a Washington Post review of the family’s federal financial disclosures. Although slightly more than half of his appearances were in the United States, the majority of his speaking income, $56.3 million, came from foreign speeches, many of them in China, Japan, Canada and the United Kingdom, the Post review found.
The financial industry has been Clinton’s most frequent sponsor. The Post review showed that Wall Street banks and other financial services firms have hired Clinton for at least 102 appearances and paid him a total of $19.6 million….”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/how-the-clintons-went-from-dead-broke-to-rich-bill-earned-1049-million-for-speeches/2014/06/26/8fa0b372-fd3a-11e3-8176-f2c941cf35f1_story.html?utm_term=.2a41bdd0d612
“Bill Clinton has been paid $104.9 million for 542 speeches around the world between January 2001, when he left the White House, and January 2013, when Hillary stepped down as secretary of state, according to a Washington Post review of the family’s federal financial disclosures. ” NYTimes below.
That says it all, doesn’t it?
PAY FOR PLAY Bill suddenly lost his value the second Hillary was out of office. Look at how much tickets are selling for on the Hillary and Bill roadshow.
Look at how much tickets are selling for on the Hillary and Bill roadshow.
Hysterical isnt it?
Oh how the Blue Stained Dress days seem so long ago!
No, Estovir, living off of your Daddy’s money isn’t a bad thing, but it proves you aren’t a self-made financial genius, as Trump has always claimed. He’s a grifter and liar. Always has been. It takes a lot of “talent” to lose this much money.
oh, he’s plenty successful in his own right. you probably don’t get that. the good news is, nobody cares, so you needn’t be embarrassed by your own ignorance
NUTCHACHA
May we presume you’re jealous of the success of others and you sin as you covet the wealth of others? Shall we order the disposition of every individual’s estate upon his death? Where does the Constitution say that succeeding is bad and passing your estate on to your family is unnatural? Do you have any assets; a will or a trust? Perhaps you’re simply a failure seeking grift. Comrade, you have absolutely no grasp of the concept of American freedom and free enterprise or the severe restrictions and limitations placed on government and the maximal freedom of individuals provided for by the Constitution.
Article 1, Section 8 provides Congress merely the power to tax for “…general Welfare…,” omitting and, thereby, excluding any power to tax for “…individual welfare…” or for the purposes of communistic redistribution of wealth. It goes on to severely restrict and limit the power of Congress to regulate anything other than trade, exchange or “…commerce among the several States” to preclude bias or favor by one state over another. Similarly, the right to private property denies to government any ability to possess or dispose of any individual’s private property with the sole exception of Eminent Domain. Government may take one’s property completely or leave it alone completely. James Madison defined private property as “that dominion which one man claims and exercises over the external things of the world, in exclusion of every other individual.”
To sum it up, government can tax only for roads, water, electricity, sewer, trash pick-up, post office, etc., GENERAL not INDIVIDUAL welfare – government cannot tax to take money from one man to give it to another. And government cannot “regulate” any aspect of any business other than “commerce among the several States.”
Other people’s money, real property, moveable property, businesses etc. are absolutely none of your or the government’s business. The entire communistic American welfare state is unconstitutional including, but not limited to, affirmative action, quotas, welfare, food stamps, rent control, social services, forced busing, minimum wage, utility subsidies, WIC, TANF, HAMP, HARP, Education, Labor, Obamacare, Obamaphones, Social Security, Social Security Disability, Medicare, Medicaid, “Fair Housing,” laws, “Non-Discrimination” laws, etc.
Karl Marx wrote the Communist Manifesto 59 years after the adoption of the Constitution because none of the principles of the Communist Manifesto were in the Constitution. Had the principles of the Communist Manifesto been in the Constitution, Karl Marx would have had no reason to write the Communist Manifesto. The principles of the Communist Manifesto were not in the Constitution then and the principles of the Communist Manifesto are not in the Constitution now.
You should consider citizenship in Cuba, China, Vietnam, North Korea or other totalitarian dictatorships in your personal “pursuit of happiness.”
NUTCHACHA falls, hook, line and sinker, for the “leaked” version of President Donald J. Trump’s taxes. What a ——- brainiac. The poor man is not greedy, in fact he lost more money than common men. Of course, this leak is pure PR and, due to its time frame, has zero relevance to anything.
You go, girl!
Or is it:
You go, boy?
George: 1. Much of the money Trump lost was other people’s money–his father’s, banks and other money lenders, and partners or, as he likes to call them “suckers”. One other revelation from the tax information is that he was in several partnerships with people who put up money. He has referred to gambling with and losing other peoples’ money as a “sport”. 2. Just why do you suppose Trump won’t release his tax returns? If he was the wildly-successful, self-made visionary entrepreneur you would like to believe he is, he’d be proud to release the information, as it would back up his boasts about being “very rich”. 3. Why does he keep 2 sets of books–one for the IRS and another for Forbes, to juice up his rating? Michael Cohen has produced the 2 sets of books, so this isn’t speculation.
He’s a liar, crook and con man, pure and simple, and once the full truth comes out even true believers like you will have trouble spinning the facts in Trump’s favor, although Faux News tried to do just that this morning. Losing over a billion dollars over a 10-year period in a booming economy is not something to be proud of, especially when much of it was borrowed from others who believed the lies about Trump being a successful visionary. Then again, maybe he’s just a tax cheater, something that has already been proven. Either way, he’s not the successful, wealthy business entrepreneur he has portrayed himself to be. He has failed at: A. Trump University; B. Trump Casinos; C. Trump steaks; D. Trump menswear and accessories and E. winning the U.S. Presidency without the assistance of a Communist dictator he’s trying to borrow money from because no US banks will loan him any more money. The biggest thing he has to sell is himself as “…a vigorous, young man,… a very stable genius….. in astonishingly excellent health… who is ….very rich. All lies.
Oh, and Allan, about the buildings. Trump borrowed other people’s money for construction. Trump is not an engineer, architect or otherwise skilled or educated in design or construction of buildings, and the buildings are not architecturally or culturally significant. He’s no Frank Lloyd Wright. He had little to nothing to do with the buildings other than borrowing other people’s money, using other people’s talent for design, and putting his name on them but taking credit. He tore down the Bonwit Teller building and destroyed valuable and significant art deco designs that the MOMA wanted, on purpose, just to show them, and put up a gaudy, gold tower to pay homage to his ego. Yes, Allan, you are still a believer.
Natacha, Honey, forget the money and and the envy. If Trump died penniless before becoming President he would still be known for the things he created. You will be dead long before his buildings become rubble.
What does that say about you? What have you done that is long lasting? Your claim to fame is that you posted on Turley’s list. That isn’t good enough Honey.
“Over all, Mr. Trump lost so much money that he was able to avoid paying income taxes for eight of the 10 years. It is not whether the I.R.S. later required changes after audits.” (from the NY Times article)
Or Trump simply manufactured the losses so as to avoid paying taxes.
If you don’t like the laws, change them. The problem is that Democrats change laws and then complain about them. They are a bunch of unhappy people.
Real estate enterprise taxation is not exactly simple stuff. Maybe you can pretend it is, if you haven’t had to try to properly report and pay your own real estate enterprise taxes.
But a lot of fools will pretend they understand it. A lot of those fools includes most lawyers and other such like “professionals” of various sorts, to say nothing of all the lesser credentialed cyberspace commentators out there.
Mr. Kurtz,
I thought it was easy, simple stuff, based on what I’ve read here from the comments of our tax law specialists who comment here. Trump either legally used the tax loss carry-foreward or he committed tax returns evasivion by doing so illegally.
Trump eitther actually incurred those loses in the early 1990s, or he inflated the amount of those losses to commit tax fraud.
So for those who here who are speculating about all of this, a satisfactory conclusion is easy to reach.
They already “know” if Trump committed tax law violations by exaggerating the tax losses, he legitimately used those losses from to the early 1990s, or he lied about the amount of the losses to cheat on his taxes.
Tom,
Sometimes mistakes on returns are just mistakes. a mistake is not evasion. it’s just a mistake. i’m not sure his returns had either mistakes or evasions. that’s a subject in itself, too. reporters are worthless at such distinctions.
he probably was fine with whatever he did. i am sure he has the best advice on such things. I feel like this is a non-story.
Mr. Kurtz,
The only way that Trump could get nailed on tax evasion is if he personally “cooked the books” or ordered others to do so.
In a lot of the applicable years mentioned here, there has been the speculation that he either actually had massive tlds or that he those losses.
Or that he ( or his accountants) lied about the amount of the losses.
It’s likely that the OSC was able to obtain and look over his tax returns.
If the OSC had found any suspicious/ criminal offenses they uncovered I those returns, it is not mentioned in the Mueller Report.
And I’ve seen nothing that indicates the Trump used tax evasion .
It seems like he aggressively used legal tax avoidance strategies, but if the feds never went after him in the 1990s, I don’t expect other agencies/ Congressional Committees making a case now.
Tom, Trump has been so frequently investigated that I significantly doubt he would intentionally commit a criminal act of tax evasion.
The idiots on the one hand say Trump (actually corporations with many investors) went bankrupt many times (not unusual in high risk business.)
On the other hand the idiots say he shouldn’t be allowed to take the losses when a business loses money.
Some of his businesses lost money and some gained money. The tax codes permit losses of money to be taken off of ones taxes for a number of years and the tax codes permit depreciation and other things as well.
Trump did exactly what the tax codes said he was supposed to do except he did it with style.
EXACTLY! this is much ado about nothing, just more pestilence
Kurtz:
You can’t equate world class losses – real or not – with normal real estate taxation. In 1990 and 1991 Trump had losses of over $250 million a year — “more than double those of the nearest taxpayers in the I.R.S. information for those years.”
Since Trump was not the richest man in America, or even close to that, showing the worst losses of anyone by a factor 2 is not explainable as SOP for real estate investors. He was either a colossal loser, a colossal tax cheat, or some combination of both.
The crimes against Trump from him being anti-Semitic (with Jewish grandchildren and an orthodox Jewish daughter) to Russia have all failed so Anon is going back to the beginning. Tax returns and business matters cheered by the NYTimes decades ago and audited by the IRS. He talks about this as if he has knowledge of big business when his big business is buying nails from ACE Hardware.
It’s non stop all because Trump won the Presidential election and Anon cannot suffer that his candidate Hillary Clinton lost the election. What we are seeing might be considered the loudest temper tantrum in the history of the world.
Trump should pass a new entitlement bill providing all the Hillary fans a free baby nipple.
Allan is not worth any discussion, but my gross this year will be about $1.5 million on projects I have bid. They are not cost plus projects and beyond subs from whom I do have quotes, I have employees who’s time I have to estimate, sometimes volatile pricing on materials like concrete, lumber, and sheet rock, projects which exist only on paper as I do custom work, not the same house done 20 times, and as always the possibility of clients – like Trump – who won’t pay when the project is done. I design – including structural details – and draw plans on some of my projects, do working drawings on others, estimate projects, oversee work in the field, deal personally with clients, architects, and interior designers, and am fully and personally responsible for every element and the scores of people who work on my projects. I have never not paid someone, declared bankruptcy, been sued, or lost money for a year in my 30+ years doing this.
I know something about risk.
“I know something about risk.”
Anon, Firstly $1.5Million is not a lot of money that makes things so complex. What I garner is that you were building a private home for $1.5 million. Whether it was a spec home or for an individual or corporation I don’t know. The expenses both in materials, human capital and government requirements account for almost all of that money which is predictable within a certain variation. The total cost is also dependent on the location of the building since transportation costs can increase prices considerably and the site itself might require considerable cost. If provided the plans and location I could probably provide you the actual cost within ten percent or so without even obtaining bids from subcontractors by using a simple free program. Getting a contractors license in many states is relatively easy and in some states even that is not needed when only building one or a couple of homes per year.
If you are reasonably competent what one is risking is a portion of the profit. If it’s a spec home or you are providing the land then there is a bit more risk especially where loans are involved. Of course I can’t go through all the possible alternatives so I only provided those things that I think most likely pertain to you.
Everyone knows something about risk. Yours is not particularly impressive.
“This Evening’s “New York Times””
…And how is the NYTimes doing?
Trump is still worth billions despite the fact that some do not understand financials or the world of business. Additionally his beautiful buildings remain standing and used. NYC is doing pretty good in part due to his activities in the city especially when the city needed investments like the one’s he made when the city was in deep financial trouble.
In the end the NYTimes is working its way to insolvency keeping itself afloat by running scurrilous stories on Trump and his administration. The NYTimes and Washington Post of today have become luridly sensationalized and are raking in the dollars maker their readership into fools.
Allan: just how do you know what Trump is “worth”? Please cite your source for this statement. I’d like to see it, and so would most other Americans. At this point what we DO know is that he lies, paid no taxes for a 10-year period during a booming economy, gambles with other people’s money, he lost a record amount during a booming economy and that no US bank will loan him any more money, so he went to Russia to borrow. He has claimed to be a self-made financial genius, which is a lie. Cohen produced 2 sets of books–one Trump used for the IRS and the second he used to boost his rating in Forbes because his ego needed it. These are facts, so when you claim that “Trump is worth billions”, do you have some reliable source for this statement? And, no, “financials” and “the world of business” really aren’t that hard to understand.
do your own internet research NATCH. this time i give it to you for free, from wiki
“the net worth of Donald Trump, the 45th President of the United States, is approximately $3.1 billion according to Forbes as of 5 March 2019, whereas Bloomberg estimated his wealth at $2.8 billion.”
old man Fred was way under that mark. give the Donald credit where its due. Oh i forgot your life is devoted to slandering him!
Kurtz, old man Fred presided over a New York real estate market that was worth far less than the current market. What’s more, there’s no way that Donald could have withstood loses for that many years with dipping into Fred’s money.
I agree with those two statements. You might have added the effects of inflation on decreasing purchasing power.
Nonetheless he has advanced his own developments and enterprises far along from where his father had them.
Trump has had some business failures. Many successful business people have had failures. He has had some huge successes too. Oh, what’s that just past the ivory wrigley building at Michigan and Wacker? A big steel and glass skyscraper with TRUMP on it which somehow can charge $500 some a night for a room when the other luxury hotels nearby sell for half as much. That seems like success to me but I’m a simple minded person.
https://www.google.com/maps/uv?hl=en&pb=!1s0x880e2caea511689f%3A0x7d92d3215f6863d5!2m22!2m2!1i80!2i80!3m1!2i20!16m16!1b1!2m2!1m1!1e1!2m2!1m1!1e3!2m2!1m1!1e5!2m2!1m1!1e4!2m2!1m1!1e6!3m1!7e115!4shttps%3A%2F%2Flh5.googleusercontent.com%2Fp%2FAF1QipOKJdqkNpcxj6lIbEsaBEkoF0pu_c7NFxlDNxt4%3Dw238-h160-k-no!5swrigley%20building%20-%20Google%20Search!15sCAQ&imagekey=!1e10!2sAF1QipOKJdqkNpcxj6lIbEsaBEkoF0pu_c7NFxlDNxt4&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiqnaS5vIziAhVGlKwKHZXnCwEQoiowD3oECA4QBg
See it on the left hand side of the image? the blue thing.
Kurtz, my parents lived in River Plaza (405 N. Wabash) for several years. They were among the first tenants there. So I have spent a lot of time at that sight on the river. Trump Tower Chicago is completely out of scale to that area. It dwarfs all those classic skyscrapers like the Wrigley and Tribune Towers. Trump Tower Chicago is a hideous eyesore!
yeah I’m not a big fan of it either. but his developments have outstripped his father’s, I think that is clear.
the worst atrocity in chicago architecture is when they landed a UFO on Soldier Field and called it an expansion. I still cant get over that.
One day I’m driving by thinking about taking Stony Island to pick up the Toll Road, and just as I was imagining Mosque Maryam, passing by Soldier Field’s UFO like bolted on bleacher superstructure, I thought:
MY HEAVENS! THIS MUST BE THE “MOTHERPLANE” NOI USED TO TALK ABOUT!
SURELY FARRAKHAN WAS GLAD IT PICK CHICAGO AS A LANDING SITE
It’s a good looking building. I think the biggest problem people have with the building is political. His The name TRUMP is very prominently shown.
it looks fine in its own right but it’s a little out of place
then again a lot of buildings in chicago seem out of place
i like helmut jahn but the Thompson center is ugly as hell
i always wonder how it all comes down. lots of bribes people tell me.
“it looks fine in its own right” “lots of bribes people tell me”
If the city wants to preserve a look it has the ability to zone it so. That apparently was not the case. One has to consider what type of major city Chigago would be if the max height of a building was 5 stories high and matched the architecture of Chicago in the early 20th century.
Bribes, in Chicago? It’s a city that has mostly been run by Democrats. Are you surprised? But, there is a difference between a legal bribe and an illegal one.
Peter, which losses are you talking about? Do you understand how these types of large businesses with high risks operate?
Uh, Mr. Kurtz: you DO know, don’t you, that Trump faked up books to get his Forbes rating. Michael Cohen not only testified to this, he produced 2 sets of books. The books produced to Forbes had fake income numbers that varied significantly from the books produced to the IRS. Another question: if Trump is “worth” billions, why was he trying to borrow money from Russian oligarchs?
You also know, don’t you, that Wikipedia is not considered a reliable source because it is subject to editing by readers.
NATCH
a) everybody uses wiki, i just am the only one to admit it
b) your oligarchs question is what we call a “false premise” question so i dont answer
c) you are not an auditor of his books so quit acting like you know based on whatever crap the media’s reporting today. maybe he pumped it up to serve his ego but if you think there’s not a lot of value there, maybe you need glasses
everybody uses wiki, i just am the only one to admit it
True. It is a lazy man’s handy resource but then again, I am not writing a clinical study following AMA formatting to publish in New England Journal of Medicine, so just wing it. This is all for fun anyways. Who cares!?
you are not an author
I picture the left wing paid trolls on this forum, sitting in front of computers in shifts, scouring the internet to wage their online mythical wars and then I reflect….these are really sick people who represent evolving data in America of very lonely sick people
https://www.realclearpolicy.com/articles/2019/05/06/death_by_loneliness_111185.html
Death By Loneliness
“In an era dominated by technological connection and abounding online “friends,” the dearth of flesh-and-blood relationships has become devastating. Since the mid-1980’s, the average number of friends with whom Americans say they could “discuss important matters” has dropped from three to just one….In our current moment, we do not stand for embodied ideals and interdependence, but isolation, anger, and despair”
Natacha may be one of the more reliable sources to tell us what Trump’s “true net worth” is. 😉🙄
I might add WIKI is group-sourced editing. Readers add and correct information. Teams of volunteers do some modest fact checking. It has as much bias as the Crowd brings to it. Which is usually slightly left leaning stuff. But most of it is very solid information.
It’s actually a great starting point and the notes can help reveal deeper information on the content.
Only schoolmarms dislike this incredibly useful resource. In reality everybody who is pressed for time and needs information has made it into one of the best go to websites of the internet.
“Allan: just how do you know what Trump is “worth”? ”
Natacha, Honey, my sources have some exclusivity. That keeps the bottom feeders away. I’ve already explained how your envy is your driving force and that what he has done in his lifetime has exceeded anything you have done by a thousand fold or more.
You care too much about what is in another’s back pocket. Not unusual for people of your persuasion.
Allan: Trump sold himself as a Washington insider, to feed into voters’ disgust over Washington politics, and as a very successful, wealthy entrepreneur who could run this country better than anyone because he had done such a good job creating wealth on his own with a mere $1million gift from his father. People believed the latter, which was all smoke and mirrors.
Truth is, he was financially dependent on his father well into his forties. Truth is, he squandered money mostly borrowed from others who also believed the hype about his being a visionary entrepreneur, and he even called his risky ventures with other people’s money a “sport”. Truth is, he is no visionary, but merely a narcissistic egomaniac whose main asset is selling himself. Truth is, his businesses have failed many times. Truth is, he cheats on his taxes and cooks the books to boost his rating with Forbes.
To the extent any American voted for him because they believed the hype about his being a successful financial visionary, they were duped. Because of the hundreds of contacts between Trump, his family and his campaign with Russian oligarchs, Russian meddling to help Trump “win the victory”, his need to borrow money and lying about all of this, the American people have a right to information about his finances, including his tax returns. Because the midterm elections were couched as a referendum on Trump, Congress has been given a mandate to conduct their oversight responsibilities as provided by Article II of the Constitution. There is no jealousy here. We are just trying to get to the truth.
Natacha, Honey, I will vote for Trump again because he has done well for this nation. I don’t care about his personal life or wealth. I wouldn’t vote for Obama because he failed this nation.
Tell me what is bad about a GDP of 3.2 or unemployment that is low. Deal with facts not your personal envy, Honey.
It’s just the same story the Times released in October before the election, but with more accurate numbers this time (less $$ lost by Trump than the first time they reported this.) Must be a slow news cycle.
Here is what they said about the situation back in 1995:
THE COMEBACK KING
Though there are still four years to go in the 90’s, business and government leaders in New York honored Donald J. Trump yesterday for pulling off what they called “the comeback of the decade.”
Mr. Trump, the developer who came to epitomize opulent wealth during the 80’s before tumbling into deep financial trouble, has managed to erase much of his debt and is moving ahead with major projects at a time other developers are idling.
Judging from the attention showered on him yesterday at the Union League Club, some of New York’s civic and business leaders are quite captivated by Mr. Trump, despite the financial uncertainties that still surround some of his properties.
But the operative word at the luncheon was comeback, though Mr. Trump might dispute that he ever went far away. William D. Fugazy, the limousine magnate and chairman of the Forum Club, the group of business and civic leaders that sponsored the luncheon, presented Mr. Trump with a boomerang encased in glass. “You throw it and it always comes back,” he said as he handed it over.
In a flattering speech, Lieut. Gov. Betsy McCaughey called Mr. Trump “the comeback kid.” Charles A. Gargano, who as chairman of the Empire State Development Corporation is himself considered one of the new powers of the state, joked about a Perot-Trump presidential ticket. “He would be the most loved Vice President since Spiro T. Agnew,” he said. Mr. Gargano, who heads the state’s economic development efforts, added, “Thank you for your tax dollars.”
After the collapse of the real estate market of the 1980’s, Mr. Trump’s company was left holding some $8.8 billion in debt, causing his personal net worth to drop to a low of about $1 billion in the red by 1991.
But since then, his fortunes have changed. He continues to pursue the trademark trophy-style projects he is known for, such as a hotel and condominium project on the southwest corner of Central Park that is expected to open by late 1996.
Indeed, about an hour before the luncheon, Mr. Trump and representatives from a Hong Kong development firm huddled over drawings and models for their planned Riverside South development, a 17-building project at the site of the old Pennsylvania Railroad yard on the West Side.
—NYC loved Trump for believing in them back when the city looked like it did in “The Warriors.”
Yell from the hump in times of plenty..
Vote for Trump in Two Thousand twenty.
“There is now a huge group of voters committed to voting against him.“
I’d vote for warm excrement in a shoe over the founder of Trump University.
Also, what was the state of the economy when Obama took over versus the time when Orange Swamp-Thing took over? Just curious.
When Obama took over, the U.S. recession was about to end.
TARP had stemmed the cascade of major financial institutions by late 2016. Pre-TARP, they’d been toppling like dominoes.
A president like Hoover might have the misfortune of coming into office at the peak of a speculative mania that will bring the U.S. economy crashing down within several months.
To a largely unfair degree, Hoover got the blame when the speculative bubble inevitably burst shortly after he took office.
A president who enters office shortly before things turn around is in a better position to benefit politically than one who takes office as things are about to crash.
Idiot
“Obama clean energy loans leave taxpayers in $2.2 billion hole”
Nearly $1 billion in loans have already defaulted under the Energy Department program, which included the infamous Solyndra stimulus project and dozens of other green technology programs the Obama administration has approved, totaling nearly about $30 billion in taxpayer backing, the Government Accountability Office reported in its audit. (Associated Press)
Nearly $1 billion in loans have already defaulted under the Energy Department program, which included the infamous Solyndra stimulus project and dozens of other green technology programs the Obama administration has approved, totaling nearly about $30 billion in taxpayer backing, …
Taxpayers are on the hook for more than $2.2 billion in expected costs from the federal government’s energy loan guarantee programs, according to a new audit Monday that suggests the controversial projects may not pay for themselves, as officials had promised.
By Stephen Dinan – The Washington Times – Monday, April 27, 2015
For the record, production levels stabilized in May 2009. This isn’t attributable to any policy measures adopted by the administration, because all the policies to address the financial crisis were in place when he was inaugurated. The two things added were the auto industry bailout (which was gratuitous) and the Porkulus, of which no direct effects could have been felt by May 2009.
“For the record, production levels stabilized in May 2009.”
In other words, the market was already correcting itself before Obama entered the picture. From then on Obama policies did more to hurt the economy than they did to help. That is why the turn around was so slow and anemic.
But the fact is that Mueller and Congress have a symbiotic relationship. For two years, Mueller was acting as, in effect, the lead counsel for an impeachment inquiry — bizarrely housed within the executive branch — while Congress wants to use his moral authority as a crutch at a time when it is vulnerable to charges of partisan overreaching.
This, too, is not supposed to be how the system works. But we are long beyond anyone caring. For a swath of the political world and much of the media, all that matters is that Mueller “not exonerate” Trump, and the more, the better, in whatever format or forum.
https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/05/robert-mueller-report-obstruction-decision/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=NR%20Daily%20Monday%20through%20Friday%202019-05-07&utm_term=NRDaily-Smart
There are no authentic American patriots who believe that Congress “is vulnerable to charges of partisan overreaching.” A dozen “MORE BENGHAZI!!” hearings–which revealed no criminal offenses–has set a very low bar for the exercise of Congress constitutionally-mandated role of Executive Branch oversight.
this is to “but that’s not what I heard on infowars” ollie
enjoy alex jones here since the leftist billionaire “zuckerman” and company have banned him
https://www.infowars.com/
🤯”KHAAAAAAAAAAAAAANNN!!!” – James T. Kirk
.
🤯”TRUUUUUUUUUUMMMPPP!!!” – The Democrats
“Fine Corinthian Leather”–Whitewash Barr
Its amazing her audience doesn’t throw her to the curb
😉
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Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Kamala Harris called President Trump a liar, accused him of “feeding hate” and pushed the urgent need for new leadership during a speech before thousands of people in Detroit.
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/kamala-harris-trump-feeding-hate
The Left cant handle the truth, loathe the facts and are a humorless anti-free speech mob
Why do the Left fear opposing views?
What is there to hide?
——
Twitter permanently suspends AOC parody account for being misleading
Twitter banned the account @AOCPress, labeled as a “parody,” on Monday, apparently because it sounded too much like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., while mocking her.
The social media giant also suspended the account’s creator, Michael Morrison. It said that while users could create parody accounts, they couldn’t use “misleading account information in order to engage in spamming, abusive, or disruptive behavior including attempts to manipulate the conversations on Twitter.”
“You also may not ‘post duplicative or substantially similar content, replies, or mentions over multiple accounts or multiple duplicate updates on one account, or create duplicate or substantially similar accounts.’ This account will not be reinstated,” an email from the company read.
Morrison told Human Events he believed Twitter banned the account because it had grown so much over a short period of time. “In the past month and a half alone, the account grew by roughly 50,000 followers. We’ve had tweets with over 30,000 likes on them, so I think Twitter decided it was time for [the account] to go,” he said
“They didn’t like how popular an account created by their political opposition had become.”
On Twitter, many, including the president’s son, blasted the decision to ban his account.
“What’s the deal here @jack? Because it sure looks like political bias,” Donald Trump Jr. said.
Others mocked the freshman congresswoman, who has become a magnet for criticism after making certain statements and proposing government policies.
The ban came as many decried censorship on social media platforms like Facebook, which announced on Thursday that it had banned controversial activists — Milo Yiannopoulos, Louis Farrakhan, Laura Loomer, Alex Jones, and Paul Joseph Watson — for apparently promoting or engaging in violence or hate.
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/twitter-permanently-suspends-aoc-parody-account-for-being-misleading
Democrats have some kind of freaky lock on Silicon Valley. The new public forums are technically privately owned territory, which they appear to have cornered, and thus suddenly the Democrats are the party of a new form of censorship tailor made for them to win. Shocked, Shocked i say.
and they whine about a few facebook ads bought by some Russian meddlers, as the Dem honchos have just reaped an advantage that is probably worth hundreds of millions.
Why is it Russians buying a paltry amount of FB ads is a big deal, but the Dems locking down millions of Americans free speech is not?
There is an old saying,
If not by ballots, then by b_________s.