Majorityrights News > Category: Russian Politics

Newsweek, “Evidence of Trump-Russia Collusion Already Exists, Watergate Prosecutors Say”, 14 Nov 2017:

There is definitive proof of whether the Trump campaign colluded with Russia during the 2016 election — and it exists in the email inboxes of Jared Kushner, Stephen Miller, Hope Hicks and others.

That’s what several former Watergate prosecutors believe, telling Newsweek that evidence of collaboration between the Kremlin and the president’s top campaign aides could literally be at Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s fingertips. It just has to be uncovered.

“The key difference between this and Watergate is … at the time, you certainly didn’t have computers,” said Nick Ackerman, one of the prosecutors who probed the 1972 break-in at the Democratic party’s Watergate offices. “Rather than use burglars to break into the Democratic National headquarters, they used Russian hackers. ... The question is whether that was coordinated in any way with the Trump campaign. Their emails will answer that question, once the special counsel gets its hands on them.”

Kushner has reportedly turned over documents related to his campaign contacts with Russians to Mueller earlier this month, a voluntary move of cooperation between the White House senior adviser and the federal probe. Still, it remains unclear whether those documents include emails, as well as whether Kushner provided the entirety of his communications with Russians to the investigators. If he didn’t provide investigators the full details about his correspondences, it certainly wouldn’t be the first time the president’s son-in-law failed to disclose his Russian contacts (or his business interests, for that matter), having been forced to revise his government security clearance forms with at least 100 foreign contacts previously left off the list.

Even if he’s cooperating, Kushner may be lying about the campaign’s interactions with the Russians, and doing a terrible job of covering it up, according to Jill Wine-Banks, another former Watergate prosecutor. At issue is his response to the discovery of a June meeting in Trump Tower attended by Kushner, other Trump campaign officials and Russian operatives. The meeting was set up by Donald Trump Jr.; Kushner said he didn’t know what was going to be discussed and left early after being bored by the conversation.

“The data ... will make Kushner’s defense fall entirely apart,” Wine-Banks told Newsweek. “We know that statement was a total fabrication since the [Trump] campaign was looking for dirt on Hillary Clinton from the Russians … I have faith the grand jury will get down to the bottom of what really happened in that meeting.”

Also at issue is the Trump campaign’s involvement with Cambridge Analytica, the controversial data mining operation with apparent ties to Russia, which Kushner boasted was “brought in” to steer the campaign to victory.

“As far as Russian collision, right now there are two aspects: one is, did they micro target Hillary Clinton voters to suppress the vote?” Ackerman said. “We know that there was a data mining process that was done by Kushner out of Texas and we know that the Russians were doing targeting with Facebook and Twitter. The question is trying to compare the data sets to see if there was coordination between those two things.

“Email evidence already shows that the purpose of the meeting on June 9 was to bring incriminating evidence, supposedly emails about Clinton, to the campaign, but we don’t know exactly what they did with that evidence after that meeting,” Ackerman continued.

John Ziegler on possible evidence of collusion:

Why is Donald Trump reacting to Vlaimir Putin the way he has?

Because, if this was all bull crap, and there was nothing the Putin had on Trump; he was not compromised by Russia or by Putin at all; if only for political purposes, and Trump’s not an imbecile, he’s not brilliant but he’s not an imbecile and he clearly is a political person - he likes to be liked… he would be attacking Vladimir Putin at every opportunity.

..especially on the issue of their meddling in the election. That would be just the natural inclination. 

Now, not only is he not doing that, he’s done the opposite of that.

He has been complimentary of Putin at every opportunity. And there is no evidence that he has punished Putin at all, for Russia’s meddling, regardless of whether or not the Trump team colluded in that meddling.

And today, something even more startling than Trump’s prior ass-kissing of Putin and his unwillingness to address this issue directly, of meddling having occurred.

Trump is on his foreign trip, he met with Putin, and then he told the press, that Putin told him, that Russia had nothing to do with the meddling; that it was the democrats doing, supposedly Trump quoting Putin.

And then Trump went our of his way to bash, by name - by name - the former heads of several of our intelligence agencies - including James Comey, calling them hacks and liars!

And completely buying into the idea, that the persons telling him the truth are not the people working for our own intelligence agencies, including, by the way, people that are still working for our intelligence agencies, including every major member of Congress, anybody with any credibility on this issue, or our side, has said, it’s not even a question. Russia attempted to meddle in our elections.

8:03: It’s not even a question. Russia attempted to meddle in our elections. And Trump is publicly saying, “no, I don’t believe any of that because Vladimir Putin told me so.”  Seriously?

If Barack Obama had ever had a meeting with Vladimir Putin after winning re-election ..remember that election he won where he got caught telling .the Russian official tell Vladimir “I’ll have more flexibility after the election?” Remember that whole thing which the media buried, and should have been a massive scandal, the conservative media went ape crap over that little thing, frankly only little in comparison, that was a bid deal to me at the time ...

Sean Hannity

Can you imagine if after winning the 2012 election, Obama had met with Putin, and all of our intelligence agencies were saying that yeah, Putin helped Obama win; and Obama then came out and bashed those intelligence agencies of The United States of America and said, “I believe Putin because he seems very sincere in what he’s telling me”    ...can you imagine the reaction of the Republicans in Congress, can you imagine the so-called conservatives in media?    ...Sean Hannity would be live 24/7 outside of the White house.

Instead from the conservative media there is silence. In fact, if anything, they’ll support Putin and Russia because Trump told us to. They’ll be the one’s we’re supposed to believe over our own intelligence agencies. By the way, not a couple of them, all of them - with unanimity and certitude.

READ MORE...

Flynn’s lawyer denies reports of quid pro quo with Turkey

The Hill, “Mueller investigating Flynn over alleged plan to turn cleric over to Turkey”, 10 Nov 2017:

Special counsel Robert Mueller is looking into an alleged plot involving former national security adviser Michael Flynn to return a Muslim cleric living in the U.S. to Turkey, according to a Wall Street Journal report.

FBI agents have asked at least four people about a mid-December meeting in New York, in which Flynn and his son, Michael G. Flynn, allegedly spoke with representatives of the Turkish government about removing cleric Fethullah Gulen from the U.S. in exchange for as much as $15 million.

Turkey has issued a fatwa against Gulen

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has accused Gulen of orchestrating a failed 2016 coup and has urged the U.S. to extradite the cleric.

The December meeting was attended by former CIA Director James Woolsey, who has described the proposal to The Wall Street Journal as “a covert step in the dead of night to whisk this guy away.” Woolsey has said he attended at the request of an associate of Flynn and that he sought to notify then-Vice President Joe Biden through a mutual friend.

It’s not clear how extensive Mueller’s investigation into the alleged plan is. But that the special counsel is looking into the allegations adds to the breadth of the probe into Flynn, who has already come under scrutiny for work benefitting the Turkish government.

Mueller is conducting the criminal investigation into Russia’s role in the 2016 presidential election, in particular whether members of President Trump’s campaign colluded with Russian representatives or operatives during the race.

But that probe has also expanded to include potential criminal activity not involving the campaign. Last week, former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort was charged with money laundering and tax evasion stretching back years.

The individuals that described the alleged plan to remove Gulen to The Wall Street Journal did not attend the meeting in which the topic was purportedly discussed and were not directly told of the plot by Flynn or his associates.

Flynn has become a central figure in Mueller’s investigation. He was forced to resign from his White House job in February — just 24 days into his tenure — after it was revealed that he had misled Vice President Pence about his conversations with the Russian ambassador in the months before Trump took office.

Since then, however, he has faced scrutiny for his lobbying work on behalf of Turkish interests and for not disclosing financial ties to Turkey and Russia.

“Aspen Institute”: (((Panel discusses))) Active Measures

The Alt-Right is discussed in minute 14:45:

Evelyn Farkas: Former Assistant Secretary of Defense for Russia, Ukraine and Eurasia: 14:45: It drives me crazy when Former Director Comey says that the Russians are coming back. To your point, they never left. I mean they’re still here, they have all that information, they’re in our cyber- and in our information-sphere.

Ned Price: And its broader than just Wikileaks and the overt or semi overt organs of the Russian government. I think one thing we noticed even after the election; you take the sort of trending story in Alt-Right or so-called Alt-Right circles: [example] hashtag #Syriahoax started in Russia and somehow make their way to the United States and started trending in some of the same circles that are collectively known as the Alt-Right. And I think the linkage between the two is not something we fully understand; how something jumps across he Atlantic like that and tends to land with the same group of people after originating in pro-Russia circles.

Now we need a non-Jewish panel discussing Israeli and Jewish influence over the American electorate - lol.

..in fact, there are some questions toward the end that bear upon that -

Charlie D. from Duke Law: 52:00: Would it help if we broadened the discussion about all foreign nations who are trying to influence our campaigns?

Panel averts the question -

Ned Price: 52:19: I would start with the proposition that it’s natural for governments to have policy preferences. Clearly I would suspect lots of the NATO member countries were made uncomfortable listening to Donald Trump during the campaign speak of NATO being obsolete. I think that the issue is that in today’s environment there has been attempt at criminalization on policy preferences on the part of foreign capitals. But I think we have to remember is a far cry from a NATO country, you know, privately rooting for Hillary Clinton and a strategic adversary getting involved in our election with Active Measures, covert influence, social media, you name it.

Julia Ioffe: They weren’t probing and scanning our election infrastructure, yeah.

Audience Member: Have any of you considered the business role of the president and Russia; because he has, right now, no one will lend him money in New York City, no one will do business with him in New York City. He owes a great deal of money. Where does he get the money? There are a lot of rumors that he gets it from Russia. Have any of your explored any of that?

Julia Ioffe: 53:48: Both of his sons said that he (Trump) gets most of his money from them (Russia) ...and its not a crazy proposition either that if he’s doing real estate in New York and Florida ...and guess where (((Russians))) who want to park their money outside of Russia, guess where they want to buy real estate? - (((New York and Florida))).

READ MORE...

President Donald Trump and Saudi Deputy Crown Prince and Minister of Defense Mohammed bin Salman meet at the White House in Washington, U.S., March 14, 2017. Kevin Lamarque | Reuters

CNBC, “Trump may have pushed Saudi Arabia and Iran closer to war”, 7 Nov 2017:

- Saudi Arabia’s moves over the past few days are bringing it closer to direct war with Iran.

- But this process seems to have been kick started by the new Saudi crown prince’s meeting with President Trump in March.

- It’s crucial to keep this conflict contained to the Middle East.

Crucial news keeps flying out of Saudi Arabia at a frantic pace, but here’s the bottom line: The Saudis are marching ever closer towards a wider regional war. And the U.S. may have helped send them down that path.

Just to recap, in the last several days the new crown prince of Saudi Arabia has initiated a massive purge of dozens of his fellow princes, ministers, and others in the kingdom in what’s been labeled as an “anti-corruption” sweep. Most of the headlines so far are understandably focusing on the one celebrity arrested, Alwaleed bin Talal, the billionaire investor seen and heard frequently for years on financial news channels like CNBC.

But that was just the first wave of news from Riyadh. Since the crackdown began on Saturday, the Saudis have considerably ramped up their accusatory rhetoric towards their neighbors. First, the kingdom squarely blamed Iran for a missile attack on Riyadh from Yemen that was thwarted by the U.S.-made Patriot anti-missile system. The Saudis called that attack “direct military aggression by the Iranian regime and may be considered an act of war.”

Second, the Saudis accused Lebanon of — figuratively at least — declaring “war” against it because of aggression from Hezbollah. That statement spurred even Saudi ally and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi to publicly urge for calm.

al-Sisi may be too late. Because the common denominator in all these Saudi moves is a more focused preparation for a wider and more direct war with Iran for control of the region. As I noted when he was first put in his top position by his father King Salman in June, Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman was already known as a hardcore hawk against Iran. Just a month before he was made crown prince, bin Salman declared that peace dialogue with Iran was impossible.

“More aggressive anti-Iranian hawks like bin Salman may have seen Donald Trump’s election as an excuse to win the day over more dovish princes and ministers. And the White House seemingly gave Saudi Arabia a green light.”

But the direct line to these more bellicose moves begins earlier than that and goes directly to the White House. While still deputy crown prince, bin Salman visited with President Trump in March of this year. During that meeting, they publicly declared Iran as the key regional security threat in the Middle East. That was step one.

READ MORE...

“The Collapse of the Soviet Union Was the Greatest Geo-Political Catastrophe of the Century” - Vladimir Putin

Last Day of The Soviet Union. Now subtitled by RT, “Stabbing The Empire”, it provides further background - telling the story of the Bialowieza Accords that dissolved The Soviet Union.

On December 8th, 1991, the three leaders of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus signed the document which marked the end of the Soviet empire. The fate of the great conglomerate country was decided in less than 24 hours. It happened in secret in a remote residence in the Belavezha forest. Soon the agreement entered the history as the Belavezha Accords. Visit the place where it happened and reveal the mysterious details of the document with the eyewitnesses to the historic event only on RT.

READ MORE...

CNBC, “Mueller Is Now ‘Untouchable’ After The Manafort Indictment: Former US Attorney”, 30 Oct 2017:

John Lauro, former U.S. Attorney on the scope of the indictment:

“It’s very aggressive.” While it doesn’t have anything to do with the campaign yet, it is a historical indictment that includes money laundering, failure to register as a foreign agent and conspiracy against the United States.

“And they threw in something at the end there which was very significant - at the very end an item about his son-in-law. They are going to press him to no end. They are going to pressure Paul Manafort to flip or cooperate [like the prisoner’s dilemma?]. Absolutely”

“The significance of this indictment is that it gives Mueller cover going forward, nobody’s going to touch him because Paul Manafort is under indictment. And this gives him opportunity to press Manefort for information.”

[When you say nobody’s going to touch him, what do you mean?]

“He can’t be fired by the president of the United States, there’s no way, this indictment is significant because going forward nobody is going to even suggest that the investigation should stop or that Meuller should be relieved of his duties.”

“Because Paul Manafort is under indictment now, the investigation is moving forward, Trump would be impeached the next day [for obstruction of justice] if he tried to remove Mueller.”

“Mueller is now untouchable as a result of this indictment. That’s the significance of it.”

[You’ve actually got two guys under indictment, Manafort and Gates, setting up another prisoner’s dilemma as they could turn on one another]

“Right, right.”

“And here’s how the conversation goes: Mr. Manefort, you’re facing a long time in jail. Your son-in-law could be implicated, we’re ready to indict your son-in-law as well, what are you going to give us in return? What are you going to talk about? Whether its the Trump administration, other business deals or the campaign itself?”

[and they’re saying the same thing to Rick Gates as well?]

“Absolutely, that’s going on right now.”

“It’s very specific: they call it a ‘speaking indictment’, and prosecutors do that in order to signal to the defense that we have a powerful case against you.”

“This is actually a long standing case against Manafort that Meuller picked up because it allows him to squeeze Manafort and Gates.”

“The government acts slowly, but when they do, they’ve made sure to button-down every hatch.”

“The indictment sends a message to everybody that ‘we’re serious.’ There’s going to be a lot of pressure on Manafort. I suspect that there’s going to be other indictments as well; anybody who is the subject of a federal investigation, with dozens of FBI agents and sixteen of the most skilled prosecutors, good luck to you.”

Poland is correct to denounce Richard Spencer in his neo-Molotov-Ribbentrop larp.

While the Polish government is not perfectly articulate of its reasons to denounce Richard Spencer for his advocacy of a counter productive world view, they are not far off the mark and not wrong to reject him either.

Typical of American right wingers, Spencer is nursing a neo-Germanophilic world view, overly sympathetic to the German imperialism of the world wars (and antagonistic to Great Britain’s ‘interference’), with a new twist that would larp and valence a re-empowered German / Russian axis -  i.e., a newly got up Molotov-Ribbentrop agreement for an “imperium”, i.e., imperialism that would run rough shod over the interests of many necessary allies - Hungary rejected him for the same reason Poland rejects him for the same reason Britain rejected him for the same reason Japan would reject him (for the same reason all of Asia would reject him for the same reason Zionism embraces him, for the quid pro quo reasoning that comprador wielding right wing enterprises embrace him) etc. - while his larped empire (Lisbon to Vladivastok) would be governed by whom? Apparently he would depend heavily on working with Jewish interests to facilitate (maneuver) his Russo-Germanic grand civic Euro larp, in Duginesque delusion of grandeur - a delusion coddled by ((())).

News Week, “Richard Spencer Is Too Racist for Poland’s Right-Wing Government”, 27 Oct 2017:

Poland’s right-wing government doesn’t want white supremacist Richard Spencer to visit the Eastern European country, calling him a “threat” to democracy.

Spencer was scheduled to speak at a conference organized by Poland’s far right to celebrate Polish Independence Day on November 11, but the country’s Foreign Ministry condemned the alt-right leader, whose condemnation of diversity has found support among neo-Nazis, whose ideological predecessors invaded Poland and killed millions during World War II.

“As a country which was one of the biggest victims of Nazism, we believe that the ideas promoted by Mr. Spencer and his followers could pose a threat to all those who hold dear the values of human rights and democracy,” the Polish Foreign Ministry said in a statement, adding that Spencer’s views are in conflict with Poland’s legal order.

Poland is not beyond criticism in its brand and particular expressions of nationalism, but Richard Spencer is highly dubious in his imperial larp; and the Poles are correct to denounce Spencer and like apologists for the imperialist aspirations of Nazi Germany and the casualties it left in the wake of its aspired imperialism, relevantly in this case, the Poland that came back not as “a gift of Woodrow Wilson”, but through the endurance and perseverance of Polish nationalism through 123 years in exile during the tri-partition; and then again through 50 years in exile during the Nazi and Soviet regimes.

McClatchyDC.com, “Steve Bannon’s already murky Middle East ties deepen”, 23 Oct 2017:

Former presidential aide Steve Bannon appears to be fostering ties to the UAE and Saudi Arabia, countries that have cut off ties with Qatar and have been encouraging the United States to act against the nation as well - though it is home to largest American base in the Middle East. Brynn Anderson AP

White House

WASHINGTON

Shortly after Donald Trump’s chief strategist Steve Bannon left the White House, a company with close ties to him was hired by the United Arab Emirates to launch a social media campaign against its Arab neighbor, Qatar.

It was part of a multimillion-dollar effort by several Middle Eastern nations to isolate Qatar that received a boost when Trump criticized the country that for years had been a critical regional ally.

The UAE is paying $330,000 to a firm with the same parent company as Cambridge Analytica, the business Trump employed to reach voters with hyper-targeted online messaging during the campaign, to blast Qatar on Facebook and Twitter, among other sites, according to federal records.

Bannon, who remains one of Trump’s closest advisers, has long had an interest in the region. He has huddled with UAE officials behind closed doors, visited the country as recently as last month and pushed for a group of Middle Eastern nations, including the UAE, in their bitter dispute with Qatar.

On Monday, Bannon is scheduled to speak at a day-long conference in Washington organized by the Hudson Institute, a conservative think tank and paid for by multiple donors, entitled “Countering Violent Extremism: Qatar, Iran, and the Muslim Brotherhood.”

The speech follows Bannon’s September meeting in the UAE with its crown prince, Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan. The two weren’t strangers: Bannon, Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner and ousted National Security Adviser Michael Flynn met with the crown prince at Trump Tower during the presidential transition in December. That meeting triggered controversy, as the UAE hadn’t notified the outgoing Obama administration about the visit as is customary.

The UAE also helped broker a meeting in January between a Bannon friend, Blackwater founder Erik Prince, and a Russian close to President Vladimir Putin to try to establish a back-channel line of communication to Moscow for Trump just days before Trump’s inauguration, according to the Washington Post; Prince met with the Russian in the Seychelle islands off East Africa.

Prince lives in the UAE and had a multimillion dollar contract with that government to assemble a mercenary security force there. His firm also does security work in Africa, much of it for Chinese interests. But Bannon has encouraged Prince to move back to the U.S. and run for office, and in recent weeks, Prince has begun to publicly consider a primary challenge to Wyoming GOP Sen. John Barrasso.

The UAE, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Egypt cut off all ties with Qatar in June, supposedly in response to its alleged support of terrorism and ties to Iran, and mounted a blockade against the nation. Trump abruptly began accusing Qatar of funding terrorism despite its importance as host to al Udeid, the largest American military base in the Middle East, home to nearly 10,000 troops.

The nation of Qatar, unfortunately, has historically been a funder of terrorism at a very high level, and in the wake of that conference, nations came together and spoke to me about confronting Qatar over its behavior.
            - President Donald Trump

READ MORE...