Not bad, but I wish they had started with removing the T first.
Kaveladze. Covfefe source?
HOLY SHIT. It has begun.
EDIT: Begun, this witch hunt has.
[quote=“HumanTon, post:4137, topic:127454”]
I know I’m a killjoy interrupting a shower of puns but … I really wish people wouldn’t obsess so much over the alleged kompromat tape.
It really doesn’t matter at this point. What it’s supposed to show isn’t a violation of any US law. And more to the point, it wouldn’t change the minds of any Trump supporters - they’ve already shown that they’re absolutely fine with Trump ignoring all the rules of propriety. [/quote]
I have to agree. One of the signatures of this president is shamelessness. Most politicians are reticent to show public signs of greed, disrespect, anger, lust, etc. but not this one. Pence would be destroyed by something like this, but DT’s supporters would probably go with it, because it fulfills more of their own venal power fantasies.
How convenient that our translator wasn’t there to hear what they talked about. I wonder how that happened?
I think with Putin you’re supposed to look at his eyes and into his soul and communicate telepathically. Or maybe that’s just a skill Republican presidents have.
How the hell did Trump ever get the reputation as a good negotiator? Everything we’ve seen so far makes him look like a hayseed at the state fair. “Golll-ee, Mr. Putin, it shore is good of you to let me use your translator. And it’s mighty nice of you to keep my wallet safe, too.”
vyshka
4154
No one from the US besides Trump was in the meeting. Wtf
antlers
4155
In fairness, Trump does seem to have been good at dicking over his contractors, investors, and banks. Of course, that was in a field where he had some competence, and before the dementia started to take hold. In international affairs currently he has neither of those advantages.
I repeat myself, but if our intel agencies did not have a wire on his person at all times for the G20 meeting trip I would consider it dereliction of duty.
Financial Times: The ex-spy who casts a light on the Trump-Russia saga
Yet for any devotee of a good John le Carré thriller or James Bond film, it is also rather depressing. If Moscow did want to establish a relationship with the Trump campaign, was the initial connection really as easy and obvious as firing off an email? More disturbingly: what has become of the top brass of Russia’s spy network? Has Moscow’s opinion of the US really fallen so low that it phones espionage operations in via the D-Squad?
In search of answers, I visited Peter Earnest, a 36-year veteran of the CIA who spent the better part of two decades in the agency’s clandestine operations. In retirement, the white-haired but sprightly ex-spy has found himself executive director of the International Spy Museum in Washington DC after a career that spanned the Mediterranean and the Middle East. Mr Earnest said he had been watching the news unfold with piqued interest. Pointing out that he lacked insider knowledge of the drama, he noted that the initial email sent to Donald Trump Jr appeared to have the kinds of “teasers” that an intelligence operation would send out to test the interest of a target — the teaser in this case being compromising information on Hillary Clinton.
As for my complaint that the sting seemed too amateurish, he was quick to dispel any illusions: “They’re not all sneaking around in capes and floppy hats.” A carefully executed influence campaign, Mr Earnest said, might be more like lobbying and fundraising than what we traditionally think of as espionage. He recalled the Russian spy ring that was expelled from the US in 2010 after years of living undercover in the states. While some like Anna Chapman, the crimson-haired Mata Hari, were more active, others appeared to be doing little more than low-level networking and information gathering in the final years — not entirely unusual in a long-term influence campaign, Mr Earnest said.
“It’s like chipping away at something. You’re not going to bring the whole [country] down. But you’re chipping away. You’re contributing. And that’s often what influence operations are about.”
As for the reality TV-show aspects of the current story, those too made sense given the president’s background, the former spy explained: “When someone is that high-flying, you sort of have to go in at where he is. He’s not one skulking around to meet you in a doorway somewhere. But you can go down to Mar-a-Lago and buy him dinner,” he suggested.
If you’re dealing with someone who’s a terrible negotiator, you praise their negotiating skills and do so publicly to make sure nobody else ever takes the reins.
If you’re working for someone who’s a terrible negotiator, you praise their negotiating skills and do so publicly to make sure you don’t lose you job.
LockerK
4159
Alternatively, when you don’t pay the people who work for you, you can spend that money on lawyers instead!
rowe33
4160
That’s cool. Undisclosed private meetings with our archenemy without anyone else from the US present is totally OK with 99% of Republicans.
The meeting was about the pee tapes, and Trump couldn’t take the chance anything would leak out and throw a wet blanket on his Bromance with the Golden Boy Putin.
Don’t most people believe the pee tapes are real? This isn’t Jimmy Carter we are talking about it is Donald “IfuckanythingIcancatch” Trump.
