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Fake America In 3 Tweets

by Oui Sun Jun 3rd, 2018 at 07:08:13 AM EST

What more do we need to say or analyze ... woefully disturbed and far off the mark for moral standing. America got its president to destroy the planet ... America First! Corrupt ... corrupt ... corrupt ...

Dinesh D'Souza: Why did Trump pardon the provocateur? | BBC News |

Donald Trump announced that he would use his presidential powers to pardon Dinesh D'Souza, who had pleaded guilty in 2014 for campaign finance law violations.

It marks the latest twist in the rise, fall and Trump-facilitated rehabilitation of the Indian-born conservative author, lecturer and all-around political provocateur.

It also is only the latest example of Mr Trump flexing his presidential powers in a way that is markedly different from his predecessors - and could have serious implications for US politics.

Continued below the fold ...


A conservative rising star

D'Souza first gained national prominence in the early 1980s as editor of the Dartmouth Review, a student-run conservative publication at the Ivy League university that was known for sometimes controversial, inflammatory or racially tinged articles and commentary.

After a stint in the Ronald Reagan Administration, D'Souza took a job in 1988 at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank, where he wrote a series of best-selling books condemning "political correctness" in academics, offering a somewhat sympathetic view of slavery and racial segregation in the US, and touting the benefits of free-market economics and American exceptionalism.

A conviction and a sharper edge

It was the Obama film, he claims, that led Manhattan-based US Attorney Preet Bharara to target him for prosecution in order to curry favour with the Obama administration. He said Bharara, and US Attorney General Eric Holder, were part of an Obama "team of goons" unleashed on him.

Mr Bharara, in a September 2014 statement, said D'Souza had wilfully undermined "the integrity of the campaign finance process" and "had to answer for this crime".

    Preet Bharara, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced today that DINESH D'SOUZA was sentenced in Manhattan federal court to five years of probation, with eight months during the first year to be served in a community confinement center, after having pled guilty to violating the federal campaign election law by making illegal contributions to a United States Senate campaign in the names of others. D'SOUZA was sentenced today before U.S. District Judge Richard M. Berman.

    Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara stated: "Dinesh D'Souza attempted to illegally contribute over $10,000 to a Senate campaign, wilfully undermining the integrity of the campaign finance process. Like many others before him, of all political stripes, he has had to answer for this crime - here with a felony conviction."

In recent years D'Souza has occasionally attracted attention - and scorn - for controversial statements and tweets.

RACIAL AMERICA - SLAVERY IN ANY FORM IS PART OF ITS DNA, ITS FOUNDING! RELIGION PLAYS A ROLE!

Founding Fathers and Slaveholders | Smitsonian Institute |  

Know your history: Understanding racism in the US | Al Jazeera |

The Pendulum

The history of people of African descent in America - which is to say the history of America - is a pendulum of progress and setbacks, of resilience and retaliation, of protest and backlash. There have been allies and there have been opponents. There have been demagogues, who would divide Americans on the basis of colour and class, and visionaries who would seek to lead us to common ground.

The quest for "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" has been an American aspiration since the Declaration of Independence, but black Americans, Native Americans and women were not at the table in 1776. Forty of the 56 signers owned other people.

 
A colour-coded map illustrates the 'Free States,' 'Slave Holding States,' and 'Territories Open To Slavery Under The Principle Of Popular Sovereignty,'. It was published in 1898  [Getty Images]

America please stop wrecking other nations, work to make America a better place for ALL of its citizens.

US Foreign Policy from Crisis to Crisis

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Clinton's pardon of Marc Rich was something completely different, of course.
by gk (gk (gk quattro due due sette @gmail.com)) on Sun Jun 3rd, 2018 at 12:05:44 PM EST
by Oui (Oui) on Sun Jun 3rd, 2018 at 12:56:53 PM EST
[ Parent ]
I guess because Clinton pardoned Marc Rich, Trmp can pardon D'Souza and neither can be criticized for either decision on any grounds because it's simply tit for tat.  Both sides and, "After all, it's only Chinatown, Jake."

Always found this to be a silly argument with no logical basis.  If you think Clinton had no real justification for pardoning Marc Rich, argue that.  If you think Trmp has real justification for pardoning D'Souza, argue that.  To justify D'Souza's pardon because Clinton pardoned Rich is silly and beside the point entirely.

Solar IS Civil Defense

by gmoke on Mon Jun 4th, 2018 at 05:30:58 PM EST
[ Parent ]
The truth is, the US Constitution does not limit the power. No SCOTUS has proscribed the power; in fact it has repeatedly defended the purposes of a pardon, including imposition on unknown defendants, unwilling defendants and felons. Also, the odious has never impeached a POTUS over a pardon. There is no reason to expect any session ever will.

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.
by Cat on Mon Jun 4th, 2018 at 08:57:03 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Here is a spectacular example of "Fake America" outrage, a veritable cornucopia of self-serving intrigues dished by presidents.
Bush Pardons Weinberger in Iran-Contra Affair
Asked about the pardons at a news conference in Little Rock, Ark., President-electClinton said: "I am concerned by any action which sends a signal that if you work for the government you're above the law, or that not telling the truth to Congress, under oath, is somehow less serious than not telling the truth to some other body, under oath." But he said he would withhold further comment until he knew "all the details" of the pardons.
Ed Meese
Asked if he could envision any circumstances under which he would ask [ATTY GEN] Meese to leave, the president said, "Well, if he had a complete change of character."
ewww


Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.
by Cat on Mon Jun 4th, 2018 at 09:19:33 PM EST
[ Parent ]
I reiterate:
To justify D'Souza's pardon because Clinton pardoned Rich is silly and beside the point entirely.

I'm guessing within the next few months we will have a deeper debate on the limits, if there are any, of Presidential pardon power but that was not the argument I was replying to or making.  Please see above reiteration for that.

Solar IS Civil Defense

by gmoke on Tue Jun 5th, 2018 at 07:46:25 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Much research has passed through decades of controversial presidential pardons. When becomes power to pardon abuse of such power and what motivates a President. In the past, this research is a a good starting point. For Trump, it's simply his mood as a psychiatric Dark Triad to either embarrass the former President Barack Obama or to meet the urges of the masses that voted for him in 2016. Trump feels obliged to keep his promises to his voters as is also seen in foreign policy, Trump is true to his big sponsors and corporations, the pro-Israel lobby in alliance with the Gulf States minus Qatar.

The case of Marc Rich, a lot has been written and U.S. Congress of 2001 has spend was time in this subject without any reform whatsoever.

Abuse of the Pardon Power: A Legal and Economic Perspective

'Sapere aude'

by Oui (Oui) on Tue Jun 5th, 2018 at 09:29:23 PM EST
[ Parent ]
I don't think we were justifying anything. But the article presented Trump's pardons as a unique evil, whereas plenty of other presidents have done similar things. Maybe Trump's stand out as being stupidly done in the middle of his term, where they may affect subsequent elections, whereas Clinton waited to the end, when they would only harm his wife.
by gk (gk (gk quattro due due sette @gmail.com)) on Wed Jun 6th, 2018 at 06:35:51 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Robert Fisk has taken up opposition to Assad Law No. 10 with fresh vigor ... and a razor to his own wrists. In this month's episode of Simile Suicide, he compares claims to property rights ("mass property expulsion") by Syrian and Palestinian refugees (in EU, Lebanon, Turkey) to Nakba and "displacement" of Dresden and Stalingrad to firebombing by WWII Allies.
Syria's New Housing Law [?] Will Displace Tens of Thousands of Refugees, But Even That Won't Help the Regime Win the War, a non sequitor
Even inside their borders, many Syrians claim that it will strip tens of thousands of citizens of their homes - especially in those pulverised districts of the country's big cities which have been turned into miniature Stalingrads and Dresdens by years of fighting. And it will benefit the regime - author of the law - since all unclaimed property will become the property of the state. Is this the way to bring about the "reconciliation" which the Russians, the Syrian state itself and its supporters talk about so emotionally?
Surprising no one, he cannot offer any model resettlement scheme by any state bureaucracy at any time. Not even Zimbabwe, eh.

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.
by Cat on Mon Jun 4th, 2018 at 02:46:34 PM EST
See also my archived diary ...

Article 10 - Syrian Property Law

That Land is Theirs by eileen fleming on March 30, 2007

This March 30th marks the 31st year Palestinians throughout the world remember Land Day or 'Youm al-Ard' in Arabic. On March 30, 1976, in the Galilee, during a peaceful protest, six unarmed Palestinians were killed by the Israeli army and police, who also injured 96 others and arrested over 300.

The demonstration was prompted after Israeli authorities announced the confiscation of a total of 5,500 acres of land from Palestinian villages in the Galilee , and classified them as "closed military zones."

The numbers of Palestinians getting killed by Israeli sniperfire has increased dramatically ... thank you USA and the Trump cabal!
Gaza Massacre by the Jewish State of Israel

Palestinian woman killed by IDF fire in Gaza border clashes | Ynet News |

PA news agency reports Razan Ashraf Najjar, 21, a volunteer paramedic, was killed while 'providing first aid to wounded' as March of Return protests resume near Gaza Strip border fence.

Razan Ashraf Najjar was shot as she "ran toward the fortified border fence", east of the south Gaza city of Khan Yunis, in a bid to reach a casualty, a witness said.

Wearing a white uniform, "she raised her hands high in a clear way, but Israeli soldiers fired and she was hit in the chest," the witness, who requested anonymity, told Reuters.

'My daughter was a target': Gaza grieves for paramedic killed by Israel

US vetoes UN resolution on 'protection' for Palestinians
Jerusalem as the Zionists See It's Future

'Sapere aude'

by Oui (Oui) on Tue Jun 5th, 2018 at 05:37:23 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Thousands of refugees to return to Syria from Lebanon soon
Possession is 9/10 the law
~ ancient Afro-'merican saying

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.
by Cat on Thu Jun 7th, 2018 at 08:56:59 PM EST
[ Parent ]
A criminal immigrant gets a Trump pardon.  Rethuglicans don't understand irony, but they sure live it.
by rifek on Mon Jun 4th, 2018 at 11:39:28 PM EST
America please stop wrecking other nations, work to make America a better place for ALL of its citizens.

This country was created by wrecking other nations and imposing inequality.

by rifek on Mon Jun 4th, 2018 at 11:41:23 PM EST
GAHBLESS David Swanson!

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.
by Cat on Sun Jun 17th, 2018 at 02:08:38 PM EST
[ Parent ]
o. snap.*
Indicted Russian Firm Demands Grand Jury Records, motions
In its bid late last month to have U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich review the grand jury instructions in her chambers, Concord argued that they could provide a basis for dismissing the single count it faces, conspiracy to defraud the United States.
[...]
Special counsel prosecutor Jeannie Rhee objected to Concord's request on June 1, arguing that D.C. Circuit precedent forecloses review of the grand jury instructions. Rhee also said Concord had failed to present a compelling need to break grand jury secrecy.

But in a 7-page reply on Friday Concord says Mueller has admitted not following Justice Department guidelines when he indicted the case as a "knowing" rather than "willful" violation of law, a requirement Concord says is necessary for the charge to move forward.

"We now know for certain that the Special Counsel failed to follow Department of Justice guidelines and failed to heed the warnings of a three-judge panel of this Court in his attempt to evade the burden of proving that these foreign defendants had knowledge of the law and regulations they are accused of violating," the brief says.

*Has anyone beside myself noticed how many female jurists and attys, in multiple venues of the court, have been "liberated" and "empowered" by Mr Mueller's industry in the matter of "meddling and interference"? Gracious. Where did they come from? Let's ask the $20M-news-presenter!

archived
"no such crime exists in the federal criminal code"
The Battle over the Scope of Rule 17(c) Subpoenas, 9-11.120 - Power of a Grand Jury Limited by Its Function, 9-11.140 - Limitation on Grand Jury Subpoenas, 28 U.S. Code § 594 - Authority and duties of an independent counsel, &tc
"fishing for state witnesses to corroborate a conspiracy to commit WHAT CRIME?"
Spy Memo and Political Double Talk [Update]
18 USC 2,371,2349,2028A

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

by Cat on Mon Jun 11th, 2018 at 02:03:02 AM EST
Rhee's response --to refuse disclosure of charges-- is kinda Tory-ish.

On the one hand, admitting that Mueller did not charge Concord for failing to register under FARA; on the other and in any event, that Concord did defraud US gov by evading US gov'w complex collection of US taxes or... perhaps that's "fees"? or... a "penalty"? in the manner of a Individual Responsibility incentive or ... "custom duty"? imputed from ahh exports of goods by 13 foreign-nationals whom Concord may or may not have employed before its incorporation or ... intent (mens rea) to incorporate.

huh

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

by Cat on Mon Jun 11th, 2018 at 02:44:18 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Cops Perform Guns-Drawn Raid Of Chelsea Manning's Home Because Someone Reported Her Suicidal Tweets
The story here is unique in that it didn't end in death, a violent arrest, or something else not even roughly aligned with the idea of community caretaking. But that's possibly due to the fact no one was home.
[...]
The responding agency -- the Montgomery County [MD]  Police -- appears to know this isn't the proper response. Its first reaction when reached for comment was to accuse The Intercept of posting a possibly-unauthentic video. Police Captain Paul Starks also questioned The Intercept's facts, asking how it knew "no one was home."

Then he defended the guns-first approach to community caretaking.



Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.
by Cat on Mon Jun 11th, 2018 at 03:21:40 AM EST


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