Bombshell: Opposition research memos (not yet substantiated) discuss compromising Russian info on Trump

[Elixir]

No one deserves Trump, not even the idiots who voted for him.

True, but there's no point telling them so. Once they experience the suffering that Trump bestows upon them, at least a few of them will probably wake up. But most will say they are SOOOooo much better off with no insurance, YUUUUGE unemployment, a racist police state, polluted environment etc. than they were under Obama's oppressive regime... they'll vote for him again (assuming he keeps playing to their boundless fears).

 

[laughing dog]

I tend to think reports from unnamed sources using unnamed sources are unreliable. The central and disturbing allegation is plausible for Trump (that he is being blackmailed for his use of prostitutes), I find it improbable. Since no one has been able to substantiate these allegations, they have not been reported by the MSM.

So, until there is some actual substantiation, I think this is a non-story.

 

[Will Wiley]

No one deserves Trump, not even the idiots who voted for him.

True, but there's no point telling them so. Once they experience the suffering that Trump bestows upon them, at least a few of them will probably wake up. But most will say they are SOOOooo much better off with no insurance, .

I think some are just waking up now.

https://imgur.com/gallery/rWIhcx6

(unfortunately that image was too large for TFT, but it's worth a look )

 

[Harry Bosch]

Look, Trump is going to be the president. That can't be stopped. And the republican controlled house and senate won't be impeaching him. What scares most people (even republicans) is a Putin-controlled puppet (there are enough of those in the world). If the bizzare relationship between Trump and Putin can be exposed, potential conflicts and etc, he won't be able to be blackmailed as easily.

What is bizarre about two world leaders who control most of the worlds nuclear weapons wanting to get along rather than go to war with each other?

I actually would like to see better relations with Russia. However, I don't think that we should sacrifice our allies (eastern Europe) for short term truces with Russia. Secondly, I'm against Russia helping a particular party in the US get elected just because Putin wants it that way.

 

[Elixir]

True, but there's no point telling them so. Once they experience the suffering that Trump bestows upon them, at least a few of them will probably wake up. But most will say they are SOOOooo much better off with no insurance, .

I think some are just waking up now.

https://imgur.com/gallery/rWIhcx6

(unfortunately that image was too large for TFT, but it's worth a look )

I flat-out don't know what to say about that. Think I'll go to my medicare doc and get four years' worth of sleeping pills.
It does illustrate the difficulty of alerting Trump voters to what they have wrought, though.

 

[Axulus]

Look, Trump is going to be the president. That can't be stopped. And the republican controlled house and senate won't be impeaching him. What scares most people (even republicans) is a Putin-controlled puppet (there are enough of those in the world). If the bizzare relationship between Trump and Putin can be exposed, potential conflicts and etc, he won't be able to be blackmailed as easily.

What is bizarre about two world leaders who control most of the worlds nuclear weapons wanting to get along rather than go to war with each other?

You can oppose/stop/slow down a country from doing damaging things to the world without going to war with it.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Look, Trump is going to be the president. That can't be stopped. And the republican controlled house and senate won't be impeaching him. What scares most people (even republicans) is a Putin-controlled puppet (there are enough of those in the world). If the bizzare relationship between Trump and Putin can be exposed, potential conflicts and etc, he won't be able to be blackmailed as easily.

What is bizarre about two world leaders who control most of the worlds nuclear weapons wanting to get along rather than go to war with each other?

Obama wanted to get along. That doesn't mean Russia gets a blank check.

 

[Elixir]

What is bizarre about two world leaders who control most of the worlds nuclear weapons wanting to get along rather than go to war with each other?

Obama wanted to get along. That doesn't mean Russia gets a blank check.

Right. Having the sword of Damocles dangling over the POTUS' head means Russia gets a blank check. But we shouldn't try to substantiate or falsify that, because it's unsubstantiated. And that, folks, is the extent of some people's understanding of the gravity of the situation.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

Ordinarily, I'd give this story a 1% chance of being true, but since we're discussing Donald Trump, I'm upping it to 5%. Now also, since we're discussing Donald Trump, I'd say there's a 50% chance his team made the whole thing up themselves to make his detractors look bad.

 

[ksen]

Something is definitely rotten in the Republican camp.
We have Mr Pre-rinse denying that this "unverified report" was ever brought up in briefings, others claiming it was.
We have Republicans saying it's a mystery how Trump "gets it" with N. Korea, China etc. but can't "get it" regarding Russia... and failing to iterate the obvious explanation.

None of this will resolve prior to Trump getting sworn in, and then not unless he does something of which Uncle Vlad disapproves. There will be a press conference today where Trump will get to practice his delivery of "LIEEEEEEES, it's all LIEEEEEEES!", practice which will surely serve him well going forward, as he will have plenty to deny, both true and false.

NBC is now reporting that Trump was not briefed on the two page summary.

 

[Harry Bosch]

I wonder if Steve printed the Trump birther claims?

 

[tupac chopra]

Wow! The obtuse observation that was so obtuse that it was a line, just smacked and turned into a point! No one is questioning who put the documents together, unless you are suggesting the CIA is black-op'ing through a wildly convoluted scheme here.

What is unknown is if the documents put together by the former British Intelligence worker are accurate. I personally have doubts, due to just how wildly insane they are.

I asked how you knew. You didn't answer.

The British MI6 officer who allegedly made the report's name is now all over the online press.
The Brits have asked his name not be released but that didn't stop the press. You can find it easily enough if you are that keen

 

[bilby]

I asked how you knew. You didn't answer.

The British MI6 officer who allegedly made the report's name is now all over the online press.
The Brits have asked his name not be released but that didn't stop the press. You can find it easily enough if you are that keen
View attachment 9460

The D-notice was a viable tool of censorship in the 1950s, but these days they do more harm than good, courtesy of the Streisand Effect.

 

[whichphilosophy]

The British MI6 officer who allegedly made the report's name is now all over the online press.
The Brits have asked his name not be released but that didn't stop the press. You can find it easily enough if you are that keen
View attachment 9460

The D-notice was a viable tool of censorship in the 1950s, but these days they do more harm than good, courtesy of the Streisand Effect.

Key is whether the information itself stands alone regardless of who the source is.

 

[blastula]

I don't quite understand what you are getting at. These memos were mentioned as part of a classified report (two pages out of a much longer report) provided to senate intelligence committee and Obama and Trump. Are you asking why they were mentioned as part of a classified report?

Yes, I am asking why this did not go into public version of it.

The existence of the memos was publicly known last year. A Veteran Spy Has Given the FBI Information Alleging a Russian Operation to Cultivate Donald Trump | Mother Jones

 

[blastula]

Russia denies it, so nothing to see here.

Donald J. Trump ✔ @realDonaldTrump Russia just said the unverified report paid for by political opponents is "A COMPLETE AND TOTAL FABRICATION, UTTER NONSENSE." Very unfair!
4:13 AM - 11 Jan 2017

 

[Elixir]

Russia denies it, so nothing to see here.

Donald J. Trump ✔ @realDonaldTrump Russia just said the unverified report paid for by political opponents is "A COMPLETE AND TOTAL FABRICATION, UTTER NONSENSE." Very unfair!
4:13 AM - 11 Jan 2017

Unreal... the only credible entities on the planet for Don the Con are Uncle Vlad and Aunt Julian...

 

[blastula]

I read through the archived 4chan thread and it seems like someone is claiming that he sent Rick Wilson the same story he went with a while ago. But I don't see evidence yet. Trying to follow a 4chan thread is a headache.

Once again, the claim makes zero sense. The 4chan post says it was sent to a government official who then sent it to the CIA who then ran with it. This is demonstrably false as the story originated in a memo produced by an opposition research company, paid for by private parties, produced in June 2016 run by a former British intelligence officer using alleged Russian sources, _not_ the CIA.

The only part where the CIA enters into the picture is to inform top government officials about the existance of these memos and that the allegations are circulating among government agencies and journalists.

That story is nonsense for the reasons stated, and also Wilson has denied it convincingly.

Fool Chan – Rick Wilson – Medium

 

[Axulus]

Glenn Greenwald is right on point.

The serious dangers posed by a Trump presidency are numerous and manifest. There are a wide array of legitimate and effective tactics for combatting those threats: from bipartisan congressional coalitions and constitutional legal challenges to citizen uprisings and sustained and aggressive civil disobedience. All of those strategies have periodically proven themselves effective in times of political crisis or authoritarian overreach.

But cheering for the CIA and its shadowy allies to unilaterally subvert the U.S. election and impose its own policy dictates on the elected president is both warped and self-destructive. Empowering the very entities that have produced the most shameful atrocities and systemic deceit over the last six decades is desperation of the worst kind. Demanding that evidence-free, anonymous assertions be instantly venerated as Truth — despite emanating from the very precincts designed to propagandize and lie — is an assault on journalism, democracy, and basic human rationality. And casually branding domestic adversaries who refuse to go along as traitors and disloyal foreign operatives is morally bankrupt and certain to backfire on those doing it.

Beyond all that, there is no bigger favor that Trump opponents can do for him than attacking him with such lowly, shabby, obvious shams, recruiting large media outlets to lead the way. When it comes time to expose actual Trump corruption and criminality, who is going to believe the people and institutions who have demonstrated they are willing to endorse any assertions no matter how factually baseless, who deploy any journalistic tactic no matter how unreliable and removed from basic means of ensuring accuracy?

WTF is he going on about? It is the CIA's job to let our government officials and the public know about serious and credible threats facing the country. They are not "trying to subvert the US election." He is branding our intelligence angencies into the same kind of partisian bullshit that Trump and his team is trying to do.

Additionally, these unsubstantiated research memos, the topic of this OP, has nothing to do with the CIA and "its shadowy allies".

Whether the existance of these memos should or should not have been revealed to the public is a different matter. With apparently hunderds of Washington insiders and journalists knowing about them, the cat was likely to get out of the bag at some point anyway. Furthermore, there is nothing "fake" about the existence of these memos and the fact that they are unsubstantiated, which every media outlet has stated.

 

[J842P]

Glenn Greenwald is right on point.

WTF is he going on about? It is the CIA's job to let our government officials and the public know about serious and credible threats facing the country. They are not "trying to subvert the US election." He is branding our intelligence angencies into the same kind of partisian bullshit that Trump and his team is trying to do.

Additionally, these unsubstantiated research memos, the topic of this OP, has nothing to do with the CIA and "its shadowy allies".

Whether the existance of these memos should or should not have been revealed to the public is a different matter. With apparently hunderds of Washington insiders and journalists knowing about them, the cat was likely to get out of the bag at some point anyway. Furthermore, there is nothing "fake" about the existence of these memos and the fact that they are unsubstantiated, which every media outlet has stated.

Right, because the CIA has never been political.