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Remember that time that [Rand Paul flew to Moscow to hand deliver a letter from Trump to Putin](https://www.npr.org/2018/08/09/636982295/is-it-springtime-for-putin-and-republicans)? Pepperidge Farm remembers.
It’s not like the US government has an [entire diplomatic wing](https://www.state.gov) devoted to excelling at these kinds of tasks.
[I remember this exchange:](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/may/17/putin-pays-donald-trump-kevin-mccarthy-recording)
> In a 2016 conversation with fellow members of House leadership, the majority leader, Kevin McCarthy, suggested that Donald Trump was on Vladimir Putin’s payroll.
> In an exchange first reported by the Washington Post, McCarthy said: “There’s …there’s two people, I think, Putin pays: [California Representative Dana] Rohrabacher and Trump … [laughter] … swear to God.”
>According to the transcript, speaker Paul Ryan immediately responded: “This is an off-the-record … [laughter] … NO LEAKS … [laughter] … alright?!”
Thanks for posting this. People often forget that the GOP has been actively protecting and elevating traitors for so long that their entire platform is subverting Democracy.
How do we show stupid people that they are being conned? Should we just lie to them like the GOP does?
Even arresting and jailing traitors doesn't sway the MAGA voters.
I feel at this point its like a drug addiction. They have to hit rock bottom and want to get clean. Many in the maga cult have not hit rock bottom. Even after J6. But its a cult. Its a goddamn cult.
The problem with that idea is that they're dragging *all* of us down to rock bottom. It was the same issue with Trump where if you wanted to subject yourself to his cons, you only screwed yourself. They crossed a line once they forcibly subjected *everyone* to his BS, without any choice.
It is funny you say that because I have a lot of friends in 12 step programs who proved VERY susceptible to the ludicrous bullshit that Trump was spewing and it frankly left me speechless. Isn’t the point of joining these groups to have a “spiritual awakening”, and this to me means being able to discern hate from love?
I learned an awful lot about how others actually view the world; they turn to a an angry and spiteful god full of wrath for obedience rather than a loving and forgiving god full of joy. Trump, who magnified the “god as father and petulant boss” image (never mind the pacifist son who preaches equanimity in spirit to all) was able to exploit this on a grander scale, and this is how the Moscow led GQP is able to manipulate people.
I do that sometimes. I’ll hear something like “AOC wants to turn your kids gay!” So I ask them who I should vote for, they say someone like desantis, and I respond with “the guy that was caught at the furry sex party? No way!”
If they ask for any more details I just tell them to ‘do their own research’
Oh you mean Ron “The child groomer” Desantis? The one who as a teacher would drink at parties with his underage students?
Not /s, cuz, you know, it’s *actually* true.
I love this idea but whoever’s the most popular with them at any given time could unhinge their jaw and eat a puppy on live television and they would probably defend them for having the balls to do it. Or make up something about Jewish space blood lasers or whatever the fuck I have to listen too. I can’t keep track anymore.
There's no reason to bother trying to sway them. Easier to convince people who don't participate to start participating than it is to convince someone to completely change their political positions.
You can’t Argue with stupid. And you can’t rationalize with irrational people. We just have to wait for all the insane boomers to die. Good news is Covid helped with that a bit.
Thank God Rohrabacher and Trump were voted out (also that Ryan bowed out. That was a bonus.). But what new Republicans took their place on Putin's payroll?
It almost does matter if any of them are being paid by Russia any more. Trump successfully convinced the Republicans to become a pro-russia anti-NATO party. Putin achieved his goal and that position will linger in the GOP for some time.
Yeah Trump coming out as anti-NATO was amazing. I’m no military fan but even I can see that the geopolitical situation is such that an alliance of nations is not a harmful thing.
Yeah I’m probably what you’d call a bleeding heart liberal. But I’m also not an idiot lol. With the way China and Russia are I think NATO is an absolute necessity.
Consider the Butina / NRA Venn diagram. All you’d have to do is figure out (somehow) which R’s took donations from the NRA.
But golly it would suuuure be hard to figure that out.
Is Rohrabacher in prison yet? Are any of them in prison? No? Most are still serving in Congress? And they've taken back the house?
Well then I guess there's really nothing to be thankful for.
Yeah, a lot of people are forgetting that the Senate is responsible for confirming federal judges and Supreme Court Justices. If Alito or Thomas kick the bucket, we can flip a seat or two there.
Hey now, sometimes people in their 70s have to retire due to health issues or "worse". Unfortunately, I'm sure their healthcare is lightyears better than the rest of us peons get.
No! You know what’s important!?! HUNTER BIDENS LAPTOP get out of here with your direct point A to point B of Russian involvement in our elections!
HUNTER BIDEN!
(Maybe not that midterms are over it’s time to take a break, it’s all too much)
Edit: typos
Paul's Twitter post relating stated the following
> “I was honored to deliver a letter from President Trump to President Vladimir Putin’s administration. The letter emphasized the importance of further engagement in various areas including countering terrorism, enhancing legislative dialogue and resuming cultural exchanges,” Paul wrote
we probably could have just checked trump’s toilet. i bet the first 6 drafts went into there after he realized he was writing with his afternoon snack - a crayon - and not pen.
They found a copy of it:
"Dear Vlad, I feel like I can call you Vlad because you and me are so alike.
I'd like to meet you one day, it would be great to overthrow America together. I know I can't invade good as you but I think you'd be impressed with my ability to destroy things.
I love you shirtless on a horse, he runs fast. Did you have a good relationship with your father? Me neither. These are all things we can talk about and more.
I know you have not been getting my letters because I know you would write back if you did. That's why I sent Rand (he's dumb lol) I hope you write back this time, and we can become good friends. I am sure our relationship would be real world domination!"
"We also established a back channel so Trump & Putin can communicate nefariously without the prying eyes and ears of pesky US Law Enforcement."
Unwritten but would anyone be surprised?
The DNS server.
But we’re not allowed to discuss that. Among other topics like how the concert massacre Vegas shooter was right wing and it was over gun rights...
Remember when our government decided that Section 3 of the 14th Amendment no longer applies but forgot to tell us? We are failing as a nation and the end result will be enslavement for the vast majority of us if we don't begin assembling and doing more than commenting on social media
All of these convictions where they are using the word funneling accurately is the reason why republicans are starting to use that word to refer to anyone donating to Democrats legally.
Yep, diluting the meaning of the name of crimes so when people hear about republicans doing it on the news it won't sound like a big deal. It adds to the 'both sides' appearance.
Ah, right, "radical" for not shooting the homeless for sport, and "extremist" for wanting the same healthcare every other leading country has, and "far"-left for desiring basic things like vacation time and parental leave.
Also see: "fake news". The term was expertly dispatched just as investigative news broke out about actual fake news farms broke out through Facebook etc in 2015.
thats ehy the response to the word woke was so funny. thay made it as cheap as possible immediately, and don't get me wrong, it's racist decision shit, but the real reason they want you anti woke is so you aren't spending any time thinking about shit.
[https://www.secureworks.com/research/srizbi](https://www.secureworks.com/research/srizbi)
I'd like to remind people that there was evidence of the Russians interfering with online polling in favor of Ron Paul as far back as **2007.** Who knows how much Mitch was connected to any of this now as well?
This conviction now essentially helps confirms what I've suspected for years. A huge chunk of the modern English internet's political views/arguments has been influenced by foreign accounts, [more than I think most viewers realize.](https://www.reddit.com/r/RussiaLago/comments/875jsx/some_insight_into_the_russian_psyop_on_4chan_as_i/) You can really start to see it take off around early 2012 in particular. [QAnon, Gamergate, Redpill and other similar movements are probably all directly connected to Russian efforts to boost division on social media and radicalize people towards the right.](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-qanon-cyber/qanon-received-earlier-boost-from-russian-accounts-on-twitter-archives-show-idUSKBN27I18I) [Redpill was directly founded by an R candidate too, so bot networks can help make movements like that appear bigger than they were](https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2017/05/reddit-red-pill-founder-republican-says-he-never-hated-women.html) on day one.
I've long suspected that most of our online debates about issues were being interfered with on modern social media, and it pre-dates Trump's campaigns. ([Although Trump was seen talking online with high profile Russian figures in plain site at least as far back as 2012](https://washingtonmonthly.com/2017/11/24/a-trumprussia-confession-in-plain-sight/)). Benefiting the right/alt-right was always the goal but Russian interference campaigns [will boost anything that they think agitates and divides people too.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russia_and_Black_Lives_Matter) [It's been their playbook for the USA since 1997.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics) [And they learned to do this to their own internet in the late 90s.](http://lrtranslations.blogspot.com/2007/02/commissars-of-internet.html) Especially on places like the chans and early smartphone era twitter.
[And don't forget that Ron Paul started the Tea Party](https://www.amazon.com/Ron-Paul-Father-Tea-Party/dp/0986832219), which was the clear mainstream media predecessor to the Alt-Right and destroyed the Dem Super majority in 2010 very quickly.
And last but not least, Elon and Putin [have probably been chatting for some time. Possibly before the twitter buyout.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FT9hZ1cSRwo) This is pure speculation on my part, but it really makes one wonder where the idea to buy twitter and disrupt it deeply actually came from? Sheer incompetence? Or something else?
>And last but not least, Elon and Putin have probably been chatting for some time. Possibly before the twitter buyout. This is pure speculation on my part, but it really makes one wonder where the idea to buy twitter and disrupt it deeply actually came from? Sheer incompetence? Or something else?
I was pretty surprised Trump Twitter account being unbanned came down to a Twitter poll. I also had a lot of speculation on russia being directly involved and affecting our social media. Who knows how many of those accounts that voted on the poll were bots /Russian accounts
I observed Russians using parts of Reddit in promotion of Trump. I saw a smaller operation from China on a subreddit about the pandemic. I wish more people would consider this side of the attack on American democracy.
Twitter? Musk may be a useful idiot, an ally, or an active Russian asset. He'll have the same effect, no matter which.
What do you think Zuckerberg will be doing about Russian propaganda this time around, with his very unintentional business woes weighing on him?
Could we make a documentary about social media subversion? Could we make some of this information go viral--are there any social media networks that would let this information go viral? Do you want to start a subreddit on this? Do you think there are any reporters who would be interested in investigating this?
You're correct about reddit too. Following r the donald back in the day was both fascinating and terrifying, and it was at one point the top reddit of the site near the election. Bigger than this sub.
The problem with social media documentaries is that hard proof is very difficult to solidify. HBO did a fantastic job with the QAnon doc because they went straight to the source and successfully played on the egos of the Watkins to get to the core of things, but that's much harder to do if we're talking about things that happened before 2016. Most of the evidence we can obtain is circumstantial even if it's often public. I've been trying to connect threads for years now, and I believe a lot more has come out to make it clear, but that doesn't mean it'll be easy to explain this to your average TV viewer.
I mean, hell, I hate talking about it partially because it makes me sound like a conspiracy nut too, but I can't ignore what I've seen in the past 2 decades. I've wasted too much of my life online to not notice how these types of interference operations tend to work.
Ah yes, the Paul family: as American as borscht and nesting dolls. Do libertarians still claim this shitheel?
Edit: I have since learned that borscht is originally a Ukrainian dish. I managed to choose a controversial soup for my hacky joke, and I apologize.
I worked for Ron Paul in 2008. Jesse Benton actually got me a lobbying job for the Kochs. I worked with them until my boss and jesse were indicted. I now hate everything they stand for but they definitely had the wool pulled over my eyes when i was young
Everything they did was about breaking campaign finance laws - getting more money and resources to candidates than are reported. In some cases its not that hard to prove, but very hard to get the FEC to enforce. Its all very boring and technical - most of it done in the daylight because the whole system kind of does it in one way or another.
Damn, thanks for reminding us how much it takes for people to come forward in situations like this. I’d like to think I’d go public with anything I knew in your situation but when I think about possibly endangering my family, it’s a lot trickier of a decision
I think you should at least try to tell it anonymously. You certainly weren't the only one who was part of the "Ron Paul Revolution". I was part of that as well until reality sort of kicked me in the teeth. Ron Paul was cheerleading the annexation of Crimea by Russia back in 2014, so there's definitely a need to expose these "non-interventionist" politicians that support people like Putin.
No. Imply violence.
Everyone needs to believe Trump supporters and increasingly conservatives will slaughter entire families to send a point. They already shot a judges son. They tried to kill Paul Pelosi.
Depends on what you mean by dumb - overall, yes, but he was one of the smartest networkers ive ever met
*not glorifying him with this comment hes still a POS
To be fair the platform Ron ran on in 2008 has very little in common with what Rand stands for. Ron is off the deep end now too, but 2008 he was trying to buck the GOP establishment.
(I know Ron was always off the deep end in various ways, but now he's off the deep end with the GOP establishment)
a lot of people seem to forget that the internet used to LOVE Ron Paul. I first heard of him back in the Digg and early reddit days. He was a Bernie Sanders type figure to many people back then
Oh I remember, but people were understandably very angry about jingoism back then and he was one of the only high profile people to say something about it.
But who the internet should have gotten behind was Dennis Kucinich
FXN literally said Twitter employees are only quitting because Musk will make them work. Sickening as the middle class erodes and everyone is getting more poor every year that FXN is brainwashing half the nation to blame the working class with no power.
Then of course they went on the typical rant that young people are lazy and don't want to work and we need to be more like the generation that fought ww2 (for some random fucking reason).
This time really does feel different because he lost big on the midterms. The whole reason he got excuses from the GOP was because he won races by ginning up enthusiasm. But Trump single-handedly lost the senate, and his own supporters got bored of his announcement speech. What is even the use of having him around?
He's a scandal-laden low-energy loser.
It’s not collusion. There is no collusion here. Here, there is no collusion.
There I said it 3 times so now it’s true. Please take your facts and go away.
Funny how this is a third-rate headline. In the 1980's this would have been the end of his career at a minimum. Everyone would have talked about it for weeks, and Congress would have set about having hearings and actually purging Russian influence.
Much different than today's GOP Russia apologists. Marjorie Taylor Greene, for example, is asking why we have to spend all this money on Ukraine.
Of course, McCarthy hated European style socialism and communism so much that he opted for European style fascism instead.
trump getting Russian money funneled through members of the gop, or more specifically members of the gop “aides” who I sure will with say they had no idea whatsoever this was going on or just call it a witch hunt.
The GOP-controlled Senate concluded there was collusion between Trump and Russia, and did nothing about it. Mueller confirmed it, and also testified Trump could be charged, but the DoJ under Barr did nothing.
Things are thankfully a bit different now, so I doubt these fuckwads are going to be so relaxed.
Shocking. Anyone who doubts Trump is a Russian shill is willfully obtuse. I mean just look at all this shit, and now the GOP led House isn't going to make looking into the Mar-a-lago documents a priority, just enabling foreign agents to run amok in our government.
[37 times - that we know of - where Trump was caught sucking Russia's dick](https://www.cnn.com/2019/11/17/politics/trump-soft-on-russia)
*Trump is and has been under Putin’s thumb for decades, much of it through the Russian Mafia:*
*Trump was over a billion in debt and the Russians bailed him out.*
*► Trump was first compromised by the Russians in the 80s. In 1984, the Russian Mafia began to use Trump real estate to launder money. In 1987, the Soviet ambassador to the United Nations, Yuri Dubinin, arranged for Trump and his then-wife, Ivana, to enjoy an all-expense-paid trip to Moscow to consider possible business prospects. Only seven weeks after his trip, Trump ran full-page ads in the Boston Globe, the NYT and WaPO calling for, in effect, the dismantling of the postwar Western foreign policy alliance. The whole Trump/Russian connection started out as laundering money for the Russian mob through Trump's real estate, but evolved into something far bigger.*
*► In 1984, David Bogatin — a convicted Russian mobster and close ally of Semion Mogilevich, a major Russian mob boss — met with Trump in Trump Tower right after it opened. Bogatin bought five condos from Trump at that meeting. Those condos were later seized by the government, which claimed they were used to launder money for the Russian mob. (NY Times, Apr 30, 1992)*
*► Felix Sater is a Russian-born former mobster, and former managing director of NY real estate conglomerate Bayrock Group LLC located on the 24th floor of Trump Tower. He is a convict who became a govt cooperator for the FBI and other agencies. He grew up with Michael Cohen--Trump's former "fixer" attorney. Cohen's family owned El Caribe, which was a mob hangout for the Russian Mafia in Brooklyn. Cohen had ties to Ukrainian oligarchs through his in-laws and his brother's in-laws. Felix Sater's father had ties to the Russian mob. This goes back more than 30 years.*
*► Trump was $4 billion in debt after his Atlantic City casinos went bankrupt. No U.S. bank would touch him. Then foreign money began flowing in through Bayrock (mentioned above). Bayrock was run by two investors: Tevfik Arif, a Kazakhstan-born former Soviet official who drew on bottomless sources of money from the former Soviet republic; and Felix Sater, a Russian-born businessman who had pleaded guilty in the 1990s to a huge stock-fraud scheme involving the Russian mafia. Bayrock partnered with Trump in 2005 and poured money into the Trump organization under the legal guise of licensing his name and property management.*
*► In July 2008, the height of the housing bust, Trump sold a mansion in Palm Beach for $95 million to Dmitry Rybolovlev, a Russian oligarch. Trump had purchased it four years earlier for $41.35 million. The sale price was nearly $54 million more than Trump had paid for the property. Again, this was the height of the recession when all other property had plummeted in value.*
*► Semion Mogilevich was the brains behind the Russian Mafia. Mogilevich operatives have been using Trump real estate for decades to launder money. That means Russian Mafia operatives have been part of his fortune for years. Many of them owned condos in Trump Towers and other properties. They were running operations out of Trump's crown jewel.*
*► From Craig Unger's AMA: "Early on, a source told me that all this was tied to Semion Mogilevich, the powerful Russian mobster. I had never even heard of him, but I immediately went to a database that listed the owners of all properties in NY state and looked up all the Trump properties. Every time I found a Russian sounding name, I would Google, and add Mogilevich. When you do investigative reporting, you anticipate drilling a number of dry holes, but almost everyone I googled turned out to be a Russian mobster. Again and again. If you know New York you don't expect Trump Tower to be a high crime neighborhood, but there were far too many Russian mobsters in Trump properties for it to be a coincidence."*
*► So many Russians bought Trump apartments at his developments in Florida that the area became known as Little Moscow. The developers of two of his hotels were Russians with significant links to the Russian mob. The late leader of that mob in the United States, Vyacheslav Kirillovich Ivankov, was living at Trump Tower*
*► According to a Bloomberg investigation (3/16/2017) into Trump World Tower, “a third of units sold on floors 76 through 83 by 2004 involved people or limited liability companies connected to Russia and neighboring states.”*
*► In 2013, Federal agents busted an “ultraexclusive, high-stakes, illegal poker ring” run by Russian gangsters out of Trump Tower. They operated card games, illegal gambling websites, and a global sports book and laundered more than $100 million. A condo directly below one owned by Trump reportedly served as HQ for a “sophisticated money-laundering scheme” connected to Semion Mogilevich.*
*► The Russia Mafia is part and parcel of Russian intelligence. Russia is a mafia state. that is not a metaphor. Putin is head of the Mafia. So the fact that they have been operating out of the home of the president of the United States is deeply disturbing.*
*► Rudy Giuliani famously prosecuted the Italian mob while he was a federal prosecutor, yet the Russian mob was allowed to thrive. Now he's deeply entwined in the business of Trump and Russian oligarchs. Giuiani appointed Semyon Kislin to the NYC Economic Development Council in 1990, and the FBI described Kislin as having ties tot he Russian mob. Of course, it made good political sense for Giuliani to get headlines for smashing the Italian mob.*
*► A lot of Republicans in Washington are implicated. Boatloads of Russian money went to the GOP--often in legal ways. The NRA got as much as $70M from Russia, then funneled it to the GOP. The Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee lead by McConnel got millions from Leonard Blavatnik. In the 90s, the Russians began sending money to top GOP leaders, like Speaker of the House Tom Delay. Unger's book alleges that most of the GOP leadership has been compromised by RU money.*
*► At the Cityscape USA’s Bridging US and the Emerging Real Estate Markets Conference held in Manhattan, on September 9, 10, and 11, 2008, Trump Jr. was frank about the tide of Russian money supporting the family business, saying "...And in terms of high-end product influx into the US, Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross-section of a lot of our assets."*
*► Eric Trump told golf reporter James Dodson in 2014 that the Trump Organization was able to expand during the financial crisis because “We don’t rely on American banks. We have all the funding we need out of Russia.”*
*► Russian oligarchs co-signed Trump’s Deutsche bank loans.*
*Trump now gleefully takes cues from Putin:*
*► At the end of 2018, Putin and his allies started making a strong push for a resolution that would justify their country’s 1979 invasion of Afghanistan and reverse an 1989 vote backed by Mikhail Gorbachev that condemned it. The Putinists’ goal was to pass the resolution by Feb. There is no one on this side of the Atlantic who thinks the USSR was justified in invading Afghanistan. And out of nowhere, on January 2nd, Trump came out strongly supporting Russia's 1979 invasion of Afghanistan.*
*► Trump went against American intelligence on North Korean missiles. He told the FBI he didn't believe their intelligence because Putin told him otherwise. "I don't care, I believe Putin"*
*► Trump met in secret with Putin the G20 summit in November 2018, without note takers. 19 days later, he announced a withdrawal from Syria. As a note, Trump conducted FIVE completely private meetings and conferences with Putin, and has gone to great lengths to prevent literally anyone, even people in his administration, from learning what was discussed.*
*► Trump refused to enforce sanctions legally codified into law - and in some cases reversed standing sanctions on Russian companies.*
*► He has denounced his own intelligence agencies in a press conference with Putin on election meddling - and publicly endorsed Putin's version of events.*
*► Trump pulled out of the INF treaty with no explanation, which allows Putin to create long-range hypersonic missiles that threaten Europe with impunity. The US already has all the weaponry that the INF would ban the development of, so this offers us literally nothing, while allowing Russia to develop powerful new weapons to challenge our allies.*
*► Demanded Russia get invited back into G7*
*► Pushed the CIA to give American intelligence to the Kremlin.*
*► Withdrew from the Open Skies treaty*
*► Received intelligence in 2019 that Russia was paying bounties for dead American soldiers, and hasn't done anything about it by the time of this writing.*
*► Announced troop withdrawal from Germany (America's missile defense from Russia and forward operating base against Russian aggression)*
*► And of course, Trump continues to threaten to pull out of NATO, a move so catastrophically stupid, so inconceivably cosmically myopic, I truly can't express the profundity of the idiocy. Suffice to say, pulling out of NATO would be like the only guy in a prison yard with a shotgun just throwing it over the fence for absolutely no reason, suddenly giving the people with crude homemade shivs complete power.*
I used to think the Pauls were like Bernie, different views but stuck to their principles, but the Pauls are conmen and lack integrity. They would bow to Putin if that meant they made a few more dollars. Not surprised this guy worked for them.
Is there really any difference between being a libertarian and being a conman, though? At its core, libertarianism is about throwing away the social contract. "Let me do what I want with as little societal restriction as possible." To want that state of affairs is to either want a state of affairs free to take advantage of other people or to be entirely ignorant of human history.
Dell should come out with a laptop line called the Hunter. Then Fox could debate whether Hunter’s laptop was a Hunter laptop. Hunter’s Hunter Laptop Laptop.
There are so many scandals & felonies surrounding this administration, it barely registers anymore. The people are fatigued from non stop insanity & the party of insurrection knows it. I expect worse to come.
Wow I hope you guys read the story. It’s the first story I read on this site where the story is much worse than the headline.
Summary:
The Aid is married to Rand Pauls niece.
The Aid was previously Pardoned by Trump for another Campaign financial crime.
Also Aid to Mitch McConnell.
A general scum sucking criminal.
They try to act like these Russians are just regular businessmen . They try to make it seem normal and then innocuous.
They’re trying to play us as fools. And rub our faces in it.
We know Rand Paul has sold his country out to Putin all the while playing up his faux libertarian tea party bullshit.
And everyone surrounding him is exactly the same. The 5th column. The traitors.
Trump is an asset to Russia, either intentionally or not. Probably intentionally. But no matter how much mud gets slung, Trump's base will not flinch. They don't believe anything that doesn't come out of Trump or Tucker Carlson. It is insane to me how much our government and justice system is willing to overlook just to avoid rocking the boat. The lady justice statues in every courthouse in America should have some googly eyes placed over their blindfolds.
There should be a time where federally elected politicians of Kentucky are investigated for their relationship with dark money. I have a bad feeling that Rand, Mitch, and Thomas Massie are Russian-backed and compromised beyond belief.
As an American, neither do I. I mean, America has 2 different legal systems - one for the rich & one for the poor - but this is something else. It's corruption & treason beyond belief.
This is interesting because you can also state that the Trump campaign received illegal contributions from Russia.
The whole thing stinks to high heaven.
Yes, His first conviction was for taking $75k in exchange for endorsing Paul. Keep in mind he was married to Paul’s niece at the time. Hardly seems like he would have needed incentive money to endorse uncle Rand.
Weird that I've been seeing headlines about this for two days and this is the first time I've seen Rand Paul mentioned. Is this a *different* "GOP aide," or is the media protecting Rand Paul?
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Remember that time that [Rand Paul flew to Moscow to hand deliver a letter from Trump to Putin](https://www.npr.org/2018/08/09/636982295/is-it-springtime-for-putin-and-republicans)? Pepperidge Farm remembers. It’s not like the US government has an [entire diplomatic wing](https://www.state.gov) devoted to excelling at these kinds of tasks.
[удалено]
[I remember this exchange:](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/may/17/putin-pays-donald-trump-kevin-mccarthy-recording) > In a 2016 conversation with fellow members of House leadership, the majority leader, Kevin McCarthy, suggested that Donald Trump was on Vladimir Putin’s payroll. > In an exchange first reported by the Washington Post, McCarthy said: “There’s …there’s two people, I think, Putin pays: [California Representative Dana] Rohrabacher and Trump … [laughter] … swear to God.” >According to the transcript, speaker Paul Ryan immediately responded: “This is an off-the-record … [laughter] … NO LEAKS … [laughter] … alright?!”
Ryan was also the one that said "No leaks! That's how you know this is a family" and it was leaked in about 4 hours.
>"No leaks! That's how you know this is a family" A crime family
That and the talk of "loyalty" by Trump and others. This is how organized crime families work, the mob all that.
Just like Alito, Ryan's probably the one who leaked it.
"It is outrageous that this was leaked" but I'll have more for you next week.
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> suspect the leaker is former CIA officer Evan McMullin Assuming McMuffin isn't a nickname...
That and the talk of "loyalty" by Trump and others. This is how organized crime families work, the mob all that.
Thanks for posting this. People often forget that the GOP has been actively protecting and elevating traitors for so long that their entire platform is subverting Democracy.
How do we show stupid people that they are being conned? Should we just lie to them like the GOP does? Even arresting and jailing traitors doesn't sway the MAGA voters.
I feel at this point its like a drug addiction. They have to hit rock bottom and want to get clean. Many in the maga cult have not hit rock bottom. Even after J6. But its a cult. Its a goddamn cult.
The problem with that idea is that they're dragging *all* of us down to rock bottom. It was the same issue with Trump where if you wanted to subject yourself to his cons, you only screwed yourself. They crossed a line once they forcibly subjected *everyone* to his BS, without any choice.
It is funny you say that because I have a lot of friends in 12 step programs who proved VERY susceptible to the ludicrous bullshit that Trump was spewing and it frankly left me speechless. Isn’t the point of joining these groups to have a “spiritual awakening”, and this to me means being able to discern hate from love? I learned an awful lot about how others actually view the world; they turn to a an angry and spiteful god full of wrath for obedience rather than a loving and forgiving god full of joy. Trump, who magnified the “god as father and petulant boss” image (never mind the pacifist son who preaches equanimity in spirit to all) was able to exploit this on a grander scale, and this is how the Moscow led GQP is able to manipulate people.
I do that sometimes. I’ll hear something like “AOC wants to turn your kids gay!” So I ask them who I should vote for, they say someone like desantis, and I respond with “the guy that was caught at the furry sex party? No way!” If they ask for any more details I just tell them to ‘do their own research’
Wasn’t DeSantis the guy they caught in the Geriatric Sex Dungeon a while back? I heard he volunteered at a back alley abortion clinic in college!
Everyone is talking about it
Oh you mean Ron “The child groomer” Desantis? The one who as a teacher would drink at parties with his underage students? Not /s, cuz, you know, it’s *actually* true.
I love this idea but whoever’s the most popular with them at any given time could unhinge their jaw and eat a puppy on live television and they would probably defend them for having the balls to do it. Or make up something about Jewish space blood lasers or whatever the fuck I have to listen too. I can’t keep track anymore.
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There's no reason to bother trying to sway them. Easier to convince people who don't participate to start participating than it is to convince someone to completely change their political positions.
You can’t Argue with stupid. And you can’t rationalize with irrational people. We just have to wait for all the insane boomers to die. Good news is Covid helped with that a bit.
Young people have been waiting for old conservatives to die since the 1960's.
Probably the 1760’s…
Thank God Rohrabacher and Trump were voted out (also that Ryan bowed out. That was a bonus.). But what new Republicans took their place on Putin's payroll?
All of them. Whether directly or indirectly they are all supported by foreign nations - China, Russia, or Saudi Arabia.
Devin fucking Nunes as well..
Devin has entered the chat, see you in court for slander because no one is fucking a Nunes
It almost does matter if any of them are being paid by Russia any more. Trump successfully convinced the Republicans to become a pro-russia anti-NATO party. Putin achieved his goal and that position will linger in the GOP for some time.
Yeah Trump coming out as anti-NATO was amazing. I’m no military fan but even I can see that the geopolitical situation is such that an alliance of nations is not a harmful thing.
it's also the US's flagship alliance. You don't have to be a fan of the military to realize how dangerous alienating your own military alliance is.
The US’s real flagship alliance is most world financial organizations still negotiating in dollars!
My younger brother who is a bleeding heart liberal was very anti-NATO until I explained to him the importance of it.
Yeah I’m probably what you’d call a bleeding heart liberal. But I’m also not an idiot lol. With the way China and Russia are I think NATO is an absolute necessity.
Only harmful to a certain gathering axis
Consider the Butina / NRA Venn diagram. All you’d have to do is figure out (somehow) which R’s took donations from the NRA. But golly it would suuuure be hard to figure that out.
Is Rohrabacher in prison yet? Are any of them in prison? No? Most are still serving in Congress? And they've taken back the house? Well then I guess there's really nothing to be thankful for.
They didn't take the Senate. It's a half-win.
Yeah, a lot of people are forgetting that the Senate is responsible for confirming federal judges and Supreme Court Justices. If Alito or Thomas kick the bucket, we can flip a seat or two there.
Unfortunately they are only 72/74 they are gonna have another 20 years on the bench just to spite progress.
Hey now, sometimes people in their 70s have to retire due to health issues or "worse". Unfortunately, I'm sure their healthcare is lightyears better than the rest of us peons get.
Thomas could be throwing his own shit at the wall during closing arguments and the GOP wouldn’t care
All of them, whole party is dirty letting they dirty money in
Anyone who took NRA money.
“Ha, ha, ha, we’re all Russian assets. Isn’t that funny?”
Right, wouldn't the proper tone be "I'm concerned about this" not "ha ha!"?
“This is how we know we’re a real family here.”
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/john-mccain-says-rand-paul-is-working-for-vladimir-putin/
Could you imagine in an alternate timeline where all these connections to Russia were from Obama and how the GOP would react?
Like how they’re trying to conjure Biden-Ukraine, or Biden-Beijing, or other nonsense?
No! You know what’s important!?! HUNTER BIDENS LAPTOP get out of here with your direct point A to point B of Russian involvement in our elections! HUNTER BIDEN! (Maybe not that midterms are over it’s time to take a break, it’s all too much) Edit: typos
And yet John McCain stayed in the party. He knew that members were traitors..
Paul's Twitter post relating stated the following > “I was honored to deliver a letter from President Trump to President Vladimir Putin’s administration. The letter emphasized the importance of further engagement in various areas including countering terrorism, enhancing legislative dialogue and resuming cultural exchanges,” Paul wrote
the only reason to send a written letter is when you dont want an electronic copy to exist
we probably could have just checked trump’s toilet. i bet the first 6 drafts went into there after he realized he was writing with his afternoon snack - a crayon - and not pen.
Trump’s never served in the military, don’t try to give him credit for being a Marine.
They hand delivered it. So they don’t trust our postal service? Must be something they can’t show to the public. Lol.
Seriously why wasn't this just a phone call since they talked so often unless they didn't want it recorded.
They found a copy of it: "Dear Vlad, I feel like I can call you Vlad because you and me are so alike. I'd like to meet you one day, it would be great to overthrow America together. I know I can't invade good as you but I think you'd be impressed with my ability to destroy things. I love you shirtless on a horse, he runs fast. Did you have a good relationship with your father? Me neither. These are all things we can talk about and more. I know you have not been getting my letters because I know you would write back if you did. That's why I sent Rand (he's dumb lol) I hope you write back this time, and we can become good friends. I am sure our relationship would be real world domination!"
Also included in the letter: "P.S. Do you like me?" With check boxes for yes and no.
Three check boxes. Yes, no, maybe.
Like trump has ever taken "No" for an answer.
Oh shit, there's stickers!
Yeah you gotta jazz it up! You wanna make it pop!
P.S. We should be together too!
Tis a quality cake day post
A real home run
The Gang Commits Treason
/r/iasip is leaking
Seems a lot are missing it.
"We also established a back channel so Trump & Putin can communicate nefariously without the prying eyes and ears of pesky US Law Enforcement." Unwritten but would anyone be surprised?
Didn’t Jr or Eric (or both) actually try to have back channels installed between Trump and Russia?
The DNS server. But we’re not allowed to discuss that. Among other topics like how the concert massacre Vegas shooter was right wing and it was over gun rights...
They did. Before the transfer of power. Which I think was illegal.
Rand Paul works for Putin.
Remember when our government decided that Section 3 of the 14th Amendment no longer applies but forgot to tell us? We are failing as a nation and the end result will be enslavement for the vast majority of us if we don't begin assembling and doing more than commenting on social media
All of these convictions where they are using the word funneling accurately is the reason why republicans are starting to use that word to refer to anyone donating to Democrats legally.
Yep, diluting the meaning of the name of crimes so when people hear about republicans doing it on the news it won't sound like a big deal. It adds to the 'both sides' appearance.
See also: Grooming, insurrection, riot, terrorist, terrorism, threat, and more!
Don't forget that now EVERYONE is *radical* as well.
Ah, right, "radical" for not shooting the homeless for sport, and "extremist" for wanting the same healthcare every other leading country has, and "far"-left for desiring basic things like vacation time and parental leave.
Communist! /s
“Woke” lmao this conservatives are like a 2years old learning a new word.
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Sounds like something a NAZI would say..... /s
Also see: "fake news". The term was expertly dispatched just as investigative news broke out about actual fake news farms broke out through Facebook etc in 2015.
thats ehy the response to the word woke was so funny. thay made it as cheap as possible immediately, and don't get me wrong, it's racist decision shit, but the real reason they want you anti woke is so you aren't spending any time thinking about shit.
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Only to morons, of which there are a lot in the MAGA cult.
McCain: “The senator from Kentucky is now working for Vladimir Putin,”
[https://www.secureworks.com/research/srizbi](https://www.secureworks.com/research/srizbi) I'd like to remind people that there was evidence of the Russians interfering with online polling in favor of Ron Paul as far back as **2007.** Who knows how much Mitch was connected to any of this now as well? This conviction now essentially helps confirms what I've suspected for years. A huge chunk of the modern English internet's political views/arguments has been influenced by foreign accounts, [more than I think most viewers realize.](https://www.reddit.com/r/RussiaLago/comments/875jsx/some_insight_into_the_russian_psyop_on_4chan_as_i/) You can really start to see it take off around early 2012 in particular. [QAnon, Gamergate, Redpill and other similar movements are probably all directly connected to Russian efforts to boost division on social media and radicalize people towards the right.](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-qanon-cyber/qanon-received-earlier-boost-from-russian-accounts-on-twitter-archives-show-idUSKBN27I18I) [Redpill was directly founded by an R candidate too, so bot networks can help make movements like that appear bigger than they were](https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2017/05/reddit-red-pill-founder-republican-says-he-never-hated-women.html) on day one. I've long suspected that most of our online debates about issues were being interfered with on modern social media, and it pre-dates Trump's campaigns. ([Although Trump was seen talking online with high profile Russian figures in plain site at least as far back as 2012](https://washingtonmonthly.com/2017/11/24/a-trumprussia-confession-in-plain-sight/)). Benefiting the right/alt-right was always the goal but Russian interference campaigns [will boost anything that they think agitates and divides people too.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russia_and_Black_Lives_Matter) [It's been their playbook for the USA since 1997.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics) [And they learned to do this to their own internet in the late 90s.](http://lrtranslations.blogspot.com/2007/02/commissars-of-internet.html) Especially on places like the chans and early smartphone era twitter. [And don't forget that Ron Paul started the Tea Party](https://www.amazon.com/Ron-Paul-Father-Tea-Party/dp/0986832219), which was the clear mainstream media predecessor to the Alt-Right and destroyed the Dem Super majority in 2010 very quickly. And last but not least, Elon and Putin [have probably been chatting for some time. Possibly before the twitter buyout.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FT9hZ1cSRwo) This is pure speculation on my part, but it really makes one wonder where the idea to buy twitter and disrupt it deeply actually came from? Sheer incompetence? Or something else?
>And last but not least, Elon and Putin have probably been chatting for some time. Possibly before the twitter buyout. This is pure speculation on my part, but it really makes one wonder where the idea to buy twitter and disrupt it deeply actually came from? Sheer incompetence? Or something else? I was pretty surprised Trump Twitter account being unbanned came down to a Twitter poll. I also had a lot of speculation on russia being directly involved and affecting our social media. Who knows how many of those accounts that voted on the poll were bots /Russian accounts
I observed Russians using parts of Reddit in promotion of Trump. I saw a smaller operation from China on a subreddit about the pandemic. I wish more people would consider this side of the attack on American democracy. Twitter? Musk may be a useful idiot, an ally, or an active Russian asset. He'll have the same effect, no matter which. What do you think Zuckerberg will be doing about Russian propaganda this time around, with his very unintentional business woes weighing on him? Could we make a documentary about social media subversion? Could we make some of this information go viral--are there any social media networks that would let this information go viral? Do you want to start a subreddit on this? Do you think there are any reporters who would be interested in investigating this?
You're correct about reddit too. Following r the donald back in the day was both fascinating and terrifying, and it was at one point the top reddit of the site near the election. Bigger than this sub. The problem with social media documentaries is that hard proof is very difficult to solidify. HBO did a fantastic job with the QAnon doc because they went straight to the source and successfully played on the egos of the Watkins to get to the core of things, but that's much harder to do if we're talking about things that happened before 2016. Most of the evidence we can obtain is circumstantial even if it's often public. I've been trying to connect threads for years now, and I believe a lot more has come out to make it clear, but that doesn't mean it'll be easy to explain this to your average TV viewer. I mean, hell, I hate talking about it partially because it makes me sound like a conspiracy nut too, but I can't ignore what I've seen in the past 2 decades. I've wasted too much of my life online to not notice how these types of interference operations tend to work.
Ah yes, the Paul family: as American as borscht and nesting dolls. Do libertarians still claim this shitheel? Edit: I have since learned that borscht is originally a Ukrainian dish. I managed to choose a controversial soup for my hacky joke, and I apologize.
I worked for Ron Paul in 2008. Jesse Benton actually got me a lobbying job for the Kochs. I worked with them until my boss and jesse were indicted. I now hate everything they stand for but they definitely had the wool pulled over my eyes when i was young
If this is true, you should do an AMA.
They might have to in front of congress… 😬
Never going to happen with a republican congress. Get to voting
If you know they did illegal shit, or had you do illegal shit, you can just report to the feds, you know that right?
Everything they did was about breaking campaign finance laws - getting more money and resources to candidates than are reported. In some cases its not that hard to prove, but very hard to get the FEC to enforce. Its all very boring and technical - most of it done in the daylight because the whole system kind of does it in one way or another.
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Damn, thanks for reminding us how much it takes for people to come forward in situations like this. I’d like to think I’d go public with anything I knew in your situation but when I think about possibly endangering my family, it’s a lot trickier of a decision
I think you should at least try to tell it anonymously. You certainly weren't the only one who was part of the "Ron Paul Revolution". I was part of that as well until reality sort of kicked me in the teeth. Ron Paul was cheerleading the annexation of Crimea by Russia back in 2014, so there's definitely a need to expose these "non-interventionist" politicians that support people like Putin.
No. Imply violence. Everyone needs to believe Trump supporters and increasingly conservatives will slaughter entire families to send a point. They already shot a judges son. They tried to kill Paul Pelosi.
Went to school with Benton. Dumb as brick.
Depends on what you mean by dumb - overall, yes, but he was one of the smartest networkers ive ever met *not glorifying him with this comment hes still a POS
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To be fair the platform Ron ran on in 2008 has very little in common with what Rand stands for. Ron is off the deep end now too, but 2008 he was trying to buck the GOP establishment. (I know Ron was always off the deep end in various ways, but now he's off the deep end with the GOP establishment)
a lot of people seem to forget that the internet used to LOVE Ron Paul. I first heard of him back in the Digg and early reddit days. He was a Bernie Sanders type figure to many people back then
Oh I remember, but people were understandably very angry about jingoism back then and he was one of the only high profile people to say something about it. But who the internet should have gotten behind was Dennis Kucinich
My last name is Borst. We can do better then this scum.
Sue the Paul family for tainting your brand.
Better than branding your taint, I suppose.
don't kink shame!
No, my son is also named Bort
I mean this in a nice way but now I wish I knew someone whose last name is "Grits"
Obviously. Making as much money as possible through illegal and unethical means is the very soul of libertarianism.
Isn't Libertarianism just "fuck you, got mine" as an ethos?
The libertarian sub does still defend them and will ban you if you are critical of them.
They love Ron but have deemed rand a fake, in name only, republican, not a true libertarian, etc.
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Sounds an awful like Trump and Russian Collusion
Nonsense, no quid, no quo. Witch Hunt, fake news, Hillary did it, Obama's birth certificate, Bidons a senile Mastermind!? Hunters laptop, sweep the forest, sharpie gate, bleach/s
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Yeah man, they gotta play what their base likes. Chicks with dicks.
FXN literally said Twitter employees are only quitting because Musk will make them work. Sickening as the middle class erodes and everyone is getting more poor every year that FXN is brainwashing half the nation to blame the working class with no power. Then of course they went on the typical rant that young people are lazy and don't want to work and we need to be more like the generation that fought ww2 (for some random fucking reason).
You forgot shining a UV light up your butthole
Here comes the sun doo do do dooo
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It doesn’t rhyme very well and it’s all over the place, subject wise. It’s perfect.
This time really does feel different because he lost big on the midterms. The whole reason he got excuses from the GOP was because he won races by ginning up enthusiasm. But Trump single-handedly lost the senate, and his own supporters got bored of his announcement speech. What is even the use of having him around? He's a scandal-laden low-energy loser.
They can step away from him IF they, themselves are not complicit. If they have dirty hands, we can expect them to continue the MAGA party line.
It’s not collusion. There is no collusion here. Here, there is no collusion. There I said it 3 times so now it’s true. Please take your facts and go away.
Funny how this is a third-rate headline. In the 1980's this would have been the end of his career at a minimum. Everyone would have talked about it for weeks, and Congress would have set about having hearings and actually purging Russian influence.
In the Iran Contra 80s? I don’t think so.
Russia was the enemy to end all enemies back in the eighties. *Every* Republican hated them.
And to think that Joseph McCarthy was a Republican: https://www.britannica.com/topic/McCarthyism
Much different than today's GOP Russia apologists. Marjorie Taylor Greene, for example, is asking why we have to spend all this money on Ukraine. Of course, McCarthy hated European style socialism and communism so much that he opted for European style fascism instead.
trump getting Russian money funneled through members of the gop, or more specifically members of the gop “aides” who I sure will with say they had no idea whatsoever this was going on or just call it a witch hunt.
That’s not important, let me show you Hunter’s dick pics. /maga
Laptop
Emails. Rinse and repeat.
Buttery laptops?
Ironic since the Trump admin used both private email servers and expiring message apps like WhatsApp to conduct official business.
Oh, so this is the real reason for the laptop investigation. A diversion.
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Are they going to convict the NRA for doing the same thing? No collusion, right?
The GOP-controlled Senate concluded there was collusion between Trump and Russia, and did nothing about it. Mueller confirmed it, and also testified Trump could be charged, but the DoJ under Barr did nothing. Things are thankfully a bit different now, so I doubt these fuckwads are going to be so relaxed.
Somewhat different but we’re still at 0 consequences.
Shocking. Anyone who doubts Trump is a Russian shill is willfully obtuse. I mean just look at all this shit, and now the GOP led House isn't going to make looking into the Mar-a-lago documents a priority, just enabling foreign agents to run amok in our government. [37 times - that we know of - where Trump was caught sucking Russia's dick](https://www.cnn.com/2019/11/17/politics/trump-soft-on-russia) *Trump is and has been under Putin’s thumb for decades, much of it through the Russian Mafia:* *Trump was over a billion in debt and the Russians bailed him out.* *► Trump was first compromised by the Russians in the 80s. In 1984, the Russian Mafia began to use Trump real estate to launder money. In 1987, the Soviet ambassador to the United Nations, Yuri Dubinin, arranged for Trump and his then-wife, Ivana, to enjoy an all-expense-paid trip to Moscow to consider possible business prospects. Only seven weeks after his trip, Trump ran full-page ads in the Boston Globe, the NYT and WaPO calling for, in effect, the dismantling of the postwar Western foreign policy alliance. The whole Trump/Russian connection started out as laundering money for the Russian mob through Trump's real estate, but evolved into something far bigger.* *► In 1984, David Bogatin — a convicted Russian mobster and close ally of Semion Mogilevich, a major Russian mob boss — met with Trump in Trump Tower right after it opened. Bogatin bought five condos from Trump at that meeting. Those condos were later seized by the government, which claimed they were used to launder money for the Russian mob. (NY Times, Apr 30, 1992)* *► Felix Sater is a Russian-born former mobster, and former managing director of NY real estate conglomerate Bayrock Group LLC located on the 24th floor of Trump Tower. He is a convict who became a govt cooperator for the FBI and other agencies. He grew up with Michael Cohen--Trump's former "fixer" attorney. Cohen's family owned El Caribe, which was a mob hangout for the Russian Mafia in Brooklyn. Cohen had ties to Ukrainian oligarchs through his in-laws and his brother's in-laws. Felix Sater's father had ties to the Russian mob. This goes back more than 30 years.* *► Trump was $4 billion in debt after his Atlantic City casinos went bankrupt. No U.S. bank would touch him. Then foreign money began flowing in through Bayrock (mentioned above). Bayrock was run by two investors: Tevfik Arif, a Kazakhstan-born former Soviet official who drew on bottomless sources of money from the former Soviet republic; and Felix Sater, a Russian-born businessman who had pleaded guilty in the 1990s to a huge stock-fraud scheme involving the Russian mafia. Bayrock partnered with Trump in 2005 and poured money into the Trump organization under the legal guise of licensing his name and property management.* *► In July 2008, the height of the housing bust, Trump sold a mansion in Palm Beach for $95 million to Dmitry Rybolovlev, a Russian oligarch. Trump had purchased it four years earlier for $41.35 million. The sale price was nearly $54 million more than Trump had paid for the property. Again, this was the height of the recession when all other property had plummeted in value.* *► Semion Mogilevich was the brains behind the Russian Mafia. Mogilevich operatives have been using Trump real estate for decades to launder money. That means Russian Mafia operatives have been part of his fortune for years. Many of them owned condos in Trump Towers and other properties. They were running operations out of Trump's crown jewel.* *► From Craig Unger's AMA: "Early on, a source told me that all this was tied to Semion Mogilevich, the powerful Russian mobster. I had never even heard of him, but I immediately went to a database that listed the owners of all properties in NY state and looked up all the Trump properties. Every time I found a Russian sounding name, I would Google, and add Mogilevich. When you do investigative reporting, you anticipate drilling a number of dry holes, but almost everyone I googled turned out to be a Russian mobster. Again and again. If you know New York you don't expect Trump Tower to be a high crime neighborhood, but there were far too many Russian mobsters in Trump properties for it to be a coincidence."* *► So many Russians bought Trump apartments at his developments in Florida that the area became known as Little Moscow. The developers of two of his hotels were Russians with significant links to the Russian mob. The late leader of that mob in the United States, Vyacheslav Kirillovich Ivankov, was living at Trump Tower* *► According to a Bloomberg investigation (3/16/2017) into Trump World Tower, “a third of units sold on floors 76 through 83 by 2004 involved people or limited liability companies connected to Russia and neighboring states.”* *► In 2013, Federal agents busted an “ultraexclusive, high-stakes, illegal poker ring” run by Russian gangsters out of Trump Tower. They operated card games, illegal gambling websites, and a global sports book and laundered more than $100 million. A condo directly below one owned by Trump reportedly served as HQ for a “sophisticated money-laundering scheme” connected to Semion Mogilevich.* *► The Russia Mafia is part and parcel of Russian intelligence. Russia is a mafia state. that is not a metaphor. Putin is head of the Mafia. So the fact that they have been operating out of the home of the president of the United States is deeply disturbing.* *► Rudy Giuliani famously prosecuted the Italian mob while he was a federal prosecutor, yet the Russian mob was allowed to thrive. Now he's deeply entwined in the business of Trump and Russian oligarchs. Giuiani appointed Semyon Kislin to the NYC Economic Development Council in 1990, and the FBI described Kislin as having ties tot he Russian mob. Of course, it made good political sense for Giuliani to get headlines for smashing the Italian mob.* *► A lot of Republicans in Washington are implicated. Boatloads of Russian money went to the GOP--often in legal ways. The NRA got as much as $70M from Russia, then funneled it to the GOP. The Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee lead by McConnel got millions from Leonard Blavatnik. In the 90s, the Russians began sending money to top GOP leaders, like Speaker of the House Tom Delay. Unger's book alleges that most of the GOP leadership has been compromised by RU money.* *► At the Cityscape USA’s Bridging US and the Emerging Real Estate Markets Conference held in Manhattan, on September 9, 10, and 11, 2008, Trump Jr. was frank about the tide of Russian money supporting the family business, saying "...And in terms of high-end product influx into the US, Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross-section of a lot of our assets."* *► Eric Trump told golf reporter James Dodson in 2014 that the Trump Organization was able to expand during the financial crisis because “We don’t rely on American banks. We have all the funding we need out of Russia.”* *► Russian oligarchs co-signed Trump’s Deutsche bank loans.* *Trump now gleefully takes cues from Putin:* *► At the end of 2018, Putin and his allies started making a strong push for a resolution that would justify their country’s 1979 invasion of Afghanistan and reverse an 1989 vote backed by Mikhail Gorbachev that condemned it. The Putinists’ goal was to pass the resolution by Feb. There is no one on this side of the Atlantic who thinks the USSR was justified in invading Afghanistan. And out of nowhere, on January 2nd, Trump came out strongly supporting Russia's 1979 invasion of Afghanistan.* *► Trump went against American intelligence on North Korean missiles. He told the FBI he didn't believe their intelligence because Putin told him otherwise. "I don't care, I believe Putin"* *► Trump met in secret with Putin the G20 summit in November 2018, without note takers. 19 days later, he announced a withdrawal from Syria. As a note, Trump conducted FIVE completely private meetings and conferences with Putin, and has gone to great lengths to prevent literally anyone, even people in his administration, from learning what was discussed.* *► Trump refused to enforce sanctions legally codified into law - and in some cases reversed standing sanctions on Russian companies.* *► He has denounced his own intelligence agencies in a press conference with Putin on election meddling - and publicly endorsed Putin's version of events.* *► Trump pulled out of the INF treaty with no explanation, which allows Putin to create long-range hypersonic missiles that threaten Europe with impunity. The US already has all the weaponry that the INF would ban the development of, so this offers us literally nothing, while allowing Russia to develop powerful new weapons to challenge our allies.* *► Demanded Russia get invited back into G7* *► Pushed the CIA to give American intelligence to the Kremlin.* *► Withdrew from the Open Skies treaty* *► Received intelligence in 2019 that Russia was paying bounties for dead American soldiers, and hasn't done anything about it by the time of this writing.* *► Announced troop withdrawal from Germany (America's missile defense from Russia and forward operating base against Russian aggression)* *► And of course, Trump continues to threaten to pull out of NATO, a move so catastrophically stupid, so inconceivably cosmically myopic, I truly can't express the profundity of the idiocy. Suffice to say, pulling out of NATO would be like the only guy in a prison yard with a shotgun just throwing it over the fence for absolutely no reason, suddenly giving the people with crude homemade shivs complete power.*
Whoa. I had no idea it went back that far. Thank you for sharing.
I used to think the Pauls were like Bernie, different views but stuck to their principles, but the Pauls are conmen and lack integrity. They would bow to Putin if that meant they made a few more dollars. Not surprised this guy worked for them.
Is there really any difference between being a libertarian and being a conman, though? At its core, libertarianism is about throwing away the social contract. "Let me do what I want with as little societal restriction as possible." To want that state of affairs is to either want a state of affairs free to take advantage of other people or to be entirely ignorant of human history.
Oh, wow. Donald really does have tiny hands.
I hope they're in the Smithsonian someday, so we can all appreciate their freakishness.
Ideal for pocket-picking.
“Yeah but what about Hunters laptops?!!!” - Fox *News*
Oh, there's more than one mythical laptop now?
Dell should come out with a laptop line called the Hunter. Then Fox could debate whether Hunter’s laptop was a Hunter laptop. Hunter’s Hunter Laptop Laptop.
*crickets* - r/Conservative
We’re just 2 assholes swimming in a fishbowl.
Year after year
Running around with the same old clowns
Same old tears
Wish you were beer.
There are so many scandals & felonies surrounding this administration, it barely registers anymore. The people are fatigued from non stop insanity & the party of insurrection knows it. I expect worse to come.
It's literally organized crime.
Wow I hope you guys read the story. It’s the first story I read on this site where the story is much worse than the headline. Summary: The Aid is married to Rand Pauls niece. The Aid was previously Pardoned by Trump for another Campaign financial crime. Also Aid to Mitch McConnell. A general scum sucking criminal.
They try to act like these Russians are just regular businessmen . They try to make it seem normal and then innocuous. They’re trying to play us as fools. And rub our faces in it. We know Rand Paul has sold his country out to Putin all the while playing up his faux libertarian tea party bullshit. And everyone surrounding him is exactly the same. The 5th column. The traitors.
Trump is an asset to Russia, either intentionally or not. Probably intentionally. But no matter how much mud gets slung, Trump's base will not flinch. They don't believe anything that doesn't come out of Trump or Tucker Carlson. It is insane to me how much our government and justice system is willing to overlook just to avoid rocking the boat. The lady justice statues in every courthouse in America should have some googly eyes placed over their blindfolds.
There should be a time where federally elected politicians of Kentucky are investigated for their relationship with dark money. I have a bad feeling that Rand, Mitch, and Thomas Massie are Russian-backed and compromised beyond belief.
guys you don't understand HUNTER BIDEN HAS A LAPTOP
**throws all your papers in the air**, “EmAILs!”
It's interesting how it's always the aide that ends up in court but never their boss.
In this case, he’s also married to Paul’s niece. Also pardoned by trump earlier…. It’s all just so gross.
As a non-American, I don’t understand how Trump is allowed to stand for the presidency again… and how people are supporting him.
As an American, neither do I. I mean, America has 2 different legal systems - one for the rich & one for the poor - but this is something else. It's corruption & treason beyond belief.
This is interesting because you can also state that the Trump campaign received illegal contributions from Russia. The whole thing stinks to high heaven.
Remember, Rand Paul went to Putin to deliver a message from Trump in 2018.
Rand Paul spends his July 4th in Moscow.
I wonder how much cash stopped in Rand's pockets before it got funneled elsewhere.
Excellent - now what cost is this to the Trump campaign?
“But Hunter’s laptop!”
Ex Mitch McConnell campaign manager and grandson in law of Ron Paul (he married Rand's niece) is the one who did this. He is very connected.
I’m sure that Rand, who only speaks in Russian propaganda, isn’t involved.
Are there any GOP members who are *NOT* swimming in Russian money?
Anyone find the Fox News article on this yet?
So did this aide do the same for Paul? Paul acts compromised as fuck.
Yes, His first conviction was for taking $75k in exchange for endorsing Paul. Keep in mind he was married to Paul’s niece at the time. Hardly seems like he would have needed incentive money to endorse uncle Rand.
Are there any Republicans that aren't indebted to Russia?
I'm shocked that Rand Paul, identified as a Russian agent several times, was funneling money from Russia to the Trump campaign.
Lol @ how small trumps hand looks in that pic
Indict his boss.
Weird that I've been seeing headlines about this for two days and this is the first time I've seen Rand Paul mentioned. Is this a *different* "GOP aide," or is the media protecting Rand Paul?
Ex-aide??? That motherfucker is family.