Not to say "both sides do it" or "corrupt big city politicians are the problem" or "both major party establishments are the problem," but the article makes Cyrus Vance, Jr. look roughly as bad as the Trumps.
The thing that always shocks me about political corruption is how cheap it is. I mean, $25k to make a felony indictment go away? That's a scale I could plausibly afford. I'm thinking billionaires must be throwing millions around, but no, for a year of daycare you can buy off the DA and skate with the millions you made on fraudulent deals.
Well, the true donation (what was paid after the initial contribution was returned and the issue was in the past) was more. It could be the whispered arrangement is "X now, then he'll return it, but later the commitment is for 2X per election indefinitely." (Although the quoted $50K was including bundled donations.)
One thing this story makes clear is what a bad idea it is to have elected prosecutors.
Even if he returned every penny, he still has the value of having had money then! He got to use it at the moment, perhaps when cash was short.
This and the guardians for the elderly story is making me think good things about the American Justice system.
Isn't it less likely this was a one time thing, and more likely he just made the mistake of taking a bribe from someone who was too famous.
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The impending decertification of the Iran deal and the inevitable fallout are going to be the next Trumpian clusterfuck to confront us.
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I'm kind of unclear on what exactly follows desertification.. If Iran and all the other parties just ignore the US, then what bad things happen?
OK, we've ended the possibility of a deal with NK.
10.2 I think that may well end up being the main consequence, we've proven that we don't keep our word. And I think 10.1 is probably what will happen, Iran will declare that they'll continue to abide by the JCPOA, the IAEA will continue to certify that Iran is in compliance with same (because they will be) and there will be no support for sanctions from the EU, Russia, China. This will only serve to further isolate and weaken the US. Which may not be a bad thing considering.
I wonder what kind of strong-arm tactics the Trump administration will try to get the other signatories to go along with new sanctions, and whether or not it will work. Maybe not at all, this lot doesn't appear to have the competence to pull that kind of thing off.
Is Iran still penalized by existing sanctions not being dangled in the nuclear deal though?
12 I'm not sure of what you mean.
A lot of sanctions were lifted and crucially money held in US accounts was unfrozen which has since been transferred.
10.2 I think that may well end up being the main consequence, we've proven that we don't keep our word.
Is this summary from MY basically accurate?
[T]he president's team seems to unanimously agree that following through on his campaign pledge to tear up the nuclear deal with Iran would be a disaster. But instead of telling him straightforwardly that he's wrong about this and needs to face the facts, Eliana Johnson reports that his team has hit upon a high-wire strategy in which they have "unanimously recommended that he decertify the Iran nuclear deal -- but that he stop short of pushing Congress to reimpose sanctions on Tehran that could unravel the agreement."
Relative to a straightforward flip-flop, this approach has zero conceivable upside and carries with it risks ranging from regional war to Iranian acquisition of a nuclear weapon. But nobody wants to tell the snowflake in chief that the big problem here is that his campaign rhetoric was incorrect and irresponsible.
14: Can't they do any better than that? "Donald, your genius saved the Iran deal! It was a terrible deal, and the Iranians would have built a bomb secretly but now they are so scared of you they are keeping to it. You're the greatest!"
14 I've seen stories to that effect, I don't recall where.
Man, the memoirs that are going to come out of this administration are going to be something else. If we all live to read them.
Holy shit, is this guy the Kevin Bacon of celebrity criminal scandals?
I suspect being Manhattan DA puts you in that position rather a lot compared to most people.
Probably part of why the post has tended to such outrageous incumbency since 1942.
It's just a tiny island. How many people can possibly live there?
I'm kind of unclear on what exactly follows desertification
I thought desertification was supposed to follow the catastrophic war.
Nuclear winter is the best counter to global warming. Trump is about to prove himself the greatest environmentalist list since Mr. Arbor Lodge.
Best case scenario: Trump installs commemorative plaques and fake magazine covers at his golf courses and buildings celebrating victory in a nuclear war that never happened.
14 I've seen stories to that effect, I don't recall where
The FT is reporting basically that story today, though they say Tillerson and Mattis are pushing for some sort of "fix" whereby Trump doesn't have to keep certifying the deal, but it stays in place.
I'm kind of unclear on what exactly follows desertification
The cheese course.
Mad Max: Dairy Road. The Cheese Stands Alone.
There might actually be 60 votes in the Senate for Iran sanctons. Maybe 75.
This "calm before the storm" comment is alarming.
What can you do? He loves death and you love Pepsi.
This "calm before the storm" comment is alarming.
No shit.
There's at least a 90% chance he's not talking about an American nuclear first strike.
Pee tape update: Still might happen.
Would the release of the pee tape, by itself*, make any difference at this point? Anyone still supporting Trump at this point has seen the Access Hollywood tape plus every other norm-breaking and common-decency-flouting thing he's done since taking office, and is OK with all that.
* I get how proof of the existence of the pee tape would strengthen the case that Russia is using kompromat to influence Trump. But the pee tape qua pee tape? Meh.
I get that nobody would stop supporting Trump because of the pee tape, but I think you are too quick to discount both the sheer joy it would bring me to know such a tape exists and how much easier it would be to have the fight about whether or not a bakery has to make a cake for a gay couple if every time somebody equates homosexuality with sexual perversion, you can mention the pee tape.
35: It would make a huge difference. It would cause a huge spike in the Golden Showers market especially in Red states.
Also, maybe it will hurt Trump. Obviously, nobody who votes for him cares that he gropes women but that's not because they are just too sex positive to care. It's because don't like women. I bet a tape where Trump pees on women wouldn't hurt him with his supporters, but a tape where Trump is peed on by women would hurt him.
You know, I would have been thrilled to see that happen any time during the campaign. But now, I'm not seeing the upside. It would make Trump less stable, so presumably he'd be less effective at efficiently implementing Republican policies... as if that was ever the biggest concern. At this point, making Trump less stable just makes nuclear war more likely. The tape wouldn't shake Republican support for him in any meaningful way. A significant fraction of them have attained pure conspiracy theorist status and could dismiss it as completely faked. Another big fraction of them would conclude that since the tapes don't show Trump personally having sex, it's weird but not actually unforgivable.
Also, we'd be forced to picture and read about Trump, prostitutes, and pee in serious contexts. Nuclear war would be attractive.
but a tape where Trump is peed on by women would hurt him.
Maybe it would, but is anyone alleging that that exists? To quote the article you linked:
It also says that Russian officials have a video of Trump in an upscale Moscow hotel room watching prostitutes pee on a bed that Barack and Michelle Obama once slept in.
Nothing about Trump, shall we say, being directly involved.
Who knows what somebody who will pay to watch somebody pee wants?
At this point, making Trump less stable just makes nuclear war more likely.
That was my point in 31. I think you still got to take the chance on getting rid of Trump even if anything you do to get rid of him will certainly make the short term more risky.
I'm inclined to think a competent Republican administration at this moment could and would permanently steal the republic, seriously menacing human civilization into the indefinite future. Trump isn't that kind of threat. Like we've said before, Kaiser not Führer.
That's not an analogy I find comforting. The Kaiser started a war that killed some obscenely high percentage of the men who came of age during its course and I've got a son who will turn 18 before the end of the next presidential term.
It wasn't meant to be comforting. It was meant to say, things can still get worse.
Also, I don't right now see a path to world war. A nuclear exchange with DPRK would be catastrophic for all affected, but realistically not a threat to civilization. Permanent Republicanism would be, if only by derailing climate change mitigation.
I don't think there's any serious threat of permanent Republicanism without the white nationalism that is Trump's base.
If Trump is removed the base will remain, led by newly emboldened authoritarians with better political and management skills.
The disaffected voters Trump brought out of the woodwork hate establishment Republicans almost as much as they hate Democrats. You could certainly find a racist with better management skills than Trump without looking very hard at all, but I think that kind of efficiency would require things like not threatening create international crises for the fuck of it. I think that doing so would turn-off enough of the Trump voters to make it difficult to win.
This is more for posterity than anything else, but I just learned it was Fleet Week and thought, jeez, maybe I should look into the Navy as the least worst option if Trump via complete incompetence draws us into some horrible large-scale conventional war.
You mean like to join or like for an American version of Admiral Dönitz at the end?
48: It may not be. The new anti-ship missiles are very lethal.
The Navy's recent record at least in the Pacific does not exactly inspire confidence...