Trumps Indictment: Historical and Future Implications II
February 16, 2024
HEATHER COX RICHARDSON
FEB 17, 2024
At the Munich Security Conference, where leaders from more than 70 countries gather annually in Germany to discuss international security policy, Vice President Kamala Harris today responded to Trump’s recent attacks on America’s global leadership with a full-throated defense of global engagement.
People around the world have reason to wonder if the United States is committed to global leadership, she acknowledged. Americans, she said, must also ask themselves “[w]hether it is in America’s interest to continue to engage with the world or to turn inward. Whether it is in our interest to defend longstanding rules and norms that have provided for unprecedented peace and prosperity or to allow them to be trampled. Whether it is in America’s interest to fight for democracy or to accept the rise of dictators. And whether it is in America’s interest to continue to work in lockstep with our allies and partners or go it alone.”
Harris spoke at least in part to people at home, saying that upholding international rules and democratic values “makes America strong, and it keeps Americans safe.” Isolating ourselves and embracing dictators while we “abandon commitments to our allies in favor of unilateral action” is “dangerous, destabilizing, and indeed short-sighted,” she said. “That view would weaken America and would undermine global stability and undermine global prosperity.”
The Biden administration’s approach to global engagement is not “based on the virtues of charity,” Harris said, but rather is based on the nation’s strategic interest. “Our leadership keeps our homeland safe, supports American jobs, secures supply chains, and opens new markets for American goods. And I firmly believe,” she added, “our commitment to build and sustain alliances has helped America become the most powerful and prosperous country in the world—alliances that have prevented wars, defended freedom, and maintained stability from Europe to the Indo-Pacific. To put all of that at risk would be foolish.”
Turning to the defense of Ukraine in the face of Russia’s invasion, she said: “we have joined forces with our friends and allies to stand up for freedom and democracy…. The world has come together, with leadership from the United States, to defend the basic principles of sovereignty and territorial integrity and to stop an imperialist authoritarian from subjugating a free and democratic people.”
The European Union has recently committed $54 billion to support Ukraine in addition to “the more than $100 billion our European allies and partners have already dedicated,” she said, noting that that support makes it clear that Europe will stand with Ukraine.
“I will make clear President Joe Biden and I stand with Ukraine,” Harris said. “In partnership with supportive, bipartisan majorities in both houses of the United States Congress, we will work to secure critical weapons and resources that Ukraine so badly needs. And let me be clear: The failure to do so would be a gift to Vladimir Putin.”
“If we fail to impose severe consequences on Russia” for its invasion of Ukraine, she warned, “other authoritarians across the globe would be emboldened, because you see, they will be watching…and drawing lessons. “In these unsettled times, it is clear,” she said. “America cannot retreat. America must stand strong for democracy. We must stand in defense of international rules and norms, and we must stand with our allies.”
“[T]he American people will meet this moment,” Vice President Harris said, “and America will continue to lead.”
News that arrived just before Harris began to speak underscored her argument: Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny has died in a Russian prison a day after being recorded on video in court, seemingly healthy. Navalny’s crusade against Putin’s corruption had led Putin to try repeatedly to murder him, then finally in 2021 to imprison him on trumped-up charges. Navalny’s widow, Yulia Navalnaya, took the stage after Harris and vowed that Vladimir Putin and his allies “will be brought to justice, and this day will come soon.”
Russian elections will be held next month, and while Putin is assumed to be the certain victor, his recent disqualification of Boris Nadezhdin, who was running on a platform that opposed the Ukraine war, suggests he is concerned about opposition. Eliminating Navalny at this moment sends a warning to other Russians that, as Anne Applebaum noted in a piece today in The Atlantic, courage in opposing Putin is pointless.
In the U.S., Navalny’s apparent murder creates a political problem for Republicans. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-LA) yesterday recessed the House for two weeks without taking up the national security supplemental bill that would support Ukraine in its fight against Russia, just as its supplies are running out.
On Saturday, former president Trump told an audience he would encourage Russia to “do whatever the hell they want” to NATO countries that are not devoting 2% of their gross domestic product to building up their militaries. Meanwhile, former Fox News Channel personality Tucker Carlson has been in Moscow, interviewing Putin and favorably comparing Russia to the United States.
On Monday, in Dubai, Egyptian journalist Emad El Din Adeeb asked Carlson why, when interviewing Putin, he “did not talk about Navalny, about assassinations, about restrictions on opposition in the coming elections.” Carlson replied by equating Russia and the U.S., saying: “Every leader kills people…. Some kill more than others. Leadership requires killing people.”
The death of Navalny at just this moment appears to tie the Republicans to Putin’s murderous regime, and party leaders scrambled today to distance themselves from Putin. House speaker Mike Johnson, who has resisted passing aid to Ukraine and insisted the House would not be “rushed” into passing such a measure, released a statement saying that “as international leaders are meeting in Munich, we must be clear that Putin will be met with united opposition…. [T]he United States, and our partners, must be using every means available to cut off Putin’s ability to fund his unprovoked war in Ukraine and aggression against the Baltic states.”
Republicans trying to carve out distance between themselves and Trump’s MAGA Republicans used the occasion to call out MAGAs, saying, as former vice president Mike Pence did, “There is no room in the Republican Party for apologists for Putin.” Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina, who has pushed hard for Ukraine aid, wrote: “Putin is a murderous, paranoid dictator. History will not be kind to those in America who make apologies for Putin and praise Russian autocracy. Nor will history be kind to America’s leaders who stay silent because they fear backlash from online pundits.”
Navalny attacked the Putin regime by calling attention to its extraordinary corruption, and somewhat fittingly, the corruption of former president Donald Trump, who won the White House with Putin’s help, was also on the docket today.
Cont below
HEATHER COX RICHARDSON
FEB 17, 2024
At the Munich Security Conference, where leaders from more than 70 countries gather annually in Germany to discuss international security policy, Vice President Kamala Harris today responded to Trump’s recent attacks on America’s global leadership with a full-throated defense of global engagement.
People around the world have reason to wonder if the United States is committed to global leadership, she acknowledged. Americans, she said, must also ask themselves “[w]hether it is in America’s interest to continue to engage with the world or to turn inward. Whether it is in our interest to defend longstanding rules and norms that have provided for unprecedented peace and prosperity or to allow them to be trampled. Whether it is in America’s interest to fight for democracy or to accept the rise of dictators. And whether it is in America’s interest to continue to work in lockstep with our allies and partners or go it alone.”
Harris spoke at least in part to people at home, saying that upholding international rules and democratic values “makes America strong, and it keeps Americans safe.” Isolating ourselves and embracing dictators while we “abandon commitments to our allies in favor of unilateral action” is “dangerous, destabilizing, and indeed short-sighted,” she said. “That view would weaken America and would undermine global stability and undermine global prosperity.”
The Biden administration’s approach to global engagement is not “based on the virtues of charity,” Harris said, but rather is based on the nation’s strategic interest. “Our leadership keeps our homeland safe, supports American jobs, secures supply chains, and opens new markets for American goods. And I firmly believe,” she added, “our commitment to build and sustain alliances has helped America become the most powerful and prosperous country in the world—alliances that have prevented wars, defended freedom, and maintained stability from Europe to the Indo-Pacific. To put all of that at risk would be foolish.”
Turning to the defense of Ukraine in the face of Russia’s invasion, she said: “we have joined forces with our friends and allies to stand up for freedom and democracy…. The world has come together, with leadership from the United States, to defend the basic principles of sovereignty and territorial integrity and to stop an imperialist authoritarian from subjugating a free and democratic people.”
The European Union has recently committed $54 billion to support Ukraine in addition to “the more than $100 billion our European allies and partners have already dedicated,” she said, noting that that support makes it clear that Europe will stand with Ukraine.
“I will make clear President Joe Biden and I stand with Ukraine,” Harris said. “In partnership with supportive, bipartisan majorities in both houses of the United States Congress, we will work to secure critical weapons and resources that Ukraine so badly needs. And let me be clear: The failure to do so would be a gift to Vladimir Putin.”
“If we fail to impose severe consequences on Russia” for its invasion of Ukraine, she warned, “other authoritarians across the globe would be emboldened, because you see, they will be watching…and drawing lessons. “In these unsettled times, it is clear,” she said. “America cannot retreat. America must stand strong for democracy. We must stand in defense of international rules and norms, and we must stand with our allies.”
“[T]he American people will meet this moment,” Vice President Harris said, “and America will continue to lead.”
News that arrived just before Harris began to speak underscored her argument: Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny has died in a Russian prison a day after being recorded on video in court, seemingly healthy. Navalny’s crusade against Putin’s corruption had led Putin to try repeatedly to murder him, then finally in 2021 to imprison him on trumped-up charges. Navalny’s widow, Yulia Navalnaya, took the stage after Harris and vowed that Vladimir Putin and his allies “will be brought to justice, and this day will come soon.”
Russian elections will be held next month, and while Putin is assumed to be the certain victor, his recent disqualification of Boris Nadezhdin, who was running on a platform that opposed the Ukraine war, suggests he is concerned about opposition. Eliminating Navalny at this moment sends a warning to other Russians that, as Anne Applebaum noted in a piece today in The Atlantic, courage in opposing Putin is pointless.
In the U.S., Navalny’s apparent murder creates a political problem for Republicans. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-LA) yesterday recessed the House for two weeks without taking up the national security supplemental bill that would support Ukraine in its fight against Russia, just as its supplies are running out.
On Saturday, former president Trump told an audience he would encourage Russia to “do whatever the hell they want” to NATO countries that are not devoting 2% of their gross domestic product to building up their militaries. Meanwhile, former Fox News Channel personality Tucker Carlson has been in Moscow, interviewing Putin and favorably comparing Russia to the United States.
On Monday, in Dubai, Egyptian journalist Emad El Din Adeeb asked Carlson why, when interviewing Putin, he “did not talk about Navalny, about assassinations, about restrictions on opposition in the coming elections.” Carlson replied by equating Russia and the U.S., saying: “Every leader kills people…. Some kill more than others. Leadership requires killing people.”
The death of Navalny at just this moment appears to tie the Republicans to Putin’s murderous regime, and party leaders scrambled today to distance themselves from Putin. House speaker Mike Johnson, who has resisted passing aid to Ukraine and insisted the House would not be “rushed” into passing such a measure, released a statement saying that “as international leaders are meeting in Munich, we must be clear that Putin will be met with united opposition…. [T]he United States, and our partners, must be using every means available to cut off Putin’s ability to fund his unprovoked war in Ukraine and aggression against the Baltic states.”
Republicans trying to carve out distance between themselves and Trump’s MAGA Republicans used the occasion to call out MAGAs, saying, as former vice president Mike Pence did, “There is no room in the Republican Party for apologists for Putin.” Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina, who has pushed hard for Ukraine aid, wrote: “Putin is a murderous, paranoid dictator. History will not be kind to those in America who make apologies for Putin and praise Russian autocracy. Nor will history be kind to America’s leaders who stay silent because they fear backlash from online pundits.”
Navalny attacked the Putin regime by calling attention to its extraordinary corruption, and somewhat fittingly, the corruption of former president Donald Trump, who won the White House with Putin’s help, was also on the docket today.
Cont below
Cont from above
In Manhattan, in the case concerning Trump and the Trump Organization’s manipulation of financial statements in order to get better loan terms and to pay fewer taxes, Justice Arthur Engoron ordered Trump and the Trump Organization to disgorge about $355 million in ill-gotten gains as well as more than $98 million in interest on that money from the time Trump obtained it through fraud. The total came to just under $454 million. Engoron also barred Trump from running a business or applying for a loan in New York for three years. The judge ordered Trump’s sons Donald Jr. and Eric to pay more than $4 million each and barred them from serving as officers or directors of any New York corporation or legal entity for two years.
“[D]efendants submitted blatantly false financial data to…accountants,” Engoron wrote, “resulting in fraudulent financial statements. When confronted at trial with the statements, defendants’ fact and expert witnesses simply denied reality, and defendants failed to accept responsibility….” Engoron detailed the reluctance of the Trumps, including Ivanka, to tell the truth on the witness stand, and concluded: “Their complete lack of contrition and remorse borders on pathological.”
New York attorney general Letitia James, who brought the lawsuit, commented: “Donald Trump is finally facing accountability for his lying, cheating, and staggering fraud. Because no matter how big, rich, or powerful you think you are, no one is above the law.”
In his 2022 documentary about Alexei Navalny, director Daniel Roher asked Navalny what message he would leave for the Russian people if he were killed. “Listen,” Navalny answered. “I’ve got something very obvious to tell you. You’re not allowed to give up. If they decide to kill me, it means that we are incredibly strong. We need to utilize this power to not give up, to remember we are a huge power that is being oppressed by these bad dudes. We don’t realize how strong we actually are.”
—
Notes: https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/february-16-2024
Reminder, I am now reading the letters the morning after I post them. They are available at Substack, Apple Podcasts, and now Spotify, linked here:
In Manhattan, in the case concerning Trump and the Trump Organization’s manipulation of financial statements in order to get better loan terms and to pay fewer taxes, Justice Arthur Engoron ordered Trump and the Trump Organization to disgorge about $355 million in ill-gotten gains as well as more than $98 million in interest on that money from the time Trump obtained it through fraud. The total came to just under $454 million. Engoron also barred Trump from running a business or applying for a loan in New York for three years. The judge ordered Trump’s sons Donald Jr. and Eric to pay more than $4 million each and barred them from serving as officers or directors of any New York corporation or legal entity for two years.
“[D]efendants submitted blatantly false financial data to…accountants,” Engoron wrote, “resulting in fraudulent financial statements. When confronted at trial with the statements, defendants’ fact and expert witnesses simply denied reality, and defendants failed to accept responsibility….” Engoron detailed the reluctance of the Trumps, including Ivanka, to tell the truth on the witness stand, and concluded: “Their complete lack of contrition and remorse borders on pathological.”
New York attorney general Letitia James, who brought the lawsuit, commented: “Donald Trump is finally facing accountability for his lying, cheating, and staggering fraud. Because no matter how big, rich, or powerful you think you are, no one is above the law.”
In his 2022 documentary about Alexei Navalny, director Daniel Roher asked Navalny what message he would leave for the Russian people if he were killed. “Listen,” Navalny answered. “I’ve got something very obvious to tell you. You’re not allowed to give up. If they decide to kill me, it means that we are incredibly strong. We need to utilize this power to not give up, to remember we are a huge power that is being oppressed by these bad dudes. We don’t realize how strong we actually are.”
—
Notes: https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/february-16-2024
Reminder, I am now reading the letters the morning after I post them. They are available at Substack, Apple Podcasts, and now Spotify, linked here:
CIA PANICS Over Missing Binder, RAIDS Trump Over It According To New Theory
https://youtu.be/JA3IhDNx3SE?si=TCeLp4UAVRmRobZW
https://youtu.be/JA3IhDNx3SE?si=TCeLp4UAVRmRobZW
How white liberals have adopted blacks as their mascots...Thomas Sowell
https://youtu.be/n9vv6xiacp8?si=fsfUPp1DTPYS_Aa0
https://youtu.be/n9vv6xiacp8?si=fsfUPp1DTPYS_Aa0
As far as the so called "fraud" from Biden sucker New York injustice system....First of all it will be overturned in appeal like the so called defamation suit.
Who supposedly gets the money?
The bank testified FOR Trump, stating the Lawfare waged by Nazi Democrats was "unfounded"
So who gets the money?
If the banks were paid and happy and did not bring the suit to begin with...who was the victim?
Justice is the victim. All destroyed by piece of shit democrat lawyers and their sycophantic cult of Biden/Obama ...
Interesting that in the rape lawsuit, of which Trump was found not guilty, New York changed the law to allow the fake charge and that New rule will expire in 6 months...
Why did they change a law just for this case that will revert back to the old law in 6 months?
The same reason states changed their election laws to cheat and install Biden in 2020 , to then change them back after the election...
History marks corruption...This will be in the history books with the rest of the skullduggery done by the Jim Crows....That is, if we allow that party to even exist...
Who supposedly gets the money?
The bank testified FOR Trump, stating the Lawfare waged by Nazi Democrats was "unfounded"
So who gets the money?
If the banks were paid and happy and did not bring the suit to begin with...who was the victim?
Justice is the victim. All destroyed by piece of shit democrat lawyers and their sycophantic cult of Biden/Obama ...
Interesting that in the rape lawsuit, of which Trump was found not guilty, New York changed the law to allow the fake charge and that New rule will expire in 6 months...
Why did they change a law just for this case that will revert back to the old law in 6 months?
The same reason states changed their election laws to cheat and install Biden in 2020 , to then change them back after the election...
History marks corruption...This will be in the history books with the rest of the skullduggery done by the Jim Crows....That is, if we allow that party to even exist...
February 17, 2024
HEATHER COX RICHARDSON
FEB 17, 2024
Although few Americans paid much attention at the time, the events of February 18, 2014, in Ukraine would turn out to be a linchpin in how the United States ended up where it is a decade later.
On that day ten years ago, after months of what started as peaceful protests, Ukrainians occupied government buildings and marched on parliament to remove Russian-backed president Viktor Yanukovych from office. After the escalating violence resulted in many civilian casualties, Yanukovych fled to Russia, and the Maidan Revolution, also known as the Revolution of Dignity, returned power to Ukraine’s constitution.
The ouster of Yanukovych meant that American political consultant Paul Manafort was out of a job.
Manafort had worked with Yanukovych since 2004. In that year, the Russian-backed politician appeared to have won the presidency of Ukraine. But Yanukovych was rumored to have ties to organized crime, and the election was full of fraud, including the poisoning of a key rival who wanted to break ties with Russia and align Ukraine with Europe. The U.S. government and other international observers did not recognize the election results, while Russia’s president Vladimir Putin congratulated Yanukovych even before the results were officially announced.
The government voided the election and called for a do-over.
To rehabilitate his reputation, Yanukovych turned to Manafort, who was already working for a young Russian billionaire, Oleg Deripaska. Deripaska worried that Ukraine would break free of Russian influence and was eager to prove useful to Vladimir Putin. At the time, Putin was trying to consolidate power in Russia, where oligarchs were monopolizing formerly publicly held industries and replacing the region’s communist leaders. In 2004, American journalist Paul Klebnikov, the chief editor of Forbes in Russia, was murdered as he tried to call attention to what the oligarchs were doing.
With Manafort’s help, Yanukovych finally won the presidency in 2010 and began to turn Ukraine toward Russia. In November 2013, Yanukovych suddenly reversed Ukraine’s course toward cooperation with the European Union, refusing to sign a trade agreement and instead taking a $3 billion loan from Russia. Ukrainian students protested the decision, and the anger spread quickly. In 2014, after months of popular protests, Ukrainians ousted Yanukovych from power and he fled to Russia.
Manafort, who had borrowed money from Deripaska and still owed him about $17 million, had lost his main source of income.
Shortly after Yanukovych’s ouster, Russia invaded Ukraine’s Crimea and annexed it, prompting the United States and the European Union to impose economic sanctions on Russia itself and also on specific Russian businesses and oligarchs, prohibiting them from doing business in U.S. territories. These sanctions were intended to weaken Russia and froze the assets of key Russian oligarchs.
By 2016, Manafort’s longtime friend and business partner Roger Stone—they had both worked on Richard Nixon’s 1972 campaign—was advising Trump’s floundering presidential campaign, and Manafort was happy to step in to help remake it. He did not take a salary but reached out to Deripaska through one of his Ukrainian business partners, Konstantin Kilimnik, immediately after landing the job, asking him, “How do we use to get whole? Has OVD [Oleg Vladimirovich Deripaska] operation seen?”
Manafort began as an advisor to the Trump campaign in March 2016 and became the chairman in late June.
Thanks to journalist Jim Rutenberg, who pulled together testimony given both to the Mueller investigation and the Republican-dominated Senate Intelligence Committee, transcripts from the impeachment hearings, and recent memoirs, we now know that in 2016, Russian operatives presented Manafort a plan “for the creation of an autonomous republic in Ukraine’s east, giving Putin effective control of the country’s industrial heartland, where Kremlin-armed, -funded, and -directed ‘separatists’ were waging a two-year-old shadow war that had left nearly 10,000 dead.”
In exchange for weakening NATO, undermining the U.S. stance in favor of Ukraine in its attempt to throw off the Russians who had invaded in 2014, and removing U.S. sanctions from Russian entities, Russian operatives were willing to help Trump win the White House. The Republican-dominated Senate Intelligence Committee in 2020 established that Manafort’s Ukrainian business partner Kilimnik, whom it described as a “Russian intelligence officer,” acted as a liaison between Manafort and Deripaska while Manafort ran Trump’s campaign.
Now, ten years later, Putin has invaded Ukraine in an effort that when it began looked much like the one his operatives suggested to Manafort in 2016, Trump has said he would “encourage Russia to do whatever they hell they want” to NATO allies that don’t commit 2% of their gross domestic product to their militaries, and Trump MAGA Republicans are refusing to pass a measure to support Ukraine in its effort to throw off Russia’s invasion.
The day after the violence of February 18, 2014, in Ukraine, then–vice president Joe Biden called Yanukovych to “express grave concern regarding the crisis on the streets” and to urge him “to pull back government forces and to exercise maximum restraint.”
Ten years later, Russia has been at open war with Ukraine for nearly two years and has just regained control of the key town of Avdiivka because Ukrainian troops lack ammunition. President Joe Biden is warning MAGA Republicans that “[t]he failure to support Ukraine at this critical moment will never be forgotten.”
“History is watching,” he said.
—
Notes: https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/february-17-2024
HEATHER COX RICHARDSON
FEB 17, 2024
Although few Americans paid much attention at the time, the events of February 18, 2014, in Ukraine would turn out to be a linchpin in how the United States ended up where it is a decade later.
On that day ten years ago, after months of what started as peaceful protests, Ukrainians occupied government buildings and marched on parliament to remove Russian-backed president Viktor Yanukovych from office. After the escalating violence resulted in many civilian casualties, Yanukovych fled to Russia, and the Maidan Revolution, also known as the Revolution of Dignity, returned power to Ukraine’s constitution.
The ouster of Yanukovych meant that American political consultant Paul Manafort was out of a job.
Manafort had worked with Yanukovych since 2004. In that year, the Russian-backed politician appeared to have won the presidency of Ukraine. But Yanukovych was rumored to have ties to organized crime, and the election was full of fraud, including the poisoning of a key rival who wanted to break ties with Russia and align Ukraine with Europe. The U.S. government and other international observers did not recognize the election results, while Russia’s president Vladimir Putin congratulated Yanukovych even before the results were officially announced.
The government voided the election and called for a do-over.
To rehabilitate his reputation, Yanukovych turned to Manafort, who was already working for a young Russian billionaire, Oleg Deripaska. Deripaska worried that Ukraine would break free of Russian influence and was eager to prove useful to Vladimir Putin. At the time, Putin was trying to consolidate power in Russia, where oligarchs were monopolizing formerly publicly held industries and replacing the region’s communist leaders. In 2004, American journalist Paul Klebnikov, the chief editor of Forbes in Russia, was murdered as he tried to call attention to what the oligarchs were doing.
With Manafort’s help, Yanukovych finally won the presidency in 2010 and began to turn Ukraine toward Russia. In November 2013, Yanukovych suddenly reversed Ukraine’s course toward cooperation with the European Union, refusing to sign a trade agreement and instead taking a $3 billion loan from Russia. Ukrainian students protested the decision, and the anger spread quickly. In 2014, after months of popular protests, Ukrainians ousted Yanukovych from power and he fled to Russia.
Manafort, who had borrowed money from Deripaska and still owed him about $17 million, had lost his main source of income.
Shortly after Yanukovych’s ouster, Russia invaded Ukraine’s Crimea and annexed it, prompting the United States and the European Union to impose economic sanctions on Russia itself and also on specific Russian businesses and oligarchs, prohibiting them from doing business in U.S. territories. These sanctions were intended to weaken Russia and froze the assets of key Russian oligarchs.
By 2016, Manafort’s longtime friend and business partner Roger Stone—they had both worked on Richard Nixon’s 1972 campaign—was advising Trump’s floundering presidential campaign, and Manafort was happy to step in to help remake it. He did not take a salary but reached out to Deripaska through one of his Ukrainian business partners, Konstantin Kilimnik, immediately after landing the job, asking him, “How do we use to get whole? Has OVD [Oleg Vladimirovich Deripaska] operation seen?”
Manafort began as an advisor to the Trump campaign in March 2016 and became the chairman in late June.
Thanks to journalist Jim Rutenberg, who pulled together testimony given both to the Mueller investigation and the Republican-dominated Senate Intelligence Committee, transcripts from the impeachment hearings, and recent memoirs, we now know that in 2016, Russian operatives presented Manafort a plan “for the creation of an autonomous republic in Ukraine’s east, giving Putin effective control of the country’s industrial heartland, where Kremlin-armed, -funded, and -directed ‘separatists’ were waging a two-year-old shadow war that had left nearly 10,000 dead.”
In exchange for weakening NATO, undermining the U.S. stance in favor of Ukraine in its attempt to throw off the Russians who had invaded in 2014, and removing U.S. sanctions from Russian entities, Russian operatives were willing to help Trump win the White House. The Republican-dominated Senate Intelligence Committee in 2020 established that Manafort’s Ukrainian business partner Kilimnik, whom it described as a “Russian intelligence officer,” acted as a liaison between Manafort and Deripaska while Manafort ran Trump’s campaign.
Now, ten years later, Putin has invaded Ukraine in an effort that when it began looked much like the one his operatives suggested to Manafort in 2016, Trump has said he would “encourage Russia to do whatever they hell they want” to NATO allies that don’t commit 2% of their gross domestic product to their militaries, and Trump MAGA Republicans are refusing to pass a measure to support Ukraine in its effort to throw off Russia’s invasion.
The day after the violence of February 18, 2014, in Ukraine, then–vice president Joe Biden called Yanukovych to “express grave concern regarding the crisis on the streets” and to urge him “to pull back government forces and to exercise maximum restraint.”
Ten years later, Russia has been at open war with Ukraine for nearly two years and has just regained control of the key town of Avdiivka because Ukrainian troops lack ammunition. President Joe Biden is warning MAGA Republicans that “[t]he failure to support Ukraine at this critical moment will never be forgotten.”
“History is watching,” he said.
—
Notes: https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/february-17-2024
I love how the last posts were noting but you copying and pasting what some other loser has said. Runaway makes the most sense in here, and a few token others, but you always refuse to acknowledge those that oppose you unless, as you would say, were looking for attention.
You are the only attention seeking one here due to all of your copying and pasting. Instead of all that nonsense, for what it truly is, why dont you say what YOU feel. Give us YOUR thoughts. Not someone else's. For once, tell us what you've experienced, in real life, to hate those you oppose. Dont give some idiots perspective, give yours.
Tell how you really feel. Im being serious. One sided minds have never really experienced the shit they oppose, so what say you?
You are the only attention seeking one here due to all of your copying and pasting. Instead of all that nonsense, for what it truly is, why dont you say what YOU feel. Give us YOUR thoughts. Not someone else's. For once, tell us what you've experienced, in real life, to hate those you oppose. Dont give some idiots perspective, give yours.
Tell how you really feel. Im being serious. One sided minds have never really experienced the shit they oppose, so what say you?
Democrats most certainly will support the literal Nazis in the Ukrainian army and the dictator Zelensky. The money laundering scheme, sex trafficking and biolabs in the most corrupt country in the world is certain a perfect place for Democrats that have been proven suppressors of speech with government agencies, like Ukraine, raiding and arresting political opposition, like Ukraine, shutting down churches, like Ukraine and running sex scams on children, like Ukraine....The traitors in America who have stolen elections, like Ukraine and segregate by race, like Ukraine.. .are demanding my taxes fund their evil....
The propaganda machine will cover up their crimes with obfuscation and their mules will post Op/Ed pieces parading as truth tellers and cowards will spread the lies...
The truth about Ukraine is not what you think...
https://youtu.be/Sm8QfxZ3HHw?si=1t2jxS9_cnOZyxtr
The propaganda machine will cover up their crimes with obfuscation and their mules will post Op/Ed pieces parading as truth tellers and cowards will spread the lies...
The truth about Ukraine is not what you think...
https://youtu.be/Sm8QfxZ3HHw?si=1t2jxS9_cnOZyxtr
Here’s a look inside Donald Trump’s $355 million civil fraud verdict
https://apnews.com/article/trump-fraud-letitia-james-new-york-engoron-38bc3a7f2ccb22555c026e9bf70fd5bb
https://apnews.com/article/trump-fraud-letitia-james-new-york-engoron-38bc3a7f2ccb22555c026e9bf70fd5bb
The Arrogant Fani Willis: What Happens When She’s Disqualified From the Trump Racketeering Case?
https://youtu.be/7ZJBd7284F0?si=XtEKZdgd7fo46y2Z
https://youtu.be/7ZJBd7284F0?si=XtEKZdgd7fo46y2Z
mysteriouslady said:I love how the last posts were noting but you copying and pasting what some other loser has said. Runaway makes the most sense in here, and a few token others, but you always refuse to acknowledge those that oppose you unless, as you would say, were looking for attention.
You are the only attention seeking one here due to all of your copying and pasting. Instead of all that nonsense, for what it truly is, why dont you say what YOU feel. Give us YOUR thoughts. Not someone else's. For once, tell us what you've experienced, in real life, to hate those you oppose. Dont give some idiots perspective, give yours.
Tell how you really feel. Im being serious. One sided minds have never really experienced the shit they oppose, so what say you?
Currently woke "Diversity" is strictly about Marxist segregation of skin color to divide and conquer, while Diversity of thought is strictly verboten. It is only necessary to repeat the establishment lie. Original thought would go against the regime. Yes, it is tell telling when someone can not explain their position but rather parrot the elite propaganda...
Bolsheviki Russia and Nazi Germany were run the same way. Step outside the dogma of the state and face the firing squad...This has currently been relabeled as cancel culture....
You are the only attention seeking one here due to all of your copying and pasting. Instead of all that nonsense, for what it truly is, why dont you say what YOU feel. Give us YOUR thoughts. Not someone else's. For once, tell us what you've experienced, in real life, to hate those you oppose. Dont give some idiots perspective, give yours.
Tell how you really feel. Im being serious. One sided minds have never really experienced the shit they oppose, so what say you?
Currently woke "Diversity" is strictly about Marxist segregation of skin color to divide and conquer, while Diversity of thought is strictly verboten. It is only necessary to repeat the establishment lie. Original thought would go against the regime. Yes, it is tell telling when someone can not explain their position but rather parrot the elite propaganda...
Bolsheviki Russia and Nazi Germany were run the same way. Step outside the dogma of the state and face the firing squad...This has currently been relabeled as cancel culture....
[quote-574653-ajay]Why would anyone vote for Trump who wasn't either:
a) very rich?
b) the owner of a company that did all of its business in the USA, or had a substantial shareholding in such a company?
c) stupid?
Perhaps we support the anti slavery Republican party that did everything for freedom and civil liberties and not the Klan, eugenic, anti mesegination, voter fraud, speech suppressing, Nazi inspiring Jim Crow democrats.
Why would I vote for fascists?
That WOULD be stupid....
Here is a video of your pedo Biden sniffing kids and talking very inappropriate....
https://youtu.be/3w2xDjMTZDw?si=L8WZBbCPlLVajCKc
a) very rich?
b) the owner of a company that did all of its business in the USA, or had a substantial shareholding in such a company?
c) stupid?
Perhaps we support the anti slavery Republican party that did everything for freedom and civil liberties and not the Klan, eugenic, anti mesegination, voter fraud, speech suppressing, Nazi inspiring Jim Crow democrats.
Why would I vote for fascists?
That WOULD be stupid....
Here is a video of your pedo Biden sniffing kids and talking very inappropriate....
https://youtu.be/3w2xDjMTZDw?si=L8WZBbCPlLVajCKc
runaway-mindtrain said:[quote-574653-ajay]Why would anyone vote for Trump who wasn't either:
a) very rich?
b) the owner of a company that did all of its business in the USA, or had a substantial shareholding in such a company?
c) stupid?
Perhaps we support the anti slavery Republican party that did everything for freedom and civil liberties and not the Klan, eugenic, anti mesegination, voter fraud, speech suppressing, Nazi inspiring Jim Crow democrats.
Why would I vote for fascists?
That WOULD be stupid....
Here is a video of your pedo Biden sniffing kids and talking very inappropriate....
https://youtu.be/3w2xDjMTZDw?si=L8WZBbCPlLVajCKc
Hi, Runaway. I see you're Option C, then, of the above list. 🙃
a) very rich?
b) the owner of a company that did all of its business in the USA, or had a substantial shareholding in such a company?
c) stupid?
Perhaps we support the anti slavery Republican party that did everything for freedom and civil liberties and not the Klan, eugenic, anti mesegination, voter fraud, speech suppressing, Nazi inspiring Jim Crow democrats.
Why would I vote for fascists?
That WOULD be stupid....
Here is a video of your pedo Biden sniffing kids and talking very inappropriate....
https://youtu.be/3w2xDjMTZDw?si=L8WZBbCPlLVajCKc
Hi, Runaway. I see you're Option C, then, of the above list. 🙃
runaway-mindtrain said:Democrats most certainly will support the literal Nazis in the Ukrainian army and the dictator Zelensky. The money laundering scheme, sex trafficking and biolabs in the most corrupt country in the world is certain a perfect place for Democrats that have been proven suppressors of speech with government agencies, like Ukraine, raiding and arresting political opposition, like Ukraine, shutting down churches, like Ukraine and running sex scams on children, like Ukraine....The traitors in America who have stolen elections, like Ukraine and segregate by race, like Ukraine.. .are demanding my taxes fund their evil....
The propaganda machine will cover up their crimes with obfuscation and their mules will post Op/Ed pieces parading as truth tellers and cowards will spread the lies...
The truth about Ukraine is not what you think...
https://youtu.be/Sm8QfxZ3HHw?si=1t2jxS9_cnOZyxtr
How many elections has zelensky cancelled now?
The propaganda machine will cover up their crimes with obfuscation and their mules will post Op/Ed pieces parading as truth tellers and cowards will spread the lies...
The truth about Ukraine is not what you think...
https://youtu.be/Sm8QfxZ3HHw?si=1t2jxS9_cnOZyxtr
How many elections has zelensky cancelled now?
Carpe_Noctem said:
How many elections has zelensky cancelled now?
Zelensky has done nothing outside of his country's constitution. This is OLD news.
Last week, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky confirmed that the country’s presidential election, that in peacetime would be expected next March, will not be taking place while Ukraine remains under martial law and is in a state of war with Russia.
Western right-wing social media personalities predictably greeted this news as confirmation of their prejudices against Ukrainian democracy. Failed politician and 2020 U.S. election denier Kari Lake was among those who complained, saying on X, formerly known as Twitter, “Zelensky is considering canceling elections in Ukraine. I didn’t realize that Democracy could just be turned off & on like a TV.” Not wanting to be left out, reactionary Michael Tracey dedicated several tweets to misunderstanding Ukraine’s constitution while furiously denouncing his own followers for correcting his mistakes via X’s Community Notes feature, claiming that “it’s totally false that holding elections during Martial Law is ‘banned’ by Ukraine’s constitution.” (The Community Note is, in fact, correct, and Tracey is, of course, wrong.)
So while, I hope, everyone knows not to take such figures seriously, Americans might still have qualms over the failure to hold elections. The United States itself has a habit, rare among democracies, of keeping the vote going even during wartime, as in 1864 and 1944.
Thus, it’s worth going into detail as to why the Ukrainian government has taken this position and how the Ukrainian electorate is responding to that. This news certainly didn’t come as a surprise to anyone in Ukraine, and the pressure surrounding wartime elections has been entirely external, leaving many Ukrainians baffled. The most prominent of these interventions was made by U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, who on a visit to Kyiv in August said he believed the Ukrainian government should hold elections in 2024. While it should be noted that, in responding to Graham, Zelensky appeared to hold the door open for elections next year, he also stressed that they were legally prohibited under martial law in the same interview.
These opinions are not confined to American conservatives either, with the president of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, Tiny Kox, telling European Pravda in May that Ukraine is expected to “organize free and fair elections,” shortly before walking those comments back in a subsequent interview.
[ . . . ]
For those who are unaware of what martial law is, in most countries it entails the suspension of a civilian government, replacing it with a military administration enacted during times of war, and it normally involves the curtailment of peacetime political freedoms such as freedom of speech and the freedom of assembly. While martial law is never a positive political development for a nation-state, at times of war, such as the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, such legal measures become unfortunately necessary to save lives.
Both constitutionally and legally speaking, the Ukrainian government is simply following Ukrainian law. The Ukrainian constitution and martial law legislation clearly prohibit presidential, parliamentary, and local elections from taking place under martial law, and Zelensky’s comments last week were merely a repetition of what other Ukrainian government officials have said on this topic in recent months. Other European countries, such as Germany, have similar provisions for postponing wartime elections.
[ . . . ]
https://foreignpolicy.com/2023/11/17/ukraine-elections-war-russia-zelensky/
For those interested in the truth ^.
It's interesting how attention is being driven from Putin's murder of Alexei Navalny to purporting that Zelensky is holding the country he's personally fighting to defend hostage because, you know, Russia is trying to liberate it. [/sarcasm]
How many elections has zelensky cancelled now?
Zelensky has done nothing outside of his country's constitution. This is OLD news.
Last week, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky confirmed that the country’s presidential election, that in peacetime would be expected next March, will not be taking place while Ukraine remains under martial law and is in a state of war with Russia.
Western right-wing social media personalities predictably greeted this news as confirmation of their prejudices against Ukrainian democracy. Failed politician and 2020 U.S. election denier Kari Lake was among those who complained, saying on X, formerly known as Twitter, “Zelensky is considering canceling elections in Ukraine. I didn’t realize that Democracy could just be turned off & on like a TV.” Not wanting to be left out, reactionary Michael Tracey dedicated several tweets to misunderstanding Ukraine’s constitution while furiously denouncing his own followers for correcting his mistakes via X’s Community Notes feature, claiming that “it’s totally false that holding elections during Martial Law is ‘banned’ by Ukraine’s constitution.” (The Community Note is, in fact, correct, and Tracey is, of course, wrong.)
So while, I hope, everyone knows not to take such figures seriously, Americans might still have qualms over the failure to hold elections. The United States itself has a habit, rare among democracies, of keeping the vote going even during wartime, as in 1864 and 1944.
Thus, it’s worth going into detail as to why the Ukrainian government has taken this position and how the Ukrainian electorate is responding to that. This news certainly didn’t come as a surprise to anyone in Ukraine, and the pressure surrounding wartime elections has been entirely external, leaving many Ukrainians baffled. The most prominent of these interventions was made by U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, who on a visit to Kyiv in August said he believed the Ukrainian government should hold elections in 2024. While it should be noted that, in responding to Graham, Zelensky appeared to hold the door open for elections next year, he also stressed that they were legally prohibited under martial law in the same interview.
These opinions are not confined to American conservatives either, with the president of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, Tiny Kox, telling European Pravda in May that Ukraine is expected to “organize free and fair elections,” shortly before walking those comments back in a subsequent interview.
[ . . . ]
For those who are unaware of what martial law is, in most countries it entails the suspension of a civilian government, replacing it with a military administration enacted during times of war, and it normally involves the curtailment of peacetime political freedoms such as freedom of speech and the freedom of assembly. While martial law is never a positive political development for a nation-state, at times of war, such as the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, such legal measures become unfortunately necessary to save lives.
Both constitutionally and legally speaking, the Ukrainian government is simply following Ukrainian law. The Ukrainian constitution and martial law legislation clearly prohibit presidential, parliamentary, and local elections from taking place under martial law, and Zelensky’s comments last week were merely a repetition of what other Ukrainian government officials have said on this topic in recent months. Other European countries, such as Germany, have similar provisions for postponing wartime elections.
[ . . . ]
https://foreignpolicy.com/2023/11/17/ukraine-elections-war-russia-zelensky/
For those interested in the truth ^.
It's interesting how attention is being driven from Putin's murder of Alexei Navalny to purporting that Zelensky is holding the country he's personally fighting to defend hostage because, you know, Russia is trying to liberate it. [/sarcasm]
