US President Donald J. Trump turning from the cameras with arms outstretched to raise his eyes to the sky at the moment he said "I am the Chosen One", C-Span YouTube account, 21 August 2019.
See: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lzlxrPC_E_U |
Showing posts with label Donald Trump. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Donald Trump. Show all posts
Saturday 24 August 2019
U.S. Politics 2019
Labels:
Donald Trump,
US politics
Saturday 27 July 2019
Tweets of the Week
In 2018, the Democratic National Committee filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, against the Russian Federation et al. Donald Trump Jr is one of the defendants. There is a court hearing today - Trump Snr trying shut lawsuit down #USPolitics pic.twitter.com/hT2ioGEhPS— no_filter_Yamba (@no_filter_Yamba) July 19, 2019
Good morning @ScottMorrisonMP— 💧🌏🏳️🌈Jenny Frecklington-Jones; #NotMyPM (@Triplejay58) July 20, 2019
While you're off to Hillsong to clap your hands & speak in tongues, just wanted to let you know that my 90yo Mum who was once a milliner is busy today making this for you in Blue.
Let me know if you'd prefer black text.
& you're welcome. #auspol pic.twitter.com/hG4MVQJ5H7
exciting to see major media have worked out that #RaiseTheRate would be an actual stimulus measure. Looks like we’re just waiting on how government can work it into their economic narrative and it might just happen. Priorities. #Insiders— Ingrid M (@iMusing) July 20, 2019
Labels:
court,
Donald Trump,
law,
Scott Morrison,
US politics
Sunday 16 June 2019
USA 2019: The Fool On the Hill
There are really only two rational responses to the actions of US President Donald Trump - spontaneous loud laughter or appalled silence.
This time it was the laughter......
The
Guardian, 12
June 2019:
Mexico’s foreign
minister, Marcelo Ebrard, said Mexico also agreed to a 45-day timeline to show
increased enforcement efforts were effective in reducing the people flows. If
that fails, Mexico has agreed to consider a longstanding US demand that Central
American asylum seekers crossing through Mexico apply for refuge there, not the
United States, making Mexico a “safe third country”, a demand that Mexico has
long rejected.
“Safe third country
could be applied if we fail, and we accept what they say,” Ebrard said on
Tuesday evening, noting that Mexican legislators would then give consideration to
accommodating a change in migration law.
Nevertheless, Ebrard
said other Latin American countries should share the burden, something that the
United States appeared to have agreed to.
The document that Trump
waved at reporters laid out “a regional approach to burden-sharing in relation
to the processing of refugee status claims to migrants”; talked of “45 days”;
and said Mexico had committed to immediately examine its laws and rules to
enable it to implement such an agreement.
Snapshot of the piece of paper Trump was waving about.......
CBS, The Late Show |
Labels:
Donald Trump,
US politics,
USA-Mexico relations
Thursday 13 June 2019
The one about the Australian entitled private school twit & political dunce, with a penchant for fishnet and leopard skin, who did the United States of America the favour of the century
ABC
News, 24 May
2019:
One rainy night in May
2016, a Trump campaign advisor named George Papadopoulos walked into a posh
wine bar in affluent West London.
The meeting at the Kensington Wine Rooms was
only meant to be a drink with Australia's High Commissioner to the UK,
Alexander Downer.
However, the Mueller Report indicates at a number of points that this is the case.
U.S. Dept. of Justice, Report On
The Investigation Into Russian Interference In The 2016 Presidential Election,
Volume
I of ll, Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller, III, March 2019, extracts:
In late July 2016, soon after WikiLeaks's first release of stolen documents, a foreign government contacted the FBI about a May 2016 encounter with Trump Campaign foreign policy advisor George Papadopoulos. Papadopoulos had suggested to a representative of that foreign government that the Trump Campaign had received indications from the Russian government that it could assist the Campaign through the anonymous release of information damaging to Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. That information prompted the FBI on July 31, 2016, to open an investigation into whether individuals associated with the Trump Campaign were coordinating with the Russian government in its interference activities……
July 2016 was also the
month WikiLeaks first released emails stolen by the GRU from the DNC. On July
22, 2016, WikiLeaks posted thousands of internal DNC documents revealing information
about the Clinton Campaign. Within days, there was public reporting that U.S. intelligence
agencies had "high confidence" that the Russian government was behind
the theft of emails and documents from the DNC. And within a week of the
release, a foreign government informed the FBI about its May 2016 interaction with
Papadopoulos and his statement that the Russian government could assist the
Trump Campaign. On July 31, 2016, based on the foreign government repo11ing, the
FBI opened an investigation into potential coordination between the Russian
government and individuals associated with the Trump Campaign…..
In late April 2016,
Papadopoulos was told by London-based professor Joseph Mifsud, immediately
after Mifsud's return from a trip to Moscow, that the Russian government had
obtained "dirt" on candidate Clinton in the form of thousands of
emails. One week later, on May 6, 2016, Papadopoulos suggested to a
representative of a foreign government that the Trump Campaign had received
indications from the Russian government that it could assist the Campaign through
the anonymous release of information that would be damaging to candidate Clinton…..
Further
reading
Labels:
Australia-US relations,
Donald Trump,
US politics
Tuesday 4 June 2019
US Court Blocks Trump's Border Wall As Court Case Proceeds
It would appear that two years and four months after Donald Trump was sworn in as President of the United States of America a healthy resistance against his heavy-handed autocratic tendencies is still alive and well........
“The position
that when Congress declines the Executive’s request to appropriate funds, the
Executive nonetheless may simply find a way to spend those funds “without
Congress” does not square with fundamental separation of powers principles
dating back to the earliest days of our Republic." [Judge
Haywood S. Gilliam, US District Court Northern District of California, Sierra Club et al v Donald J. Trump et al, 24
May2019]
American
Civil Liberties Union (ACLU),
25 May 2019:
From the beginning of
his campaign for president, Donald Trump claimed that he was going to build a
wall along the southern border. He said “nobody
builds walls better than me.” He said the wall would be “big”
and “beautiful.” He said someone
elsewould pay for it. And he said it would be built so fast that “your head would
spin.”
Last night, for the first time, a federal judge made clear to President Trump he couldn’t get his wall by illegally diverting taxpayer money.
The judge’s ruling comes in an ACLU lawsuit on behalf of the Sierra Club and the Southern Border Communities Coalition (SBCC). Together, the Sierra Club and SBCC represent the communities who live in, protect, and treasure the lands and communities along our southern border. For years, these communities have engaged in the democratic process and successfully persuaded their congressional representatives to deny President Trump funding to build his wall.
Our lawsuit centers on the question of whether the president abused his power to divert funds for a border wall Congress denied him. Unfortunately for President Trump, the Constitution is clear on the matter: only Congress has the power to decide how taxpayer funds are spent. And Congress, like border communities, said no to the President’s wall.
Congress didn’t bow to Trump’s pressure even after he caused the longest government shutdown in U.S. history over his demands for billions of dollars for his wall. Congress allocated only a fraction of the money that Trump demanded, and imposed restrictions on where and how quickly any border barriers could be built.
In a blatant abuse of power meant to circumvent Congress, President Trump declared a national emergency on February 15, 2019, and announced he would illegally divert $6.7 billion from military construction and other accounts for the border wall project.
From the beginning, the emergency was obviously a sham. Trump said as much himself when he declared the emergency, saying he “didn’t need to do this” but he’d prefer to build the wall “much faster.” He added that he declared a national emergency because he was “not happy” that Congress “skimped” on the wall by denying him the billions he demanded.
Despite this, the Trump administration tried to argue in court last Friday that Congress never actually “denied” President Trump the billions of dollars he is now trying to take from the military. The court rejected the administration’s argument, reminding the administration that “the reality is that Congress was presented with—and declined to grant—a $5.7 billion request for border barrier construction.”
The court’s ruling blocks the sections of wall that the Trump administration announced would be built with military pay and pension funds. It also invites us to ask the court to block additional projects as they are announced in the future. The judge emphasized the government’s commitment to inform the court immediately about future decisions to build.
It may be easy to ridicule President Trump’s desperation for a border wall — an absurd and xenophobic campaign promise for which he has only himself to blame. But as pointless and wasteful as it may be, Trump’s campaign promise now threatens to cause irreparable and real damage to our constitutional checks and balances, the rule of law, border communities, and the environment.
The wall is part of an exclusionary agenda that President Trump has targeted, over and over, at people of color. From his notorious Muslim Ban, to his efforts to eliminate protections for immigrants from Haiti, Sudan, Nicaragua, and El Salvador, courts have found“evidence that President Trump harbors an animus against non-white, non-European” immigrants. Trump has repeatedly justified his wall by lying about border communities, falsely claiming that America needs a wall.
Border communities know firsthand that walls are dangerous and wasteful. They divide neighborhoods, worsen dangerous flooding, destroy lands and wildlife, and waste resources. As our clients explained to the court, “we are a community that is safe, that supports migrants, that works well together and supports one another, that is worthy of existence.” What border communities truly need is infrastructure and investment, not militarization and isolation.
The court’s order is a vindication of border communities’ advocacy for themselves, and of our Constitution’s separation of powers. As the court wrote, “Congress’s ‘absolute’ control over federal expenditures—even when that control may frustrate the desires of the Executive Branch regarding initiatives it views as important—is not a bug in our constitutional system. It is a feature of that system, and an essential one.”
Labels:
ACLU,
Donald Trump,
law,
people power,
US politics
Sunday 2 June 2019
US President Donald J Trump finally admits in writing that Russia helped get him elected in 2016
Labels:
corruption,
Donald Trump,
US politics,
US-Russia relations
Saturday 25 May 2019
Quotes of the Week
“Donald Trump has
traits of a dictator and after he managed to get out of the Mueller
investigation, he turned on the heat and is becoming more and more dismissive
of the basic measures of democracy such as free press and the rule of law. I
cannot really believe that I am writing these words in reference to America, as
from where I came from, America seemed to be the only place where free press
and the rule of law mattered. Donald Trump is attacking the blood vessels of
democracy and it’s really hard to watch what he is doing to this country…” [Journalist
Ksenija Pavlovic, The Pavlovic Today,
23 May 2019]
“I have always believed in miracles! I'm standing with the three biggest
miracles in my life here tonight - and tonight we've been delivered
another one…..God bless Australia!” [Prime Minister &
Liberal MP for Cook Scott ‘Liar From The Shire’ Morrison in
his victory speech after
his government won re-election, 18 May 2019]
Labels:
Donald Trump,
Scott Morrison
Monday 15 April 2019
American Politics: Opening lines to remember
From "Everything Trump Touches Dies: A Republican Strategist Gets Real About The Worst President Ever" by Rick Wilson, published in 2018.
Labels:
books,
Donald Trump,
US politics
Monday 21 January 2019
USA 2019: crazy continues to be order of the day (Part Three)
A look at the US politician so many Australian Liberal and Nationals MPs and senators admire and seek to emulate....
Daily
Kos, 12
January 2019:
Most of Donald
Trump's $35 million in real estate deals in 2018 came with a huge political footnote
attached to them. A Forbes analysis found the largest deal, yielding
$20 million to Trump, came from the sale of a $900 million
federally subsidized housing complex in Brooklyn in which the
Trump Organization had a 4 percent stake.
The Department of Housing &
Urban Development had to approve the sale. In other words, the Trump
Organization, which is still owned by Trump, needed permission from HUD, which
reports to Trump as pr*sident, to turn a profit through a Brooklyn real
estate deal. And guess what: HUD greenlit the deal.
Trump also took
in another $5.5 million from 36 units sold in a 64-story Las Vegas
tower. The catch? About a third of those units were bought by buyers hiding
behind limited liability companies so they wouldn't have to disclose their
identities. In 2017, USA Today reported that during the two
years before Trump became the GOP nominee, only 4 percent of Trump’s building
units were acquired by LLCs. So now that Trump's pr*sident, anonymous
people are lining his pockets with real estate purchases cloaked through LLCs.
Remember when Trump made
a big show of stacking up all the paperwork he was signing in order to supposedly clear up his conflicts of
interest and forfeit management of his businesses? Yeah, he's still
getting that money.
Labels:
conflict of interest,
corruption,
Donald Trump,
ethics
Thursday 17 January 2019
Donald Trump and his Antipodean shadow
US President Donald J Trump (left) & sycophantic Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrision (right) |
Labels:
Donald Trump,
Scott Morrison
Tuesday 15 January 2019
USA 2019: crazy continues to be the order of the day (Part Two)
On 8 January
2019 the current President of the World Bank Group Jim Yong Kim announced he would be
stepping down on 1 February this year.
US President Donald Trump appears to be considering
his daughter for appointment as the new bank president.
A position which has an after tax salary package of est. US$878,391 plus per year. The package
contains a supplemental allowance of $89,600 to cover expenses. As a U.S.
citizen, the president receives a tax allowance to cover the estimated taxes on salary and benefits. In addition to a pension, the president receives a supplemental retirement benefit
equal to 5 percent of annual salary.
Financial
Review, 16
January 2018:
Ivanka Trump is on a
list of potential successors to Jim Yong Kim, who unexpectedly quit this past
week as president of the World Bank, the Financial Times reported.
Other people being
considered for the role include David Malpass, a current top US Treasury
official on international affairs, Nikki Haley, the former US ambassador to the
UN and Mark Green, head of the US Agency for International Development, the FT
reported.
Mr Kim is stepping down
after six years at the helm of the Washington-based bank.
He was nominated for both a first and second term by President Barack Obama. He is leaving to take a job at investment firm Global Infrastructure Partners.
He was nominated for both a first and second term by President Barack Obama. He is leaving to take a job at investment firm Global Infrastructure Partners.
Kristalina Georgieva,
who has been chief executive at the bank since 2017, will serve as interim
president until a successor for Mr Kim is named.
President Donald Trump however, will wield strong influence in
choosing Mr Kim's successor, according to Reuters, as the US holds a
controlling share of the World Bank's voting rights. The bank president has
traditionally been an American chosen by the US administration……
Ivanka Trump is an
advisor to her father on job creation and economic empowerment, workforce
development and entrepreneurship. She's married to Jared Kushner, also an
advisor to President Donald Trump.
Ivanka Trump
is seriously being considered for the position of president of a bank which awards major
contracts around the world worth billions of dollars annually?
The same
Ivanka Trump with this background…..
In 2018 the
State Of New York sued the Donald J.
Trump Foundation and its directors -- including Trump, his sons Eric and
Donald Jr. and his daughter Ivanka – for allegedly violating
federal and state charities law with a "persistent" pattern of
conduct that included unlawful coordination with the 2016 Trump presidential
campaign. At times during the presidential race, the lawsuit alleges, for
example, Trump campaign staffers were permitted to direct the charity's
expenditures, and in certain cases those expenditures appeared to benefit
groups that were politically valuable to the then-candidate.
In December
2018 it was announced that the Trump Foundation would be dissolved under supervision of the Manhattan Supreme Court and its remaining funds would
be dispersed among reputable charities. The court case continues.
At the end of
2018 it was reported that Ivanka
Trump and her husband Jarrod Kushner were being sued by a private citizen for allegedly omitting certain of their financial assets in declarations made in official public financial
disclosure documents. Both Ivanka and Kushner have previously been fined for
late filings of these documents.
In 2017
Ivanka Trump’s fashion
brand was accused of using ‘slave’ labour to produce clothing items and
accessories for sale in the USA, paying some workers as little as US$1 an
hour. By
mid-2018 Ivanka Trump announced she was closing down her failing business,
By
December 2017 it was being reported by GQ
magazine that: Thanks to an overlooked filing made in federal court this past summer,
we can now add a jewelry business to the list of Trump family enterprises that
allegedly served as vehicles to fraudulently hide the assets of ultra-rich
foreigners with checkered backgrounds. In late June, the Commercial Bank of
Dubai sought—and later received—permission to subpoena Ivanka Trump’s now-defunct
fine jewelry line, claiming its diamonds were used in a massive scheme to hide
roughly $100 million that was owed to the bank, according to filings at the
U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.
Labels:
Donald Trump,
nepotism,
World Bank
Saturday 12 January 2019
Quote of the Week
"So therein
lies what’s like your classic Catch-22 situation where we’re at a -- it puts us
in such a tough spot. If Sessions won’t un-recuse and Mueller won’t clear the
president, we’re the only ones, which is really the danger. That’s why I keep --
and thank you for saying it by the way -- I mean, we have to keep all these
seats. We have to keep the majority. If we do not keep the majority, all of
this goes away." [Republican Rep. Devin Nunes of California on the need for the Republican Party to
protect Donald Trump from the DOJ-FBI Russia investigation, quoted in The Intellectualist, 9
August 2018]
Labels:
Donald Trump,
US politics
Sunday 6 January 2019
USA 2019: crazy continues to be the order of the day
SPIN, 2 January 2019:
CREDIT: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images |
President Trump delivered
a harsh post-holiday awakening at his first cabinet meeting of 2019,
holding forth for a nearly two-hour freestyle press conference in the
presence of reporters.
In what amounted to
a barely coherent filibuster, Trump dragged his former secretary of defense, chalked recent
stock market turbulence up to a
“glitch,”gave a
shoutout to Kanye West, and mused that he might have made a good general himself. Most of the
time, he sounded like a guy at a bus station arguing with
pigeons. Behind him, ex-Fox News exec turned head of the White House press shop Bill
Shine shifted uncomfortably in his chair.
In spite of his best
efforts, Trump was nearly upstaged by a parody poster of
himself as a Game of Thrones character with the
text “Sanctions are coming.” The president initially shared the
parody image on his Twitter feed in November, apparently signaling
his intention to impose sanctions on Iran. On Wednesday afternoon, an
actual, physical, movie-theater-sized version of the poster was laid out on the
table in front of the president facing the press pool.
When the image first
appeared in November, HBO issued a statement that they would “prefer our
trademark not be misappropriated for political purposes.” An HBO rep told
Spin the network has no additional comment.
Trump didn’t address why
the poster was so prominently positioned, but he did extol the virtues of a
Southern border wall while posing with appropriated imagery from a dragon soap
opera that vehemently undermines that premise. “Walls work,” he told
reporters. Trump is currently holding out for wall funding amid an ongoing
government shutdown, leaving some 800,000 federal employees currently without pay.
TRUMP: "I had a meeting at the Pentagon with lots of generals. They were like from a movie. Better looking than Tom Cruise, & stronger. And I had more generals than I've ever seen, & we were at the bottom of this incredible room. I said, 'this is greatest room I've ever seen.'" pic.twitter.com/fTpgDXVso8— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) January 2, 2019
Labels:
Donald Trump,
US politics,
USA
Monday 24 December 2018
A letter foreshadowing a politically unstable world in 2019
In the early hours of 20 December an increasingly unstable US President Donald J. Trump without consulting his own government tweeted; We have defeated ISIS in
Syria, my only reason for being there during the Trump Presidency.
He followed that some some nine hours later with a series of tweets as a surprised world began to react.
Getting out of Syria was
no surprise. I’ve been campaigning on it for years, and six months ago, when I
very publicly wanted to do it, I agreed to stay longer. Russia, Iran, Syria
& others are the local enemy of ISIS. We were doing there work. Time to
come home & rebuild. #MAGA
Does the
USA want to be the Policeman of the Middle East, getting NOTHING but spending
precious lives and trillions of dollars protecting others who, in almost all
cases, do not appreciate what we are doing? Do we want to be there forever?
Time for others to finally fight.....
....Russia, Iran, Syria & many
others are not happy about the U.S. leaving, despite what the Fake News says,
because now they will have to fight ISIS and others, who they hate, without us.
I am building by far the most powerful military in the world. ISIS hits us they
are doomed!
Trump's own Secretary of Defense, former General commanding United States General Command James Norman Mattis, resigned within hours.......
Secretary of Defence
1000 Defense Pentagon
Washington, DC
20301.1000
December 20 2018
Dear Mr. President:
I have been privileged
to serve as our country's 26th Secretary of Defense which has allowed me to
serve alongside our men and women of the Department in defense of our citizens
and our ideals.
I am proud of the
progress that has been made over the past two years on some of the key goals
articulated in our National Defense Strategy: putting the Department on a more
sound budgetary footing, improving readiness and lethality in our forces, and
reforming the Department's business practices for greater performance. Our
troops continue to provide the capabilities needed to prevail in conflict and
sustain strong U.S. global influence.
One core belief I have
always held is that our strength as a nation is inextricably linked to the
strength of our unique and comprehensive system of alliances and partnerships.
While the US remains the indispensable nation in the free world, we cannot
protect our interests or serve that role effectively without maintaining strong
alliances and showing respect to those allies. Like you, I have said from the
beginning that the armed forces of the United States should not be the
policeman of the world. Instead, we must use all tools of American power to
provide for the common defense, including providing effective leadership to our
alliances. NATO's 29 democracies demonstrated that strength in their commitment
to fighting alongside us following the 9-11 attack on America. The Defeat-ISIS
coalition of 74 nations is further proof.
Similarly, I believe we
must be resolute and unambiguous in our approach to those countries whose
strategic interests are increasingly in tension with ours. It is clear that
China and Russia, for example, want to shape a world consistent with their
authoritarian model - gaining veto authority over other nations' economic,
diplomatic, and security decisions - to promote their own interests at the
expense of their neighbors, America and our allies. That is why we must use all
the tools of American power to provide for the common defense.
My views on treating
allies with respect and also being clear-eyed about both malign actors and
strategic competitors are strongly held and informed by over four decades of
immersion in these issues. We must do everything possible to advance an
international order that is most conducive to our security, prosperity and
values, and we are strengthened in this effort by the solidarity of our alliances.
Because you have the
right to have a Secretary of Defense whose views are better aligned with yours
on these and other subjects, I believe it is right for me to step down from my
position. The end date for my tenure is February 28, 2019, a date that should
allow sufficient time for a successor to be nominated and confirmed as well as
to make sure the Department's interests are properly articulated and protected
at upcoming events to include Congressional posture hearings and the NATO
Defense Ministerial meeting in February. Further, that a full transition to a
new Secretary of Defense occurs well in advance of the transition of Chairman
of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in September in order to ensure stability Within
the Department.
I pledge my full effort
to a smooth transition that ensures the needs and interests of the 2.15 million
Service Members and 732,079 DoD civilians receive undistracted attention of the
Department at all times so that they can fulfill their critical, round-the-clock
mission to protect the American people.
I very much appreciate
this opportunity to serve the nation and our men and women in uniform.
James N. Mattis
Two days later
it was reported that Special Presidential Envoy for the Global Coalition to
Counter ISIL Brett H. McGurk had
also resigned in protest.
Labels:
Donald Trump,
international affairs,
US politics,
war
Sunday 23 December 2018
US President Donald Trump ends 2018 as he began it....
Still under investgation by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation, still misusing family 'charities', still tweeting his venom and spite and still on a semi-permanent golfing holiday while his administration falls into chaos.
HuffPost, 18 December 2018:
WASHINGTON ―
President Donald Trump, clad in a golf shirt and golf hat under a warm
South Florida sun, hitting a drive off the tee while Secret Service agents
protecting him are forced to work without paychecks, possibly for weeks,
because Congress wouldn’t pay for Trump’s “Great Wall.”
Such is the nightmare
public relations scenario facing the White House less than a week before the
Department of Homeland Security and other key government agencies run out of
money at midnight Friday while Trump is scheduled to fly that day to his
Mar-a-Lago resort for a 16-day vacation.
The U.S. Secret Service
is among the half-dozen agencies in the quarter-million-employee DHS, which also
includes the U.S. Coast Guard and the Transportation Security Administration.
Other major agencies facing a shutdown include the departments of state,
treasury and interior. Many of the affected employees would be deemed essential
and be forced to work anyway. None would be paid during the shutdown and would
have to get by on savings or short-term loans.
Rick Tyler, a former
aide to the man who engineered the last extended government shutdown in 2013,
Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz, said that Trump will cave in the days to
come.
“The only leverage in
shutting down the government is who gets the blame for it. And he’s already
taken the blame for it,” Tyler said, predicting that Trump will approve
whatever Congress gives him.......
Labels:
Donald Trump,
US politics
Monday 10 December 2018
US President Donald Trump aka "Individual-1" named in relation to presidential election campaign violations & contact with Russian President's office
On 29 November 2018 attorney Michael Cohen plead guilty to charges of tax evasion, making false statements to financial institutions, lying to the US Congress and facilitating illegal campaign contributions totalling US$255,000 in the 2016 US presidential campaign.
His plea agreement can be found here.
US President Donald J. Trump is identified in the US Government's Sentencing Memorandums, the first of which recommenfs that Cohen be gaoled for up to three and a half years.
UNITED STATES DISTRICT
COURT SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
-v.- MICHAEL COHEN: 18 Cr. 602 (WHP)
THE
GOVERNMENT’S SENTENCING MEMORANDUM, filed 7 December 2018, excerpts:
1.
Background
Cohen
is a licensed attorney and has been since 1992. (PSR ¶ 149.) Until 2007, Cohen
practiced as an attorney for multiple law firms, working on, among other
things, negligence and malpractice cases. (PSR ¶¶ 156-157.) For that work,
Cohen earned approximately $75,000 per year. (Id.) In 2007, Cohen seized on an
opportunity. The board of directors of a condominium building in which Cohen
lived was attempting to remove from the building the name of the owner
(“Individual-1”) of a Manhattan-based real estate company (the “Company”). (PSR
¶ 155.) Cohen intervened, secured the backing of the residents of the building,
and was able to remove the entire board of directors, thereby fixing the
problem for Individual-1. (Id.) Not long after, Cohen was hired by the Company
to the position of “Executive Vice President” and “Special Counsel” to
Individual-1. (Id.) He earned approximately $500,000 per year in that position.
(Id.)
In
January 2017, Cohen formally left the Company and began holding himself out as
the “personal attorney” to Individual-1, who at that point had become the
President of the United States…..
4.
Cohen’s Illegal Campaign Contributions
On
approximately June 16, 2015, Individual-1, for whom Cohen worked at the time,
began an ultimately successful campaign for President of the United States.
Cohen had no formal title with the campaign, but had a campaign email address,
and, at various times advised the campaign, including on matters of interest to
the press. Cohen also made media appearances as a surrogate and supporter of
Individual-1. (PSR ¶ 39).
During the campaign, Cohen played a central role in
two similar schemes to purchase the rights to stories – each from women who
claimed to have had an affair with Individual-1 – so as to suppress the stories
and thereby prevent them from influencing the election. With respect to both
payments, Cohen acted with the intent to influence the 2016 presidential
election. Cohen coordinated his actions with one or more members of the
campaign, including through meetings and phone calls, about the fact, nature,
and timing of the payments. (PSR ¶ 51). In particular, and as Cohen himself has
now admitted, with respect to both payments, he acted in coordination with and
at the direction of Individual-1. (PSR ¶¶ 41, 45). As a result of Cohen’s
actions, neither woman spoke to the press prior to the election. (PSR ¶ 51)…..
First,
Cohen’s commission of two campaign finance crimes on the eve of the 2016
election for President of the United States struck a blow to one of the core
goals of the federal campaign finance laws: transparency. While many Americans
who desired a particular outcome to the election knocked on doors, toiled at
phone banks, or found any number of other legal ways to make their voices
heard, Cohen sought to influence the election from the shadows. He did so by orchestrating
secret and illegal payments to silence two women who otherwise would have made
public their alleged extramarital affairs with Individual-1. In the process,
Cohen deceived the voting public by hiding alleged facts that he believed would
have had a substantial effect on the election. It is this type of harm that
Congress sought to prevent when it imposed limits on individual contributions
to candidates. To promote transparency and prevent wealthy individuals like
Cohen from circumventing these limits, Congress prohibited individuals from
making expenditures on behalf of and coordinated with candidates. Cohen clouded
a process that Congress has painstakingly sought to keep transparent. The
sentence imposed should reflect the seriousness of Cohen’s brazen violations of
the election laws and attempt to counter the public cynicism that may arise
when individuals like Cohen act as if the political process belongs to the rich
and powerful…..
in
a secretly recorded meeting Cohen took credit for the payment and assured
Individual-1 that he was “all over” the transaction. And after making the
payment to the second woman, and after Individual-1 was elected President,
Cohen privately bragged to friends and reporters, including in recorded
conversations, that he had made the payment to spare Individual-1 from damaging
press and embarrassment.....
GOVERNMENT’S
SENTENCING MEMORANDUM,
filed 7 December 2018:
The
Special Counsel’s Office (“SCO”) provides this memorandum in connection with
the sentencing of Michael Cohen scheduled for December 12, 2018. On November
29, 2018, Cohen pleaded guilty to one count of making false statements to
Congress, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1001(a). The government does not take a
position with respect to a particular sentence to be imposed but submits that
it is appropriate for any sentence of incarceration to be served concurrently
to any sentence imposed by the Court in United States v. Cohen, 18-cr-602
(WHP).
The
defendant’s crime was serious. He withheld information material to the
investigations of Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election
being conducted by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (“SSCI”), the
House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (“HPSCI”), and the SCO. The
defendant lied to Congress about a business project (the “Moscow Project”) that
he worked on during the 2016 presidential campaign, while he served as
Executive Vice President at a Manhattan-based real estate company (the
“Company”) and as Special Counsel to the owner of the Company (“Individual 1”).
The defendant admitted he told these lies—which he made publicly and in
submissions to Congress—in order to (1) minimize links between the Moscow
Project and Individual 1 and (2) give the false impression that the Moscow
Project had ended before the Iowa caucus and the first presidential primaries, in hopes of
limiting the ongoing Russia investigations being conducted by Congress and the
SCO.....
The
defendant’s false statements obscured the fact that the Moscow Project was a
lucrative business opportunity that sought, and likely required, the assistance
of the Russian government. If the project was completed, the Company could have
received hundreds of millions of dollars from Russian sources in licensing fees
and other revenues. The fact that Cohen continued to work on the project and
discuss it with Individual 1 well into the campaign was material to the ongoing
congressional and SCO investigations, particularly because it occurred at a
time of sustained efforts by the Russian government to interfere with the U.S.
presidential election. Similarly, it was material that Cohen, during the
campaign, had a substantive telephone call about the project with an assistant
to the press secretary for the President of Russia.....
The
defendant, without prompting by the SCO, also corrected other false and
misleading statements that he had made concerning his outreach to and contacts
with Russian officials during the course of the campaign. For example, in a
radio interview in September 2015, the defendant suggested that Individual 1
meet with the President of Russia in New York City during his visit for the
United Nations General Assembly. When asked previously about these events, the
defendant claimed his public comments had been spontaneous and had not been
discussed within the campaign or the Company. During his proffer sessions, the
defendant admitted that this account was false and that he had in fact
conferred with Individual 1 about contacting the Russian government before
reaching out to gauge Russia’s interest in such a meeting. The meeting
ultimately did not take place…..
Labels:
corruption,
Donald Trump,
US politics,
US-Russia relations
Sunday 4 November 2018
Xenophobic, racist US President Donald J Trump produces a midterm election campaign video
This is US President Donald J. Trump campaigning ahead of the American mid-term elections on 6 November 2018.
As with everything Donald Trump tweets - a little fact checking is in order.It is outrageous what the Democrats are doing to our Country. Vote Republican now! https://t.co/0pWiwCHGbh pic.twitter.com/2crea9HF7G— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 31, 2018
Firstly, the
convicted felon in this video entered the USA illegally twice. The first as a 16 year-old under a Democratic Administration
in 1963 ,which later gaoled and then deported him in 1997 on drug offences.
The second time he entered the USA was under
a Republican Administration sometime around 2002 and he was not arrested until
2014 – after the drug-fuelled killings for which he was sentenced to death in April 2018.
Secondly, the
Fox News mass scene shown is not necessarily video of recent events as Trump has a history of misrepresentation and, the current 'migrant caravans’ are nowhere
near the USA-Mexico border, as the first caravan had not yet reached San Juan Guichicovi and the second was yet to enter Mexican territory on 31 October
2018. Both are quite literally thousands of kilometres south of the United
States and members of these caravans are travelling on foot.
The yellow line represents the distance the first caravan was from the US border as the crow flies on 1 November 2018. The second caravan is at least 200-300 kilometres behind the first.
The yellow line represents the distance the first caravan was from the US border as the crow flies on 1 November 2018. The second caravan is at least 200-300 kilometres behind the first.
What Trump is also not saying in his campaign ad is that no previous migrant caravan has ever made it to the US border. The last one reportedly made it to Mexico City before petering out - at least 1,300 kilometres short of reaching the United States.
Labels:
Donald Trump,
elections 2018,
immigration,
propaganda,
US politics
Friday 28 September 2018
Americans now spending time imagining their president's genitalia
Yet another book about US President Donald J. Trump has hit the bookstores.
This one includes a desciption of Trump's genitalia - unusual... smaller than average with a huge mushroom head... like a toadstool... like the mushroom character ... surrouded by "yeti pubes".
The US media kindly supplied various images of "Red Toad" to help with the imagining.....
Red Toad |
Labels:
bad taste award,
Donald Trump
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