The Impeachment Process Has Officially Begun (1 Viewer)

[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

 

[Lapaz]

Steele was running his own private intelligence firm, called Orbis, when Fusion contracted him in May 2016 to talk to his Russian sources about Trump. Fusion, in turn, had been hired by a law firm doing work for the Hillary Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee

‘Crime in Progress’ Tells the Story Behind the Steele Dossier (Published 2019)

Glenn Simpson and Peter Fritsch, founders of the private intelligence firm Fusion GPS, write about what turned up in their investigation into Donald Trump’s ties to Russia.

www.nytimes.com

As noted, Horowitz establishes that the Steele report was crucial to the FISA process, even using the same language Nunes used (“essential”). He also confirms the Nunes assertion that the FBI double-dipped in citing both Steele and a September 23, 2016 Yahoo! news story using Steele as an unnamed source. Horowitz listed the idea that Steele did not directly provide information to the press as one of seven significant “inaccuracies or omissions” in the first FISA application.

'Corroboration Zero': An Inspector General's Report Reveals the Steele Dossier Was Always a Joke

The reports throws water on one “deep state” conspiracy theory of the Russia investigation, but validates complaints about “fake news”

www.rollingstone.com

Look, I find it hilarious that both sides here can watch and read the same things I watch and read, yet still see 2 completely different things... As I have stated many times... I am an Independent that didn't vote for... and doesn't trust Trump.... yet can't stomach the current utlra-Liberal version of the Democratic party (yet voted Dem JBE for LA Governor)...

IMO... from a completely unbiased standpoint, with no horse in this race... This looks like politically motivated bias from stem to stern...

And it looks like we have been feed this for over 2 years based on that bias... after we have been told repeatedly that none of this was true, and there was no bias...

This is why I have trust issues...

Steele was hired to find opposition research, and that is completely fine. He produced raw intel data that the FBI used as part of the FISA application. That is also completely fine. The mistakes cited by the IG are comletely different matters. Do you think the Democrats were wrong to hire Steele and Fusion GPS? If so, explain why.

 

[Beach Friends]

I was speaking off the cuff. How do you blame the democrats for the FBI issues during the FISA process for Carter Page?

That’s a common narrative from Republicans, but when the entire leadership of the FBI is Republican, and the IG finds that while serious errors were made they had nothing to do with partisan politics, how do you turn around and say the democrats were responsible?

I’m not trying to play games with you, but this part of the narrative just makes no sense. Those FISA warrants were renewed several times under Rod Rosenstein.

I am really disappointed in this post.

 

[Taurus]

You're scorned, Tulsi, we get it. Just go ahead and switch parties already, spare us the hollow sob story.

ETA: I originally just left this as-is since I thought it scanned better that way, but I figure I ought to add some better content, too.

What Tulsi fails to realize is that it already is a zero-sum game. It's been that way since 2010.

A toxic combination of gerrymandering and our stupid voting system have resulted in a large set of legislators who can only lose if they aren't extreme enough. If they dare to compromise, they get primaried.
Couple that with money-driven corporate media that suffers from Jim Morrison Syndrome and you have two bases driven farther and farther from each other, each electing representatives for whom compromise is a career killer and you have what we have. One side wins, the other loses. One side does whatever the hell it wants, the other plays desperate delaying games until the pendulum swings and it's their turn to put on the jackboots.

 

[coldseat]

What do Horowitiz and his report have to do with the Impeachment and the articles of Impeachment that were approved? Why does that factor into the impeachment vote?

That makes no sense at all.

 

[Infoman]

Steele was hired to find opposition research, and that is completely fine. He produced raw intel data that the FBI used as part of the FISA application. That is also completely fine. The mistakes cited by the IG are comletely different matters. Do you think the Democrats were wrong to hire Steele and Fusion GPS? If so, explain why.

Look, if you don't see anything wrong or entirely too suspicious to be coincidence with the entirety of what I just posted... then we don't have anything to debate/discuss... and really, I'm not looking to convince you anyway...

This whole thing was a partisan turd-sandwich served to the American people by 2 bitterly opposed parties desperate for control... that's my informed observation. (By "whole thing" I mean everything from day 1... Servers, E-Mails, Fusion GPS, Russia, Muller, FISA, Comey, Page, Ukraine, etc... all the way to now - All of it)

It's so bad... that what anyone believes to be true at this point... is simply a matter of what side you stand on...

And IMO... That ultimately means we can't trust anything to be on the "up and up" at this point when it comes to totally partisan based outcomes... and this Impeachment... is just that.

The Senate "acquittal" will also be completely partisan... so there always that... *sigh*

No one... will ever convince me that both sides are not acting in good faith - and continually attempt to dupe and divide the American people... but rather they're acting in their own interest of retaining power and farming votes of the people that are willing to (turn a) blind(eye)ly follow.

Take care.

 

[Taurus]

Look, if you don't see anything wrong or entirely too suspicious to be coincidence with the entirety of what I just posted... then we don't have anything to debate/discuss... and really, I'm not looking to convince you anyway...

This whole things was a partisan turd-sandwich served to the American people by 2 bitterly opposed parties desperate for control... that's my informed observation.

No one... will ever convince me that both sides are not acting in good faith - and attempting to dupe and divide the American people... but rather in their own interest of retaining power and farming votes of the people that are willing to (turn a) blindly follow.

Take care.

And we fix that by...ranked-choice voting.

It really is the salvation of our country.

 

[Infoman]

And we fix that by...ranked-choice voting.

It really is the salvation of our country.

We've already agreed on that...

We're not getting that soon, so.... For now... I'll consider voting for someone who's not bowing down and see where that goes....

 

[V Chip]

AKA

"I'm going to run as the Green Party Candidate."

 

[Lapaz]

Look, if you don't see anything wrong or entirely too suspicious to be coincidence with the entirety of what I just posted... then we don't have anything to debate/discuss... and really, I'm not looking to convince you anyway...

This whole thing was a partisan turd-sandwich served to the American people by 2 bitterly opposed parties desperate for control... that's my informed observation. (By "whole thing" I mean everything from day 1... Servers, E-Mails, Fusion GPS, Russia, Muller, FISA, Comey, Page, Ukraine, etc... all the way to now - All of it)

It's so bad... that what anyone believes to be true at this point... is simply a matter of what side you stand on...

And IMO... That ultimately means we can't trust anything to be on the "up and up" at this point when it comes to totally partisan based outcomes... and this Impeachment... is just that.

The Senate "acquittal" will also be completely partisan... so there always that... *sigh*

No one... will ever convince me that both sides are not acting in good faith - and continually attempt to dupe and divide the American people... but rather they're acting in their own interest of retaining power and farming votes of the people that are willing to (turn a) blind(eye)ly follow.

Take care.

Okay I get you don’t trust either side, however I’m trying to understand it one piece at a time. You partially indicted the Democrats for hiring Steele, so I asked a simple question about whether the Democrats were wrong to hire Steele and if so why?

 

[MT15]

You’re conflating the FBI investigation with the Carter Page FISA warrants. The warrants were a mess but they weren’t applied for until Carter Page had left the campaign and there was nothing from them used in the FBI investigation into the Trump campaign. The FBI investigation had been going on for months before the Page FISA was sent or the Steele Dossier was even known to exist. Either way, the IG found incompetence but no political motivation.

Another important finding from the IG is that neither Strzok nor Page ever did anything that could possibly be construed as politically motivated. Not one thing. They were able to separate their personal feelings from their professional lives. Something that I’d be willing to wager each and every person on this board does every day.

once again, FBI agents skew overwhelmingly Republican and much of the investigation happened under a Republican administration. Did you read the text messages the IG found celebrating Trump’s victory? Is that evidence that the FBI was in the bag for Trump and looked the other way? It’s about as much evidence as you have that Strzok and Page did anything wrong.

the narrative that the FBI is biased against Trump and acted on that bias is still baseless. They were biased against Carter Page, maybe, but even that wasn’t politically motivated.

Of course, by now, after being smeared by Trump for years I wouldn’t be surprised if there were animosity toward Trump. But even that isn’t political. It’s a normal human response when someone does you dirty for three years.

 

[MT15]

I am really disappointed in this post.

good, that makes me feel like I must be on the right track.

 

[samiam5211]

Anyone looking at this situation (and every situation leading up to this) objectively..... can't possibly look in the mirror and say with complete honesty that BOTH sides of this shirt show have not lied, deceived, cheated, conspired, omitted, falsified and / or mis-informed on many levels - not to "do the right thing" - but solely and expressly to destroy the other side... and none of it has been for the good / benefit of the American people or the preservation of our values... It's all been to get or maintain power... and divide us to farm votes....

Anyone that's willing to ignore these things for the sake of agreement with political ideals from either side - gets eliminated from my voting pool choices...

Anyone that's willing to call this out publicly, and put their name / vote on record against this travesty being perpetrated on our country... Gets my support.

Do you believe that all (or any) of the people who testified were telling the truth?

 

[samiam5211]

Steele was running his own private intelligence firm, called Orbis, when Fusion contracted him in May 2016 to talk to his Russian sources about Trump. Fusion, in turn, had been hired by a law firm doing work for the Hillary Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee

‘Crime in Progress’ Tells the Story Behind the Steele Dossier (Published 2019)

Glenn Simpson and Peter Fritsch, founders of the private intelligence firm Fusion GPS, write about what turned up in their investigation into Donald Trump’s ties to Russia.

www.nytimes.com

As noted, Horowitz establishes that the Steele report was crucial to the FISA process, even using the same language Nunes used (“essential”). He also confirms the Nunes assertion that the FBI double-dipped in citing both Steele and a September 23, 2016 Yahoo! news story using Steele as an unnamed source. Horowitz listed the idea that Steele did not directly provide information to the press as one of seven significant “inaccuracies or omissions” in the first FISA application.

'Corroboration Zero': An Inspector General's Report Reveals the Steele Dossier Was Always a Joke

The reports throws water on one “deep state” conspiracy theory of the Russia investigation, but validates complaints about “fake news”

www.rollingstone.com

Look, I find it hilarious that both sides here can watch and read the same things I watch and read, yet still see 2 completely different things... As I have stated many times... I am an Independent that didn't vote for... and doesn't trust Trump.... yet can't stomach the current utlra-Liberal version of the Democratic party (yet voted Dem JBE for LA Governor)...

IMO... from a completely unbiased standpoint, with no horse in this race... This looks like politically motivated bias from stem to stern...

And it looks like we have been feed this for over 2 years based on that bias... after we have been told repeatedly that none of this was true, and there was no bias...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/peter-strzok-whose-anti-trump-texts-got-him-fired-from-the-fbi-sues-for-reinstatement/2019/08/06/eaf83060-b789-11e9-a091-6a96e67d9cce_story.html

Strzok, who joined the FBI in 1996 as an analyst on terrorism cases, was once one of the bureau’s go-to agents for espionage and counterintelligence work, and he was a key figure in both the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server while she was secretary of state and the inquiry into whether the Trump campaign had coordinated with Russia to influence the 2016 election.

But in the course of that work, Strzok began exchanging politically charged text messages with an FBI lawyer, Lisa Page, with whom he was having an affair. The messages, sent on work phones, were critical of numerous politicians, but none more so than Trump, who Strzok derided as “abysmal” and a “disaster.”

In August 2016, after Page wrote Trump was “not ever going to become president, right? Right?!” Strzok responded: “No. No he’s not. We’ll stop it.”

This is why I have trust issues...

Di you believe Horowitz when he says that bias did not impact the findings of the Russia investigation?

 

[Infoman]

Okay I get you don’t trust either side, however I’m trying to understand it one piece at a time. You partially indicted the Democrats for hiring Steele, so I asked a simple question about whether the Democrats were wrong to hire Steele and if so why?

Initial hire... No.... subsequent shirt show used to obtain "spy warrant" on a presidential candidate / campaign... that they openly hated.... Yup.

Steele was running his own private intelligence firm, called Orbis, when Fusion contracted him in May 2016 to talk to his Russian sources about Trump. Fusion, in turn, had been hired by a law firm doing work for the Hillary Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee

Horowitz establishes that the Steele report was crucial to the FISA process

FISA warrant allow authorities a window into other Trump figures with whom Page communicated

Horowitz uses phrases like “serious performance failures,” describing his 416-page catalogue of errors and manipulations

The so-called “Steele dossier” was, actually, crucial to the FBI’s decision to seek secret surveillance of Page.

Trump aide Carter Page

 

[coldseat]

Look, if you don't see anything wrong or entirely too suspicious to be coincidence with the entirety of what I just posted... then we don't have anything to debate/discuss... and really, I'm not looking to convince you anyway...

This whole thing was a partisan turd-sandwich served to the American people by 2 bitterly opposed parties desperate for control... that's my informed observation. (By "whole thing" I mean everything from day 1... Servers, E-Mails, Fusion GPS, Russia, Muller, FISA, Comey, Page, Ukraine, etc... all the way to now - All of it)

It's so bad... that what anyone believes to be true at this point... is simply a matter of what side you stand on...

And IMO... That ultimately means we can't trust anything to be on the "up and up" at this point when it comes to totally partisan based outcomes... and this Impeachment... is just that.

The Senate "acquittal" will also be completely partisan... so there always that... *sigh*

No one... will ever convince me that both sides are not acting in good faith - and continually attempt to dupe and divide the American people... but rather they're acting in their own interest of retaining power and farming votes of the people that are willing to (turn a) blind(eye)ly follow.

Take care.

I think it's interesting that you feel that by reacting this way or having this opinion, that you're staking out a space and opinion that is independent, self informed and non-partisan, when this is the exact reaction that Republicans want you to have to all of this. They either want you to be pissed off or uninterested (which are the two emotions you keep bouncing in between). Not only that, but this is the reaction that Russian interference in the 2016 election was intended illicit.

But what do I know ...

 

[Lapaz]

Initial hire... No.... subsequent shirt show used to obtain "spy warrant" on a presidential candidate that they openly hated.... Yup.

Steele was running his own private intelligence firm, called Orbis, when Fusion contracted him in May 2016 to talk to his Russian sources about Trump. Fusion, in turn, had been hired by a law firm doing work for the Hillary Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee

Horowitz establishes that the Steele report was crucial to the FISA process

FISA warrant allow authorities a window into other Trump figures with whom Page communicated

Horowitz uses phrases like “serious performance failures,” describing his 416-page catalogue of errors and manipulations

The so-called “Steele dossier” was, actually, crucial to the FBI’s decision to seek secret surveillance of Page.

Trump aide Carter Page

View attachment 578

So you believe the Democrats hiring Steele was fine, and you’re bothered that it was used to support the spying. The FBI often uses raw intel to support further surveillance. The FBI and the FISA courts were responsible, so why does that indict the Democrats into making this a shirt show? That’s conflating things, which is what Republicans have convinced you to do. Can you explain why the Dossier indicts the Democrats in to making this a shirt show?

 

[JimEverett]

You still didn’t answer whether it wasn’t wrong for the Democrats to hire Steele. You only stated that it was crucial to the FISA and the FISA contained errors. Why does that indict the Democrats into making this a shirt show? That’s conflating things, which is what Republicans have convinced you to do. Can you explain why the Dossier indicts the Democrats in to making this a shirt show?

Um, the DOJ that used the Steele dossier to spy on a person with connections to the Trump campaign was part of a Democratic Administration.

 

[Infoman]

I think it's interesting that you feel that by reacting this way or having this opinion, that you're staking out a space and opinion that is independent, self informed and non-partisan, when this is the exact reaction that Republicans want you to have to all of this. They either want you to be pissed off or uninterested (which are the two emotions you keep bouncing in between). Not only that, but this is the reaction that Russian interference in the 2016 election was intended illicit.

But what do I know ...

What's hilarious is... You are making my point completely.... I know what I believe, I don't need help being told how I feel... LOL

This is exactly what every ardent Trump Supporter I come in contact with says also... just have to replace "this is the exact reaction that Republicans want you to have to all of this"... with "this is the exact reaction that Democrats want you to have to all of this"... and replace "this is the reaction that Russian interference in the 2016 election was intended illicit"..... with "this is the reaction that the Russian Hoax in the 2016 election was intended illicit".

It's almost verbatim.... thanks, I'm going to show this to my brother-in-law for a good laugh over the holidays.