5324

“I’ll say one thing about Shvets’ recollection: “Extremely vulnerable intellectually” is the most polite way anyone could possibly think of to say that Trump is as dumb as a bag of orange rocks. It’s also not terribly surprising that all the KGB had to do was tickle Trump’s massive ego a little bit to make him an unwitting opp for Russian spies.”

5325

NO COLLUSION!!

5326

I’m pretty sure that that was already widely known before. I think Mueller actually did cover this, didn’t he?

I mean, I absolutely knew about this specific thing, so I must have read it somewhere.

5327

It was posited. The Post article gets into it.

On Aug. 2, 2016, with Manafort running the Trump campaign and Gates serving as his deputy, the three met at a cigar club in midtown Manhattan. Beforehand, Manafort had asked Gates to print out campaign polling data, information that Manafort apparently gave Kilimnik that evening.

Mueller’s report describes the meeting:

“They also discussed the status of the Trump Campaign and Manafort’s strategy for winning Democratic votes in Midwestern states. Months before that meeting, Manafort had caused internal polling data to be shared with Kilimnik, and the sharing continued for some period of time after their August meeting.”

At another point, the report goes into more detail about that ongoing exchange of information.

“Manafort instructed Rick Gates, his deputy on the Campaign and a longtime employee, to provide Kilimnik with updates on the Trump Campaign — including internal polling data, although Manafort claims not to recall that specific instruction. Manafort expected Kilimnik to share that information with others in Ukraine and with Deripaska. Gates periodically sent such polling data to Kilimnik during the campaign.”

The “Deripaska” referred to is Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska, a former client of Manafort’s whom the campaign chairman had been eager to impress with his position on the campaign. (Hours after the Aug. 2 meeting, a plane belonging to Deripaska landed in New Jersey; his team denies any link to the meeting.)

This was as close as Mueller got to demonstrating a connection between Trump’s campaign and the Russian effort to aid his candidacy, an effort that included both a bid to influence public opinion using social media and the release of data stolen from the Democratic Party and a senior staffer for Hillary Clinton, Trump’s 2016 opponent. It left unanswered two questions: How close was Kilimnik to Russian intelligence, and what did he do with the polling information he’d received ?

5328

Wait so the Trump campaign was giving polling information to the Russians? Am I reading that right? How does that help them?

5329

Targeting Facebook ads in conjunction with Cambridge Analytica?

5330

Oh i see. I guess I had thought that the collusion was Russia giving the Trump campaign Hilary’s polling information. Actively having the Russians working for you is far worse.

5331

Targeted hacking.

5332

NO collusion, you’re the collusion.

5333

It’s not the ads that were/are a problem. The ads are insignificant compared to the vast amount of unpaid content the IRA was able to put out or amplify, guided by polling data.

5334

Did you mean FSB or GRU?

5335

By IRA, I assume Internet Research Agency.

5336

Interesting.

5337

Jackson, who was appointed to the federal district court in Washington, D.C., by former President Obama, wrote in a scathing 41-page decision that “not only was the Attorney General being disingenuous then, but DOJ has been disingenuous to this Court with respect to the existence of a decision-making process that should be shielded by the deliberative process privilege.”

In other words, the review of the document reveals that the Attorney General was not then engaged in making a decision about whether the President should be charged with obstruction of justice; the fact that he would not be prosecuted was a given.

“The agency’s redactions and incomplete explanations obfuscate the true purpose of the memorandum, and the excised portions belie the notion that it fell to the Attorney General to make a prosecution decision or that any such decision was on the table at any time,” she added.

5338
5339

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5340

Please tell me that’s real and actually there. Please. Please?

5341

I like that the Four Seasons Total Landscaping Twitter banner is that famous garage door, stripped clean of trump stickers.

5342

I’m wearing my four seasons t-shirt today for the first time. No comments from strangers yet, but it should prove fun over the summer.

5344

“Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission 2017” on the bottom." Gofundme drive to make it happen?