The Impeachment Process Has Officially Begun (7 Viewers)

[Andrus]

By Laura Bassett

After months of internal arguing among Democrats over whether to impeach President Donald Trump, the dam is finally breaking in favor of trying to remove him from office. The Washington Post reported that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi would announce a formal impeachment inquiry on Tuesday, following a bombshell report that Trump illegally asked Ukraine’s government to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden, one of his political opponents. (He essentially admitted to having done so over the weekend.)

“Now that we have the facts, we’re ready,” Pelosi said Tuesday morning at a forum hosted by The Atlantic. At 5 p.m. the same day, she was back with more. "The actions taken to date by the president have seriously violated the constitution, especially when the president says Article Two says I can do whatever I want," referring to the segment of the Constitution that defines the power of the executive branch of the government. Pelosi's message was that checks and balances of those branches are just as central to the Constitution. And one more thing: "Today, I am announcing the House of Representatives is moving forward with an official impeachment inquiry," she said at a conference broadcast on Twitter by the Huffington Post. ...

Read the Full Story - InStyle

 

[FullMonte]

That is ignoring the fact that the Clinton campaign dollars were not targeted across the nation equally, no campaign does that.
Further, this line seems overly speculative- what evidence is there that Russia put forth an effort where resources were only spent in specific states?

And it doesn't address the fact that the Clinton's $1.2 b were spent by some of the brightest minds in the political science and advertising field - from the greatest universities/colleges in the world vs. some Russians "troll farms"

No, it was over generalizing. The point I was making was that the idea that Russia only spent a few million, so logically it couldn't have effected the election is incorrect...since the election was decided by such a minute portion of the votes. Less than one percent of the votes across three states is what separated Trump winning from Clinton winning.

As for what evidence is there that Russia put forth an effort in specific states? Wasn't there some allegation that a member of Trump's campaign shared polling data regarding specific areas with a person that congress said was a member of Russian intelligence? Wasn't that a key part of this whole thing?

 

[The moose]

No, it was over generalizing. The point I was making was that the idea that Russia only spent a few million, so logically it couldn't have effected the election is incorrect...since the election was decided by such a minute portion of the votes. Less than one percent of the votes across three states is what separated Trump winning from Clinton winning.

As for what evidence is there that Russia put forth an effort in specific states? Wasn't there some allegation that a member of Trump's campaign shared polling data regarding specific areas with a person that congress said was a member of Russian intelligence? Wasn't that a key part of this whole thing?

Exactly!
the number of votes we are talking about would not fill up a major football stadium.

I would think with the obviously shared polling data the Russian effort was concentrated where it was needed.

 

[TaylorB]

Further, this line seems overly speculative- what evidence is there that Russia put forth an effort where resources were only spent in specific states?

There's plenty of evidence suggesting that Russia targeted specific states. Russia was already targeting a number of states it considered battleground states in some of the early IRA operations in 2014, but the strategy as to which states to target shifted as Russia's information improved.

The Mueller Report (p. 140) documents that some of the "battleground states" for which Manafort shared polling data with a Russian intel officer (or a person linked to Russian intel) included Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Minnesota. Well, by 2016, Russian-linked facebook ads were specifically targeting voter demographics in Michigan and Wisconsin in a way that was "highly sophisticated":

Exclusive: Russian-linked Facebook ads targeted Michigan and Wisconsin

A number of Russian-linked Facebook ads specifically targeted Michigan and Wisconsin, two states crucial to Donald Trump's victory last November, according to four sources with direct knowledge of the situation.

www.cnn.com

The IRA organized rallies in Pennsylvania and Florida leading up to the election (Florida is a well-known battleground state; Pennsylvania was one of the Manafort battleground states):

Mueller report details the evolution of Russia's troll farm as it began targeting US politics | TechCrunch

On Thursday, Attorney General William Barr released the long-anticipated Mueller report. With it comes a useful overview of how Russia leveraged

techcrunch.com

In addition to the IRA-generated social media posts, ads, and fake rallies targeted at battleground voters, the Mueller Report notes that the GRU hack and release operation targeted themed issues, such as states (e.g., Florida and Pennsylvania) that were perceived as competitive in the 2016 election - see Mueller's report, p. 43.

Remember, Russia and the US have been interfering in elections for over a century. Russia most certainly knew how the electoral college worked. Countries with this sort of experience in covert election interference don't typically risk money and in this case, huge amounts of political capital, without a deep understanding of the political situation, the risks / rewards of interference, the likelihood of success, the consequences if detected, etc.

Manafort owed a Putin-connected oligarch tens of millions, and thought sharing internal polling data and giving private briefings on the Trump campaign would allow him to "get whole" for that debt. That's because Manafort knew that it was extremely valuable for Russia to know which voters to target. And that's why when anyone calls the Trump-Russia investigation a "hoax," the first thing I bring up is Trump's campaign manager Manafort essentially operating as an agent for the Kremlin in helping them hone in on which states to target. I've yet to see any plausible alternative theories offered by the right as to what else Manafort thought he was accomplishing by sharing that information.

 

[CoolBrees]

And couple that with the FBI (Comey) announcing four days before the election that they were indeed investigating Clinton and you have the situation that played out-

A razor thin electoral win of about 80,000 votes.

 

[FullMonte]

A razor thin electoral win of about 80,000 votes.

You misspelled "the biggest landslide electoral college victory in history."

 

[superchuck500]

Yes, and I have explained why.

I am not sure why you think that if the en banc decision comes back and says McGahn has to testify to some degree or another that it is some sort of proof that obstruction occurred. It is not. There mere fact that there is disagreement amongst the judges themselves is proof that obstruction should have never been charged.

McGahn going to en banc again at DC Cir.

Here's the request - it was granted today.

http://openargs.com/wp-content/uploads/McGahn-petition-for-reconsideration-en-banc.pdf