The Glumslinger posted:

It was turn them over or go to jail for contempt of congress

Mustached Demon posted:

I get the feeling we'll get a huge media bomb today. It'll be like mainlining heroin to us.

ReidRansom posted:

And despite Comet's various missteps and the mixed feelings about him around parts, he's a clever dude. He's not going to be dunked on easily.

Ekster posted:

I seriously believe there is a good chance that Trump is going to executive order Comey's testimony away at the last minute.

Maybe even right in the middle if that's even a possibility.

Ekster posted:

Then what were they talking about when they said Trump won't use an EO?

Ekster posted:

So it was never a possibility to begin with?

lol

Pellisworth posted:

Wasn't it that Trump was discussing his meetings with Comey on Twitter and stuff, so he can't invoke executive privilege?

Comstar posted:

And THERE IT IS. THE RUSSIAN CONNECTION. The man the President wants to be the FBI head's law firm is a consultant for Rosneft.

http://www.energyintel.com/pages/articlesummary/895380/us-firm-to-consult-rosneft-on-lng


And who, you may ask, is Rosneft? This article from 2 hours ago:

The Qatar Investment Authority and Glencore, the Swiss-based commodities giant, formed a partnership to buy the 19.5% stake in Russia's energy jewel at a time when Mr. Putin's government needed cash.

mdemone posted:

As before, new additions appear in bold; as-yet-unverified information now appears in italics.

The Players

Leonard Blavatnik is a Ukraine-born American businessman. He made his fortune through diversified investments in myriad companies through his conglomerate company, Access Industries. In 2015, he was named Britain's richest man with an estimated net worth of £17.1 billion as of April 2015. He and a friend from university, Viktor Vekselberg, joined with Mikhail Fridman's Alfa Group to form the AAR venture, which in 2011 was responsible for stopping the BP merger with Rosneft Oil, the Russian state-owned petrocorp (1). In March 2013, at Deutsche Bank in Frankfurt, there was a transfer of nearly $28 billion in U.S. currency from an account controlled by Rosneft, to one controlled by four Russian billionaires: Blavatnik, Vekselberg, Mikhail Fridman, and German Khan (2). Rosneft Chief Executive Igor Sechin, often described as Russia's second-most-powerful man, was the central figure behind the deal.

In addition to funding Trump's inauguration party, Blavatnik has long funded Mitch McConnell's super-PAC, the Senate Leadership Fund; see FEC filings showing donations of $1M in December 2015, $500k in April 2016, and $1M on October 25 2016; note that AI Altep is a shell company of Access Industries (3). Also notice that Stephen Schwarzman of Blackstone shows up for more than $2M on the October 25 filing, having also given $370k just one week prior. In October 2016, the dark-money super-PAC One Nation donates $11M to the Senate Leadership Fund, with which they share an office.

Following his election, Trump appointed as Secretary of Transportation Elaine Chao -- who is Mitch McConnell's wife and donated $42k to campaigns of Senators who would later vote on her confirmation, including her husband. During the Obama-Trump transition, McConnell had raised doubts about the CIA's report that Russian hacking affected the election, and made clear that "he would consider any effort by the Obama White House to challenge the Russians publicly an act of partisan politics" (4). In mid-2016, McConnell's brother-in-law Jim Breyer (husband of Chao's sister Angela, the CEO of the Bank of China, and a billionaire investor in his own right) joined the board of Schwarzman's Blackstone Group. Almost a year later, following a $110B+ arms deal brokered with Saudi Arabia by Jared Kushner, the Saudis subsequently announced a $20B+ investment into Blackstone Group for U.S. infrastructure. Blackstone, especially the real estate arm led by Jonathan Gray, has long been involved with Kushner's enterprises.

A handwritten ledger surfaced in Ukraine in 2016 with dollar amounts and dates next to the name of Paul Manafort, who was then Donald Trump’s campaign chairman. Ukrainian investigators called it evidence of off-the-books payments from a pro-Russian political party. Financial records confirmed that at least $1.2 million in payments listed in the ledger next to Manafort’s name were actually received by his consulting firm in the United States in 2007 and 2009 (5).

The Timeline

On June 14 2016, House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy and Speaker Paul Ryan have separate meetings with Ukrainian Prime Minister Vladimir Groysman, in which Groysman talks about Russia's financial support of populist politicians and their efforts to undermine democratic governments in Eastern Europe. The next day, McCarthy joked to Ryan and other GOP leaders that he thinks "Putin pays…Trump", after which Ryan laughs and tells the group not to leak the conversation (read the transcript here).

In August 2016, CIA Director John Brennan informs Congressional leadership (the Gang of Eight, as well as Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan) that Russia is intervening in the American election on behalf of Trump. On August 4 2016, Brennan confronts the head of Russia's FSB about the matter.

According to the famous "Steele Dossier" that comes to light in December 2016, one of Steele's inside sources describes the July 2016 meeting between Igor Sechin and Carter Page, Trump policy adviser from his campaign and foreign policy team. (In October, Russian experts would conclude that the inside source was probably a former KGB general, Oleg Erovinkin. In late December 2016, Erovinkin is found dead in his car.) According to the dossier, Sechin offers to broker a 19% sale of Rosneft to Trump's associates in return for the lifting of economic sanctions on Russia (image). Page has an audio recording of Trump promising to fulfill his end of the bargain. During the months of the general election, Trump's campaign has at least 18 undisclosed meetings/contacts with Russian officials.

On Election Day 2016, Stephen Schwarzman's housekeeper is pushed under a subway train (image, bottom]).

Following Trump's victory in November, the transition team quickly began moving to develop sanction relief for Russia, causing alarmed State Dept. officials to urge legislation codifying the sanctions. In early December, Kushner has a meeting with the Russian ambassador/spymaster Sergey Kislyak at Trump Tower, in which the men discuss the possibility of a secret back-channel for communications between the Trump team and the Kremlin.

In January 2017, 19.5% of Rosneft Oil is sold to a shell-of-shell-of-shell holding owned by (at the end of the chain) the trust company Intertrust [see the middle of image for holdings flowchart from Reuters, and tracing through shells from QHG to Intertrust]. Intertrust's major shareholder is Blackstone Group and therefore Stephen Schwarzman, who had been named chairman of the strategic and policy forum by Trump in December (he was offered a full-time role in the administration, but declined). Schwarzman now controls around 19% of Rosneft, as promised by Sechin, and has been seen with Trump at Mar-a-lago and many public events (image, bottom]).

On January 10 2017, Susan Rice, (Obama’s NSA), consults Michael Flynn about a plan to retake Raqqa from ISIS with the help of Syrian Kurdish forces. (The plan would have been executed under Trump, so Obama’s team wanted Flynn’s approval.) Flynn’s decision is to forestall the attack, an answer that happens to conform to the wishes of the Turkish government, which was benefiting from his lobbying work for which Flynn was paid at least $500,000. While Trump would eventually approve the military plan, Flynn’s decision 10 days before Trump took office delays the operation by several months. Flynn informs the Trump transition team that he is under investigation by the FBI for having been a foreign agent.

On January 27 2017, Donald Trump invites FBI Director James Comey to the White House for a private dinner, in which he asks for Comey's loyalty and assurances that there is no Russia investigation.

In February, Trump asks Pence and Sessions to leave the Oval Office before pressuring Comey again to drop the Flynn investigation; Comey writes a detailed memo about this conversation. In March, Trump asked the director of national intelligence and the director of the National Security Agency to make statements confirming that the investigation had cleared him.

In late March, Flynn requests immunity from the Senate Intelligence Committee and the FBI in return for his testimony; his lawyer claims he has "a story to tell". On April 1 2017, this request is denied.

On April 27 2017, the "Mayflower Meeting" is held, shortly before Trump's first foreign policy speech, having been organized by his campaign chair Paul Manafort and Kremlin-think-tank coordinator Jacob Heilbrunn. In the room are Jeff Sessions, Jared Kushner, and Manafort, along with ambassadors from Russia, Singapore, and the Philippines, and unidentified representatives from Rosneft. Trump's Secretary of Commerce is Wilbur Ross. He is the former vice-chair of the Bank of Cyprus, of which Vekselberg is the major shareholder. Ross, Schwarzman, Blavatnik, and McConnell/Chao would put together an $1T infrastructure plan that would depend on foreign money, as Chao admitted to Sean Hannity on Fox News on March 1 2017.

On May 9 2017, James Comey is fired as FBI Director, the week after he visited the "rocket docket" in federal court for the Eastern District of Virginia, and just days after he requested more resources for the Trump/Russia investigation. On May 10 2017, Trump meets with Russian FM Sergey Lavrov and Russian ambassador/spymaster Sergey Kislyak, in the Oval Office, without American press allowed but in the presence of Russian state media. At this meeting, Trump divulges code-word classified information from an Israeli intelligence source regarding the ISIS laptop-bomb plot; this source is said to be the most important double agent now working in ISIS, according to the Israeli Directorate of Military Intelligence (Aman). Trump also refers to Comey as a "nut job", and claims to the Russians that the investigation will be over now that Comey is gone (6). The same day of the Oval Office meeting with Russian diplomats, a federal grand jury in EDVA hands down multiple subpoenas for business/lobbying associates of former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn, regarding his foreign contacts in Russia (David Zaikin) and Turkey (Ekim Alptekin).

On May 11 2017, the Strategic Campaign Group's office is raided in Annapolis by the FBI and U.S. Marshals following the warrants handed down by EDVA from two separate grand juries, corresponding to ~25 indictments regarding money-laundering and many other charges. Less than a week later, former FBI Director Robert Mueller is appointed by the Deputy Attorney General to oversee the Russia investigation. In testimony before the House Intelligence Committee on May 23 2017, former CIA Director John Brennan verified that in August 2016 he had informed the Gang of Eight and others (including Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan) that Russia was intervening in the election on Trump's behalf.


References:
1. Yenikeyeff, Shamil, "BP, Russian billionaires, and the Kremlin: a Power Triangle that never was", Oxford Energy Comment, November 23, 2011
2. Vardi, Nathan, "The Four Horsemen of Russia's Economic Apocalypse", Forbes, February 9, 2015
3. SEC statement identifying Al Altep as a shell of Access Industries
4. Entous et al. "Secret CIA assessment says Russia was trying to help Trump win White House", Washington Post, December 9 2016
5. AP Exclusive: Manafort firm received Ukraine ledger payout
6. Apuzzo et al. "NYTimes, May 19 2017

Comstar posted:

How much money is 19% of Rosneft worth? Because Russia and Trump look to be trying to start a war (by putting pressure on Qatar) to get it back, cheap. That's the motive. Russia sold it to Qatar and wanted to get it back, and Trump was the man who can make it happen.

Flip Yr Wig posted:

Can someone remind me who, according to the original dossier, actually has access to the piss tape, and how the dossier's author knows about it?

titanium posted:

Re: The piss tape dossier, random poo poo doesnt just show up in there right? I mean they say unsubstantiated but it's not like they're going to brief the president on "hey some random dude on twitter said you touched some poop on the playground in 2014" there must be some reason this filtered up.

Night10194 posted:

It's also probably gonna get a great reaction out of him tomorrow.

Flesh Forge posted:

I've heard Comey's leaks are beneficent, and magnanimous

Sinteres posted:

Poor and old isn't a race, and some people will die in the long run as an indirect result of a policy isn't genocide.

Sinteres posted:

EwokEntourage posted:

It usually means trying to destroy an identifiable group of people

Sinteres posted:

I said it matters, it's just not loving genocide. Stupid slapfights demanding people to use incorrect terminology or they're the real Hitlers are unbelievably stupid.

Sinteres posted:

I said it matters, it's just not loving genocide. Stupid slapfights demanding people to use correct terminology or they're the real Hitlers are unbelievably stupid.

Trabisnikof posted:

Lol who cares about a piddly million dead when climate change will kill billions if we don't change our ways.

Rigel posted:

I'm constantly amazed at the silly poo poo that goons can fight about. And no, the AHCA is not genocide, that is loving absurd.

canepazzo posted:

When will this madness END?

https://twitter.com/StephenKing/status/874646427091251201

AhhYes posted:

Everything I'm seeing says the shooter is in custody.

ReidRansom posted:

I live in Texas and am very familiar with the country. Even in the country people don't usually just have their rifles in their car all the time.

Chilichimp posted:

Assuming it's a high-cap mag because he fired 50 shots is like assuming since I only bought 1 condom, I must be re-using it.

No Butt Stuff posted:

If the dude had any sort of tactical training at all, there's a good chance he can change magazines in less than 2 seconds. It doesn't have to be a high cap mag.

No Butt Stuff posted:

Putting a round center mass on a moving target is a lot harder than changing magazines.

BarbarianElephant posted:

Man, if these "jokes" were sick funny, it'd help me see you were all joking. No actual joke content so far.

Chilichimp posted:

50 shots, only 3 people hit? Shooter didn't even break the mendoza line.

Shifty Pony posted:

My favorite little tidbit about the roads at the VA/D.C. border is that the police patrolling the Pentagon make a really disproportionate number of DWI arrests. Drunks get confused by the exits and signage at the intersections of Jefferson Davis Hwy, the G.W. Parkway, the 14th St bridge, Columbia Pike, Washington Blvd, and 395 and once they make the wrong turn the one-way streets around the Pentagon baffle them to the point where the police have a good reason to pull them over.

Al Borland Corp. posted:

P sure he's talking about the Orange Julius Caesar thing

Serfer posted:

Weren't there rumors that there was evidence of Ryan and McConnell laundering Russian money into the GOP as well? I seem to recall that, but it may have been Louise Mensch craziness.

Kekekela posted:

This is what I was thinking also, but don't the logistics of having to find a non-recused AG willing to actually do the firing kind of tap the brakes on that?

evilweasel posted:

otoh he's now president so it sort of worked out

Leon Trotsky 2012 posted:

In the records they turned over to the FBI, her IT team says that when her old phone died that they remotely wiped all the data from it and smashed it with a hammer before disposing of it.

Blind Rasputin posted:

Where's that video of putin ogling that streaker protestor lady's breasts because that was a funny one.