@Balrog99: To be fair, the idea is not to make people feel guilty about eating meat. The idea is to get more people to switch to a more humane diet, whether that's vegan or simply vegetarian.
I'm semi-vegetarian and not yet quite sure what a humane diet can include, but one of the things I've realized is just how little difference it makes to switch to plants. Even in the United States, most of our calories already come from plants. It's not that big of a change, really, and the nutritional difference is petty thin, too. Protein is easy to come by, and though most vegan diets are low in B12 (only a few plants have much of it), there are supplements for that.
A vegan friend of mine once mentioned that a friend of hers was having trouble adapting to a vegan diet. Her friend had been trying to make all these elaborate dishes out of tofu and was having a hard time. how do you make a simple vegan breakfast?
Sure looks like he was aware of the meeting with his two sons and his campaign manager.
Even if this is true it's not illegal. Since I'm not a politician I'd probably want to know all the dirt possible about my opponent too. Trump isn't a traditional politician so it's not surprising to me that he was easier to tease with this stuff than someone who was born and bred to lead. It bothers me more that he wasn't smart enough to cover his tracks but his ego is so huge that I doubt it even occurred to him that it might bite him in the ass.
Election law uses the word “coordination” and makes it illegal for U.S. candidates to coordinate their efforts with foreign persons.
Doesn't even matter if he got anything good, the act of going all in to try and coordinate is the thing. It's like if your criminal wants to buy drugs and goes to buy them but oh no it's a cop and he has no drugs he's still going to jail because he wanted to commit a crime.
Doesn't matter if he thought he could win or not either, ignorance of the law is not an excuse. And if your running for office you should look into the rules.
If you were offered information on an opponent that was true is it illegal to find out what it is? In this day and age of easy information I don't think it's as simple as it used to be. Trump didn't get any dirt apparently but I don't blame him his curiosity. I'm a scientist so seeking truth is what I'm hardwired to do.
If we're talking about curiosity, the one thing I'd be most curious about is why Russia would want to help me. That's far more important than my own personal benefit.
The proper response was for Donald Trump Jr. to contact the authorities. He did not.
The one thing I truly do not understand about this situation is where Donald Trump and his son got the idea that the Russian government was a trustworthy pal who would do the United States no wrong.
No, its not illegal to listen to information offered from another country let alone something never claimed to be illegally gained as far as I can tell. And neither is Russia a hostile foriegn power. I don't even see what's arguably immoral about it besides some guilt by association with Russia. I still see it as infinitely less comprising than the middle eastern money pouring into the Clinton Foundation nor even Israel's major lobby and money poured into elections but I dont mean to change the subject. It just seems a molehill compared to mountains.
If you were offered information on an opponent that was true is it illegal to find out what it is? In this day and age of easy information I don't think it's as simple as it used to be. Trump didn't get any dirt apparently but I don't blame him his curiosity. I'm a scientist so seeking truth is what I'm hardwired to do.
Yes, if al qaeda, Russia or Canada or anyone who tells you the secrets are from a foreign country offers you stolen secrets to help you win an election the proper course of action is to alert the FBI.
If I hack a company's network, stealing trade secrets, then I sell them to you because you are that company's competition, the fact that the information I obtain is true is not important. The important fact is that I obtained the information illegally and you wanted to buy it from me. Now substitute "political candidate" in place of "company" and "dirt" for "trade secrets" and this is the story which we have at this point.
It still isn't treason but there are definitely ethics problems and violations of political campaign laws to consider. Junior isn't going to sweat it because Senior will most likely just issue a pardon.
The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Trump thought he was the underdog. Undestandably so in my opinion. I don't think I would have done differently if I believed what I was doing was right. The ends justify the means is a pretty powerful philosophy in politics. The two party system is way outdated in my opinion. Given a valid alternative, I would not have voted for Trump.
I'm just interested in the truth no matter the source, personally. I don't care where it comes from or how it was obtained, with the understanding that sometimes the most important things to know are not the things you are allowed to know.
This whole bit about info and where it comes from, from other countries, seems kinda of...small, when comparing all the money received by candidates from large MN Corporations, or from individuals that have connections and influence with various governmental organizations. That is apparently ok though. If it is info that is true, so be it, take it into account, if those in the US can't or won't deal with that. I want to see THIS type of collusion busted wide open.
Seems a bit hypocritical to me. I guess the money from within is just too much of an accepted method. Meetings to 'subvert American democracy', gimmi a break. It's already being subverted from within.
What a real circus show the political system is here, now more than ever. Disappointing it is. My fellow North Carolinian Edward Snowden was at first I thought a real piece-o-work, but now I think it was a much needed revelation for regular citizens that woke some folks up and got them talking.
No, its not illegal to listen to information offered from another country let alone something never claimed to be illegally gained as far as I can tell.
That's a matter of opinion. Personally I'm pretty sure that, if it ever came to court, even what we know of Donald Trump Jr's actions to date would indeed be found illegal. As others have said earlier in the thread it is against the law merely to plan to break the law.
I know it's been largely covered already, but I just can't resist making the following points about Trump Jr's 'transparent' behavior in this matter: - The New York Times reports the meeting with a Russian lawyer linked to the Kremlin took place. Trump Jr responds that he was asked to attend the meeting by an acquaintance and did not know in advance who he was meeting, but that the meeting was 'primarily' about adoption. - The Times reports that the meeting discussed information potentially damaging to the Clinton campaign. Ahead of publication Trump Jr was asked about the story and explained that the meeting arose as a result of a previous acquaintance with the Russian lawyer as a result of the Miss Universe pageant held in Moscow in 2013 (admitting in the process he did know who the meeting was with). The meeting did cover Clinton, but there was 'no meaningful information'. He also said he asked Kushner and Manafort to attend, but they did not know what the meeting was about in advance. - The Times reported that Trump Jr did in fact know what the meeting was about in advance and that the information to be discussed in the meeting came from the Russian government. Trump Jr responded by publishing an email chain about the meeting that makes clear Kushner, Manafort and Trump Jr all knew exactly the purpose of the meeting and that the stated source of the supposed information was indeed the Russian government. It's not yet clear why Trump published the emails, although it seems most likely that he was told the Times was about to publish them itself. Obviously there's a human tendency to put the best face on things you can, but I think Trump Jr has gone well beyond that. He's not simply used misdirection (though he has tried that), but outright lies. What seems incredible is that he won't just shut up (like Kushner) and wait until the full story emerges - and then put the best spin possible on it. Instead he's regularly responding with a different story that can actually be disproved. Even if your philosophy is that the truth is not important, that behavior seems pretty stupid ...
@Artona "And as I said - I see that kind of argument often used as a way to avoid responsibility of white Westerners."
But why is it okay to expect someone to be responsible for something that someone else did before they were ever alive? You're trading the exploitation of one person for another.
And I see the mentality that wants to blame all the world's woes on "white westerners" is motivated by a desire to let everyone who is not a white westerner off the hook. Displaying a wilful ignorance of world history, current events and human nature.
About 45 thousand years ago dark skinned African Homo Sapiens moved into Europe, driving the native light skinned Homo Neanderthalensis into extinction. Due to interbreeding white Europeans carry some Neanderthal DNA - they are what is left of their decedents. Africans and Asians carry no such DNA. Ergo Africans and Asians owe white Europeans a debt for genocide against their Neanderthal ancestors*. There is even genetic proof.
*NB, to make it clear, this is not my position, I believe that people are only responsible for their own actions, not their ancestors.
If you say we have to be literally killing each other to be enemies, then no nation in the world is our enemy. If you say we just have to be hostile to each other... well, then it gets a lot more complicated.
As far as Russia goes, it's no secret that the Russian government itself believes that Russia and the United States are enemies. Their stance is pretty obvious when you listen to their propaganda; they believe our interests are diametrically opposed, and they believe the U.S. is out to get them.
The way I see it, considering we are friends with countries as diverse as France, Saudi Arabia, Japan, Israel, Iraq, Vietnam, and South Africa, defining our current friends and our current enemies is pretty simple:
The people who say they're our friends are our friends.
The people who say they're our enemies are our enemies.
I can imagine exceptions to the first one, but not the second.
I could go with this. I presume you are referring to what they say internally, as opposed to our faces, except what's good for the goose is good for the gander.
In which case, we're enemies with...NK, Iran, Iraq, China, Syria, Russia, Libya, and probably every other Muslim-majority country in the world. Probably Cuba as well.
Why? Because WE say or intimate that they're our enemies.
It's not a matter of opinion, it's a matter of law, which none was broken. Even if he had happily accepted damaging information of some sort, it still wouldn't be illegal. Some fringe types are trying to claim it breaks campaign finance law. not recognizing the law states the campaign must be soliciting cash or another valuable item with factual information not counting and being 1st Amendment protected as is as we are free to accept ideas from anyone.
If it was so blatantly illegal I doubt both parties would have been doing it but as we've seen, when Trump does a thing it's always at least twice as nefarious as the thing itself, cause ya know, it's Trump, and he's just a Bad Guy.
This argument that it was "no big deal" and "everyone does it, I would do it" was nowhere to be found a few weeks ago. Up until now, every single argument made on this forum has been admamant there was no connection whatsoever. This new argument just so happens to coincide with the right-wing media mesaaging effort shifting from "there was no collusion" to "it's not a big deal anyway" roughly 3-4 weeks ago, clearly enough to let it seep into the public discourse. Seems to be working. The argument has shifted while acting like the first set of goalposts never existed in the first place. Pretty neat deal.
It's clear all the Trump team has to do is a.) keep moving the goalposts and b.) point and yell "Obama!" and "Hillary" to illicit some Pavlovian reaction. And if Hillary is the dastardly criminal everyone claims, why hasn't Trump (like he promised to do) instructed Jeff Sessions to open multiple cases against her?? The reason of course is that Trump can't succeed without those two as a foil to present to his base as an excuse for, literally, everything.
It's not a matter of opinion, it's a matter of law, which none was broken. Even if he had happily accepted damaging information of some sort, it still wouldn't be illegal. Some fringe types are trying to claim it breaks campaign finance law. not recognizing the law states the campaign must be soliciting cash or another valuable item with factual information not counting and being 1st Amendment protected as is as we are free to accept ideas from anyone.
If it was so blatantly illegal I doubt both parties would have been doing it but as we've seen, when Trump does a thing it's always at least twice as nefarious as the thing itself, cause ya know, it's Trump, and he's just a Bad Guy.
Ya no.
The courts will decide if what transpired was illigal, not Fox News, not the President, not some random internet boards.
What is known, is that legal experts, of all stripes, are pointing to this one law and stating it is something they, the prosecutors, can use to press charges.
And as explained prior, Both parties were not doing it. One American Citizen obtaining information from multiple sources to determine if Trump's campaign has deep Russian connections is not the DNC taking information from foriegn power and using it against Trump. The DNC clearly stated that they did not use any information the lawyer obtained in their dossier against Trump.
And if Right wingers want to make that claim, they need to prove it, just like the FBI at the moment is attempting to prove Trump's team colluded with a foriegn power during the election.
This is just another piece of information to add to the growing file against Trump's team illigal dealings during the campaign. They won't press any charges until the entire investigation is complete, and hopefully charges are applied to Trump as well as members of his campaign so he cant just pardon them in an hour after being charged.
Collusion would still need to be proven, given that Ms. Veselnitskaya claims that she had no connection to anyone in the Russian government at the time of the meeting. If her claim is correct, then why did Mr. Goldstone present the meeting to Junior as if she were some Russian official? If her claim is incorrect (meaning that she actually did have some official capacity in the government) then won't that be incredibly difficult to prove?
If Junior is presumably guilty of something then how long will it be before charges against him are filed? As I have noted many times now, won't that prompt Senior to issue a pardon? Incidentally, Trump wouldn't have to wait for charges to be filed--he may issue pardons right now for any crimes in connection with any Russian-related investigation but he would probably wait until charges are actually filed so that the text of the pardons addresses the specific charges in question. In a worst-case scenario, if Trump himself faces charges he can always pull a Nixon as long as he in is office--resign immediately then let his successor's first action be to pardon the former boss.
@jjstraka34 I suspect that your earlier assessment is completely accurate--Kushner is trying to throw Junior under the bus.
Collusion would still need to be proven, given that Ms. Veselnitskaya claims that she had no connection to anyone in the Russian government at the time of the meeting. If her claim is correct, then why did Mr. Goldstone present the meeting to Junior as if she were some Russian official? If her claim is incorrect (meaning that she actually did have some official capacity in the government) then won't that be incredibly difficult to prove?
If Junior is presumably guilty of something then how long will it be before charges against him are filed? As I have noted many times now, won't that prompt Senior to issue a pardon?
I suspect that your earlier assessment is completely accurate--Kushner is trying to throw Junior under the bus.
And even this assumes that this is the entire iceberg, rather than just the tip, which is much more likely.
I have no doubt that more shoes will drop but even I cannot say what form those shoes may take.
note: you posted while I was editing my previous post to add some more info re: pardons.
No doubt he will issue blanket pardons at some point. Which is really nothing more than admission of guilt. I still say collusion is the least of his problems. What's going to come to light is that his "business" since he went belly-up in Atlantic City has been laundering the money of Russian billionaires through his real estate and casinos.
@Balrog99: To be fair, the idea is not to make people feel guilty about eating meat. The idea is to get more people to switch to a more humane diet, whether that's vegan or simply vegetarian.
I'm semi-vegetarian and not yet quite sure what a humane diet can include, but one of the things I've realized is just how little difference it makes to switch to plants. Even in the United States, most of our calories already come from plants. It's not that big of a change, really, and the nutritional difference is petty thin, too. Protein is easy to come by, and though most vegan diets are low in B12 (only a few plants have much of it), there are supplements for that.
A vegan friend of mine once mentioned that a friend of hers was having trouble adapting to a vegan diet. Her friend had been trying to make all these elaborate dishes out of tofu and was having a hard time. how do you make a simple vegan breakfast?
Easy. You put a potato in the microwave.
Yeah but bacon tastes good for a reason!
That reason is mostly fat actually. Protein isn't terribly tasty to humans, because we scavenged scraps of fat while living on fruit mostly. We've been selected for a mostly herbivorous diet by our ancestors, but meat definately became a status symbol.
There is no proof that Homo Sapiens were respinsible for the eventual decline of the Neanderthal, but there is definstely evidence of interbreeding, so there really isn't proof of genocide, just that Neanderthal were likely not preferred mates. For all we know a disease could have wiped them out, so no reparations are required.
In terms of goal posts, the claim has always been, at least from my point of view and correct me if I am wrong, that the Trump campaign was in some way knowingly involved with an illegal hack on the DNC by Russian agents. That has been the collusion in question. Never was it that Trump Jr. met with Russians who said they had dirt on Hillary, never claimed to be ill gotten, and the former is not remotely connected to the latter let alone the smoking gun of it.
Maybe if they had said "Hey Trump Jr, we the Russian gov't have information illegally hacked from the democrats to give to you" and then they accepted that information and didn't tell anyone we might have the case so many are desperate to make. But as of now what we have is a lot of hyperventilating over every Russian "connection" that can possibly be made.
Accepting an offer to listen to information offered another country, as the son of a politician, or even as a politician, isn't illegal, and it does not equal a rigged or hacked election with the aid of the Trump campaign. Yet the witch hunts of the Trump era have long since left reality in the past. If anyone said they had incriminating evidence on a political opponent, you'd be inclined to listen. You can't just insert both criminality and knowledge of criminality into the equation without cause or reason.
As the left subverted democracy this election cycle quite knowingly without the help of foriegn agents you have to wonder how concerned the most well known Trump/Russia propagandists are with election integrity in the first place and how concerned they are about covering up their own lack of it.
The story as I see it is that Hilary Clinton needed an excuse for losing and the actual, proven, and rampant election interference coordinated on her behalf so she blamed the Russians because of Wikileaks and now the left is stuck defending something they never should have doubled down on and if they just had the ability to find fault with their own they could have just shut her down on this topic because, frankly, its all been a behind-covering ruse from the start.
There are legitimate issues with Trump, but this Russia stuff is not one of them and isn't ever going to amount to anything.
In terms of goal posts, the claim has always been, at least from my point of view and correct me if I am wrong, that the Trump campaign was in some way knowingly involved with an illegal hack on the DNC by Russian agents.
So this is wrong, and two seperate incidents.
People were up in arms that Trump, during a debate or speech, said he welcomed Russia's attempt to hack the DNC in hopes to find the deleted Clinton emails but the claim always centred around Flynn and Manafort, two key aides to Trump during the campaign and how much Trump knew of their involvement with Russia ties.
The collusion and hack were always seperate and it'd be huge bombshell if they ever are connected, but I wouldn't put money on it.
And if it was just Trump Jr meeting with the Russian contact, i'd buy the naive argument he didnt know better. Since he dragged along two of Trump's inner circle with him, the argument longer holds water.
This has nothing to do with Hillary or Obama or John Podesta or Ronald McDonald.
Trump Jr. knowingly met with some who had damaging information on Mrs. Clinton that came from the Russian government. The Russian government wished that Mr. Trump would win the election and promised Donnie Jr. damaging information. Donnie Jr. was so excited, he loved it. Before the meeting Don Sr. goes on TV promising to reveal something big about the Clintons.
The meeting happens a couple days later the excited Donnie Jr. brings along Kushner and Manaford because he's so thrilled that he might be getting damaging information on candidate Clinton originating from the Russian government.
Also, today is the day when separation of powers ended in Poland, given the Parlament passed an act changing how National Judiciary Council work and system of common courts. So we are officialy a satrapy. I may write more about it later - if anyone is interested - but it'll take time, cuz legal stuff and such.
Comments
After the email between member of his campaign donald jr and before the actual meeting Trump said this.
Sure looks like he was aware of the meeting with his two sons and his campaign manager.
Doesn't even matter if he got anything good, the act of going all in to try and coordinate is the thing. It's like if your criminal wants to buy drugs and goes to buy them but oh no it's a cop and he has no drugs he's still going to jail because he wanted to commit a crime.
Doesn't matter if he thought he could win or not either, ignorance of the law is not an excuse. And if your running for office you should look into the rules.
The proper response was for Donald Trump Jr. to contact the authorities. He did not.
The one thing I truly do not understand about this situation is where Donald Trump and his son got the idea that the Russian government was a trustworthy pal who would do the United States no wrong.
It still isn't treason but there are definitely ethics problems and violations of political campaign laws to consider. Junior isn't going to sweat it because Senior will most likely just issue a pardon.
What we need is more choices!
Assuming the other guy is a criminal is not a valid excuse for your own criminal activities.
If it is info that is true, so be it, take it into account, if those in the US can't or won't deal with that. I want to see THIS type of collusion busted wide open.
Seems a bit hypocritical to me. I guess the money from within is just too much of an accepted method.
Meetings to 'subvert American democracy', gimmi a break. It's already being subverted from within.
What a real circus show the political system is here, now more than ever. Disappointing it is.
My fellow North Carolinian Edward Snowden was at first I thought a real piece-o-work, but now I think it was a much needed revelation for regular citizens that woke some folks up and got them talking.
I know it's been largely covered already, but I just can't resist making the following points about Trump Jr's 'transparent' behavior in this matter:
- The New York Times reports the meeting with a Russian lawyer linked to the Kremlin took place. Trump Jr responds that he was asked to attend the meeting by an acquaintance and did not know in advance who he was meeting, but that the meeting was 'primarily' about adoption.
- The Times reports that the meeting discussed information potentially damaging to the Clinton campaign. Ahead of publication Trump Jr was asked about the story and explained that the meeting arose as a result of a previous acquaintance with the Russian lawyer as a result of the Miss Universe pageant held in Moscow in 2013 (admitting in the process he did know who the meeting was with). The meeting did cover Clinton, but there was 'no meaningful information'. He also said he asked Kushner and Manafort to attend, but they did not know what the meeting was about in advance.
- The Times reported that Trump Jr did in fact know what the meeting was about in advance and that the information to be discussed in the meeting came from the Russian government. Trump Jr responded by publishing an email chain about the meeting that makes clear Kushner, Manafort and Trump Jr all knew exactly the purpose of the meeting and that the stated source of the supposed information was indeed the Russian government. It's not yet clear why Trump published the emails, although it seems most likely that he was told the Times was about to publish them itself.
Obviously there's a human tendency to put the best face on things you can, but I think Trump Jr has gone well beyond that. He's not simply used misdirection (though he has tried that), but outright lies. What seems incredible is that he won't just shut up (like Kushner) and wait until the full story emerges - and then put the best spin possible on it. Instead he's regularly responding with a different story that can actually be disproved. Even if your philosophy is that the truth is not important, that behavior seems pretty stupid ...
About 45 thousand years ago dark skinned African Homo Sapiens moved into Europe, driving the native light skinned Homo Neanderthalensis into extinction. Due to interbreeding white Europeans carry some Neanderthal DNA - they are what is left of their decedents. Africans and Asians carry no such DNA. Ergo Africans and Asians owe white Europeans a debt for genocide against their Neanderthal ancestors*. There is even genetic proof.
*NB, to make it clear, this is not my position, I believe that people are only responsible for their own actions, not their ancestors.
In which case, we're enemies with...NK, Iran, Iraq, China, Syria, Russia, Libya, and probably every other Muslim-majority country in the world. Probably Cuba as well.
Why? Because WE say or intimate that they're our enemies.
If it was so blatantly illegal I doubt both parties would have been doing it but as we've seen, when Trump does a thing it's always at least twice as nefarious as the thing itself, cause ya know, it's Trump, and he's just a Bad Guy.
It's clear all the Trump team has to do is a.) keep moving the goalposts and b.) point and yell "Obama!" and "Hillary" to illicit some Pavlovian reaction. And if Hillary is the dastardly criminal everyone claims, why hasn't Trump (like he promised to do) instructed Jeff Sessions to open multiple cases against her?? The reason of course is that Trump can't succeed without those two as a foil to present to his base as an excuse for, literally, everything.
The courts will decide if what transpired was illigal, not Fox News, not the President, not some random internet boards.
What is known, is that legal experts, of all stripes, are pointing to this one law and stating it is something they, the prosecutors, can use to press charges.
And as explained prior, Both parties were not doing it. One American Citizen obtaining information from multiple sources to determine if Trump's campaign has deep Russian connections is not the DNC taking information from foriegn power and using it against Trump. The DNC clearly stated that they did not use any information the lawyer obtained in their dossier against Trump.
And if Right wingers want to make that claim, they need to prove it, just like the FBI at the moment is attempting to prove Trump's team colluded with a foriegn power during the election.
This is just another piece of information to add to the growing file against Trump's team illigal dealings during the campaign. They won't press any charges until the entire investigation is complete, and hopefully charges are applied to Trump as well as members of his campaign so he cant just pardon them in an hour after being charged.
If Junior is presumably guilty of something then how long will it be before charges against him are filed? As I have noted many times now, won't that prompt Senior to issue a pardon? Incidentally, Trump wouldn't have to wait for charges to be filed--he may issue pardons right now for any crimes in connection with any Russian-related investigation but he would probably wait until charges are actually filed so that the text of the pardons addresses the specific charges in question. In a worst-case scenario, if Trump himself faces charges he can always pull a Nixon as long as he in is office--resign immediately then let his successor's first action be to pardon the former boss.
@jjstraka34 I suspect that your earlier assessment is completely accurate--Kushner is trying to throw Junior under the bus.
note: you posted while I was editing my previous post to add some more info re: pardons.
There is no proof that Homo Sapiens were respinsible for the eventual decline of the Neanderthal, but there is definstely evidence of interbreeding, so there really isn't proof of genocide, just that Neanderthal were likely not preferred mates. For all we know a disease could have wiped them out, so no reparations are required.
Maybe if they had said "Hey Trump Jr, we the Russian gov't have information illegally hacked from the democrats to give to you" and then they accepted that information and didn't tell anyone we might have the case so many are desperate to make. But as of now what we have is a lot of hyperventilating over every Russian "connection" that can possibly be made.
Accepting an offer to listen to information offered another country, as the son of a politician, or even as a politician, isn't illegal, and it does not equal a rigged or hacked election with the aid of the Trump campaign. Yet the witch hunts of the Trump era have long since left reality in the past. If anyone said they had incriminating evidence on a political opponent, you'd be inclined to listen. You can't just insert both criminality and knowledge of criminality into the equation without cause or reason.
As the left subverted democracy this election cycle quite knowingly without the help of foriegn agents you have to wonder how concerned the most well known Trump/Russia propagandists are with election integrity in the first place and how concerned they are about covering up their own lack of it.
There are legitimate issues with Trump, but this Russia stuff is not one of them and isn't ever going to amount to anything.
People were up in arms that Trump, during a debate or speech, said he welcomed Russia's attempt to hack the DNC in hopes to find the deleted Clinton emails but the claim always centred around Flynn and Manafort, two key aides to Trump during the campaign and how much Trump knew of their involvement with Russia ties.
The collusion and hack were always seperate and it'd be huge bombshell if they ever are connected, but I wouldn't put money on it.
And if it was just Trump Jr meeting with the Russian contact, i'd buy the naive argument he didnt know better. Since he dragged along two of Trump's inner circle with him, the argument longer holds water.
Trump Jr. knowingly met with some who had damaging information on Mrs. Clinton that came from the Russian government. The Russian government wished that Mr. Trump would win the election and promised Donnie Jr. damaging information. Donnie Jr. was so excited, he loved it. Before the meeting Don Sr. goes on TV promising to reveal something big about the Clintons.
The meeting happens a couple days later the excited Donnie Jr. brings along Kushner and Manaford because he's so thrilled that he might be getting damaging information on candidate Clinton originating from the Russian government.
This is the issue at hand.
Also, today is the day when separation of powers ended in Poland, given the Parlament passed an act changing how National Judiciary Council work and system of common courts. So we are officialy a satrapy.
I may write more about it later - if anyone is interested - but it'll take time, cuz legal stuff and such.