[vienna]

Originally Posted by Bilge_Rat

not surprised you agree with him, Old man.

Ben Sasse is a dead man walking, either he has already decided not to run again in 2020 or he will be beaten in the primary. With the iron grip that Trump has on the GOP, those that cross him are pushed out like Corker or Flake.

of course as you get closer to 2020 you may see that Sasse all of a sudden starts to see new qualities in Trump and his agenda...

p.s. - notice that despite all his anti-Trump rhetoric, he is still a solid yes vote on Kavanaugh.

A couple of things:

Don't equate respect with or mistake it for total agreement with an individual, group, or idea; it is very possible to respect someone without necessarily being in total agreement; I respect anyone who appears to have given their stance considered, mature thought and who is not mindlessly regurgitating a party line or exhibiting lemming behavior. Ben Sasse, like Barry Goldwater and John McCain before him, is his own person and I say more power to him...

Your statement about Sasse making an about face regarding Trump in Sasse's 2020 reelection bid is a bit laughable. First, there is no guarantee Trump will be around, politically, in 2020 nor that Trump will have any serious influence if he is still in office. Things have steadily gone downhill for Trump and continues to get worse; in 2020, Trump would be not an asset, but a liability. Then there is the matter of Sasse's own political stature in his home state; Sasse won his seat in 2014 by defeating the DEM candidate in Nebraska with a total of 64.4% of the vote to the DEMs 31.5%, a whopping margin of 32.9%, a very, very substantial victory. Sasse really doesn't need Trump; in truth, to keep Nebraska in the GOP fold, the GOP and Trump will be more in need of Sasse...

The yes vote for Kavanaugh is just one and, most likely not the deciding one, so it is what it is; besides, with the way things are going for this SCOTUS nomination, the GOP and Trump should be grateful for the vote all...

Originally Posted by August

"Best people"?

He was fired after just 2 months and long before the election. What he's been convicted of has nothing to do with Trump or the 2016 Presidential campaign.

This is what, like round 100 for the Trump haters? You should know by now that it is just going to be another dry well.

Hmm, the old Trumpian "Well, he was not a very important part of my circle..." deflection. Let's see about Manafort and his connection to Trump:


From Wikipedia --

...

Chairman of Donald Trump's 2016 campaign

In February 2016, Manafort approached Donald Trump through a mutual friend, Thomas J. Barrack Jr. He pointed out his experience advising presidential campaigns in the United States and around the world, described himself as an outsider not connected to the Washington establishment, and offered to work without salary. In March 2016, he joined Trump's presidential campaign to take the lead in getting commitments from convention delegates. On June 20, 2016, Trump fired campaign manager Corey Lewandowski and promoted Manafort to the position. Manafort gained control of the daily operations of the campaign as well as an expanded $20 million budget, hiring decisions, advertising, and media strategy Like most hires in the Trump campaign, Manafort was not vetted.

On June 9, 2016, Manafort, Donald Trump Jr., and Jared Kushner were participants in a meeting with Russian attorney Natalia Veselnitskaya and several others at Trump Tower. A British music agent, saying he was acting on behalf of Emin Agalarov and the Russian government, had told Trump Jr. that he could obtain damaging information on Hillary Clinton if he met with a lawyer connected to the Kremlin. At first, Trump Jr. said the meeting had been primarily about the Russian ban on international adoptions (in response to the Magnitsky Act) and mentioned nothing about Mrs. Clinton; he later said the offer of information about Clinton had been a pretext to conceal Veselnitskaya's real agenda.

In August 2016, Manafort's connections to former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych and his pro-Russian Party of Regions drew national attention in the US, where it was reported that Manafort may have received $12.7 million in off-the-books funds from the Party of Regions.

On August 17, 2016, Donald Trump received his first security briefing. The same day, August 17, Trump shook up his campaign organization in a way that appeared to minimize Manafort's role. It was reported that members of Trump's family, particularly Jared Kushner who had originally been a strong backer of Manafort, had become uneasy about his Russian connections and suspected that he had not been forthright about them. Manafort stated in an internal staff memorandum that he would "remain the campaign chairman and chief strategist, providing the big-picture, long-range campaign vision". However, two days later, Trump announced his acceptance of Manafort's resignation from the campaign after Steve Bannon and Kellyanne Conway took on senior leadership roles within that campaign.

Upon Manafort's resignation as campaign chairman, Newt Gingrich stated, "nobody should underestimate how much Paul Manafort did to really help get this campaign to where it is right now." Gingrich later added that, for the Trump administration, "It makes perfect sense for them to distance themselves from somebody who apparently didn't tell them what he was doing."
...

BY God, Agust is right: by the above description, all Manfort did was go on coffee (or covfefe) runs...

Here's a good timeline of Trump's connections to Manafort (and their connection to some others in the Trump circle)...

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_a...ump_world.html

It should be noted that Manafort and Trump had continued contact after Manafort resigned as Trump's Campaign Manager and that Trump's legal team and Manafort's legal team had an information sharing agreement (now voided by Manafort's plea agreement) all during the time after the appointment of Mueller as Special Counsel, you know, kinda of like collusion regarding the SC's investigation...

Originally Posted by August

...

We'll see but the plea deal was for, in his lawyers words: "conduct that dates back many years", ie long before his involvement with the Trump or the campaign. I'm betting that this will be just another disappointment in a long line of them for the Trump Haters.

The plea deal also requires Manafort to testify, under oath, and provide any supporting evidence connected with the testimony, on any and all matters either prior to his tenure with Trump, during his Tenure, or after. The very fact he was a participant, along with Trump Jr. and Trump's son-in-law Kushner, in the Trump Tower meeting shows he was much more than a sideline benchwarmer on the Trump team and connects the Trump team to, and on its face, act of criminal conspiracy with a foreign power that actually does fall under the purview of Mueller's investigation. Considering that Mueller has gotten indictments on about a couple of dozen subjects of the probe, has actually gotten a conviction against the one hold out (Manafort) who, until last Friday wouldn't take a plea, and has actually gotten guilty pleas against about 8 of those involved in the Trump circle, I would safely venture a guess the one who is really disappointed is President Chump:


https://www.vox.com/policy-and-polit...nts-grand-jury


Yes, most likely very, very disappointed...


... and very scared. Mueller has run a surprisingly tight ship and has maintained not only his trademark poker face throughout, he has, in a city known for "leaks" has been watertight. It must be frustrating for Trump, who thrives on 'insider' information, to have neither any clue as to what the SC is planning nor the means to get a foothold on any information...

Originally Posted by Dowly

That the public hasn't heard anything re:Gates' cooperation doesn't mean a thing. Mueller is under no obligation to prosecute the moment he finds evidence of a crime.

Absolutely true. From what has transpired thus far, it appears the SC is building his case(s) from the ground up, placing certain persons and events in an order to lay a solid foundation for the next level up in action(s). For example, the Cohen plea deal has Cohen not only admitting his participation in a scheme to violate US Law regarding campaign financing, it also has him naming Trump as participant, as yet unindicted; the Manafort plea deal has Manafort not only admitting his participation in the infamous Trump Tower meeting in a conspiracy to violate US Law regarding collusion with a foreign power against the interests of the US, he also admitted to the content and purpose of the meeting and the participation of Trump Jr and Kushner; it should be noted if, as Trump's own attorneys have stated, that Trump, himself, dictated the statement, released under Trump Jr's name, in an effort to obfuscate the true nature of the meeting and to sidetrack pending investigation, then Trump would be open to obstruction of justice, criminal conspiracy, etc. ...


It appears what the SC has done, and is doing, is getting all the low level lackeys to all agree on who was the Chief who was actually calling the shots...

Originally Posted by August

OK but expect to be disappointed.

Nah, I don't think the American people will be disappointed: we'll be too busy celebrating...


... but don't worry: we'll at least offer you a beer to cry into...











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