Hot Karl Marx posted:

https://twitter.com/pattymo/status/1070033612588896257

also rip my account

Bolow posted:

I had to see this and now all of you have to

https://twitter.com/peta/status/1070066047414345729

McNally posted:

https://twitter.com/BenFromEssex/status/1070086929306304512

Bolow posted:

I had to see this and now all of you have to

https://twitter.com/peta/status/1070066047414345729

Bolow posted:

I had to see this and now all of you have to

https://twitter.com/peta/status/1070066047414345729

Bolow posted:

I had to see this and now all of you have to

https://twitter.com/peta/status/1070066047414345729

Bolow posted:

I had to see this and now all of you have to

https://twitter.com/peta/status/1070066047414345729

posted:

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The United States delivered Russia a 60-day ultimatum on Tuesday to come clean about what Washington says is a violation of a arms control treaty that keeps missiles out of Europe, saying only Moscow could save the pact.

NATO allies led by Germany pressed U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo at a meeting in Brussels to give diplomacy a final push before Washington pulls out of the 1987 Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces Treaty, fearing a new arms race in Europe.

“Russia has a last chance to show in a verifiable way that they comply with the treaty ... but we also have to start to prepare for the fact that this treaty may break down,” NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told reporters.

NATO foreign ministers agreed to formally declare Russia in “material breach” of the INF treaty in a statement in support of the United States, after Pompeo briefed them at the alliance headquarters in Brussels on Russian violations and on U.S. President Donald Trump’s stated aim to withdraw from it.

Russia denies undertaking any such development of land-based, intermediate-range Cruise missile capable of carrying nuclear warheads and hitting European cities at short notice.

Germany, the Netherlands and Belgian are concerned about the deployment of U.S. missiles in Europe - as happened in the 1980s, touching off large anti-American demonstrations - while being caught up in nuclear competition between Moscow and Washington.

A U.S. exit from the INF treaty would put another strain on NATO allies already shaken by Trump’s demands for higher defense spending and what diplomats say is a lack of clarity about where U.S. strategy is heading on the issue.

While Stoltenberg said there would now be an intense diplomatic push to try to convince Russia to give up what Pompeo said were “multiple battalions of the SSC-8 missiles”, Washington is set to start to pull out in February, prompting a six-month withdrawal period under the accord, diplomats said.

“Its range makes it a direct menace to Europe,” Pompeo said of the missiles, which also are called Novator 9M729. He added that Russia’s actions “greatly undermine America’s national security and that of our allies”.

Difficult to detect and fired from mobile launchers, the Russian missiles are especially dangerous because they reduce the warning time that NATO air defenses might have to shoot them down, military experts say.

Pompeo said the U.S. government had raised the issue at least 30 times since 2013 with Moscow but had faced what he said were denials and counter-actions.

He also said that the United States had evidence that the test launches were from a single site in Russia, the Soviet-era base Kupustin Yar, near Volgograd, southeast of Moscow.

“In the light of these facts, the United States declares Russia in material breach of the treaty and will suspend our obligations ... effective in 60 days unless Russia returns to full and verifiable compliance,” Pompeo said.

EUROPE CAUGHT IN THE MIDDLE
Washington has said it would be forced to restore the military balance in Europe after the 60-day period but Pompeo declined to elaborate, saying only that tests and deployments of new missiles were on hold until then.

He also said that because China, Iran and North Korea were not signatories to the INF, the United States was putting itself at a disadvantage by not developing medium-range missiles, citing three failed diplomatic attempts to enlarge the treaty.

However, experts believe the United States would be better off modernizing its long-range missile deterrent and ensuring that it could penetrate sophisticated Russian air defenses, rather than developing a new class of medium-range rockets.

The INF treaty, negotiated by then-President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev and ratified by the U.S. Senate, eliminated the medium-range missile arsenals of the world’s two biggest nuclear powers and reduced their ability to launch a nuclear strike at short notice.

U.S. Cruise and Pershing missiles deployed in Britain and West Germany were removed as a result of the treaty, while the Soviet Union pulled back its SS-20s out of European range.

The treaty requires the United States and Russia “not to possess, produce, or flight-test” a ground-launched cruise missile with a range capability of 500 km to 5,500 km (310-3,420 miles), “or to possess or produce launchers of such missiles.”

McNally posted:

https://twitter.com/BenFromEssex/status/1070086929306304512

apseudonym posted:

This lead to me reading the Wikipedia page on speciesism which links to a paper titled "Can the Treatment of Animals Be Compared to the Holocaust?"

quote:

WASHINGTON (AP) — The attorneys general of the District of Columbia and Maryland plan to file subpoenas Tuesday seeking records from the Trump Organization, the Treasury Department and dozens of other entities as part of a lawsuit accusing Donald Trump of profiting off the presidency.

The flurry of subpoenas came a day after U.S. District Court Judge Peter J. Messitte approved a brisk schedule for discovery in the case alleging that foreign and domestic government spending at Trump’s Washington, D.C., hotel amounts to gifts to the president in violation of the Constitution’s emoluments clause.

The subpoenas target 37 entities, including 13 Trump-linked entities and the federal agency that oversees the lease for Trump’s Washington hotel. Subpoenas were also being sent to the Department of Defense, General Services Administration, Department of Commerce and Department of Agriculture, all of which have spent taxpayer dollars at the hotel or have information on Trump’s finances relevant to the case.

Other Trump entities that officials plan to subpoena include those related to his Washington hotel and its management. Eighteen private entities including restaurants, venues and hotels that compete with the Trump hotel are also being subpoenaed to “illuminate the unfair nature of that competition,” said Maryland Attorney General Brian E. Frosh.

“We’re seeking to confirm the information that everybody already knows: Trump’s violation of the emoluments clause of the Constitution,” Frosh said. “He’s received numerous payments from foreign governments and state governments and they’ve been funneled, at least in part, through the Trump (hotel) in D.C.”

While news organizations have reported how groups representing Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain and the Philippines have hosted events at Trump’s D.C. hotel since he took office, the subpoenas offer the best chance to get a complete picture of which foreign and domestic governments are spending at the hotel, how much they are spending and where that money is going. They’re also trying to determine how Trump’s hotel is affecting the hospitality industry in D.C. and Maryland.

The subpoenas seek to prove that hotel revenues are going to the president through his affiliated entities, including The Donald J. Trump Revocable Trust. Most of the records are being requested back to Jan. 1, 2015.

The Justice Department declined to comment. Neither Trump’s personal attorney on the case, William S. Consovoy, nor the White House responded to a request for comment Tuesday.

Trump’s Justice Department lawyers filed a notice to the court Friday indicating it plans to challenge the Maryland judge’s decision to allow the case to move forward. Justice lawyers have argued that earnings from business activity such as hotel stays don’t qualify as emoluments and that any discovery would “be a distraction to the President’s performance of his constitutional duties.”

The president’s notice that he may seek a writ of mandamus — to have the appeal heard by a higher court — is considered an “extraordinary remedy” that partly rests on showing Messitte’s decisions to be clearly wrong.

Because the president has not released his tax returns, any responsive records would likely provide the first clear picture of the finances of Trump’s business empire as well as his Washington hotel.

There is no indication yet that Frosh and District of Columbia Attorney General Karl A. Racine, both Democrats, would push for the president’s tax returns, at least in this initial round of legal discovery, given the sensitive nature of such a request and likely additional delays it would cause. But tax returns for some of Trump’s business entities, including the state and federal tax returns for the Trump Organization, are also being requested.

Co-counsel on the case is Washington-based nonprofit Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.

The Treasury Department is being subpoenaed to determine not only whether its officials patronized Trump’s hotel but also to learn more about Trump’s promised donations of profit of foreign government spending at his hotel and similar businesses to the Treasury. In February, The Trump Organization donated $151,470 — what it said was the total amount of spending in Trump’s first year in office. The subpoena requests “all communications” regarding that payment.

State officials earlier told The Associated Press that the IRS would likely be subpoenaed, but it was unclear if that would happen on Tuesday or whether it would happen at all.

“We’re certainly not ruling that out, just like we’re not ruling out seeking the president’s tax returns,” Frosh said.

The Trump Organization said in an emailed statement to the AP that the company had “voluntarily donated” the profits and “intend to make a similar contribution in 2019.” The company did not comment on the case otherwise.

There is a separate federal lawsuit involving the General Services Administration, which oversees the lease for the hotel with the Trump Organization. Democratic lawmakers want to know how Trump was approved by the GSA to maintain the lease of the Trump International Hotel in Washington after he became president.

The hotel is housed in the historic Old Post Office, which is owned by the federal government, and its lease has a clause barring any “elected official of the government of the United States” from deriving “any benefit.”

Maine is also expected to receive a subpoena, likely because its governor, Republican Paul LePage, stayed at Trump’s D.C. hotel when he had official business to conduct, including discussions with the president. LePage’s office did not respond to a request for comment.

On one of those trips last year, Trump and LePage appeared together at a news conference at which Trump signed an executive order to review orders of the prior administration that established national monuments within the National Park Service. President Barack Obama had established a park and national monument in Maine over LePage’s objections in 2016.

If there are no delays, legal discovery would conclude in early August.

Nostalgia4Butts posted:

Mike Flynn is getting no prison time.

https://www-m.cnn.com/2018/12/04/politics/flynn-mueller-filing/index.html?r=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cnn.com%2F

Nostalgia4Butts posted:

Casimir Radon posted:

This had better have been good. The piece of poo poo deserves some jail time.

Milo and POTUS posted:

Was it Flynn who was working with the Turks and wanted to black bag/disappear citizens or someone else. Cuz man, it really ought to be good if so.

Milo and POTUS posted:

Was it Flynn who was working with the Turks and wanted to black bag/disappear citizens or someone else. Cuz man, it really ought to be good if so.

joat mon posted:

Yes, Fethullah Gülen. The same one Trump talked about offering to the Turks if they'd stop being mad at KSA.

joat mon posted:

Yes, Fethullah Gülen. The same one Trump talked about offering to the Turks if they'd stop being mad at KSA.

DoktorLoken posted:

Wasn’t Devin Nunes supposedly involved in the Gulen thing.

Vasudus posted:

driver sobbed after realizing it was a white woman more like