Day 512 Friday June 15, 2018 1,066 Days to Go
Ten Sixty Six is an important year in English history. whenever I see that number I think of my dad who always remarked on the year ten sixty six, the last year England was invaded. We’ve been invaded and that’s how many days we have left of the occupation – hopefully.
Yesterday was a momentous day because two things happened of importance:
The Inspector General released his report about the Hillary Clinton FBI email investigation,
and
The State of New York brought charges agains the Trump Foundation.
In summary, the FBI conducted a proper investigation and they found no cause to charge Hillary. The IG went on to say that James Comey acted improperly both by having a news conference in July about the investigation and again in late October to say he was reopening the investigation.
The State of New York has charged Trump and his three kids that work with him and the Trump Foundation as breaking the law in regards to running a non-profit organization. The state says that the foundation was used as a political tool of the Trump election, that it bought things and paid bills for Trump’s businesses and him personally, and that it used monies to buy items from other non-profits. Little or no money actually went to helping the people and organizations it was meant to help. In fact Trump himself hadn’t put any money of his own into it for years. Much of this by the way was known and reported by the New York Times months and months ago. Now it’s official and the charges go deeper than the Times was able to discern.
Oh yeah, and last week Trump talked to Kim and by the very act of him talking to Kim we are no longer under the threat of nuclear attack from North Korea. Right.
The whole Comey FBI probe into Hillary thing always bothered me. I couldn’t figure it out, until last night, when I was hit with it between the eyes by Rachel. Thank-you Rachel Maddow. The problem I had was that Comey thought he had to say something to the public about Clinton, while keeping quiet about a much more potentially serious investigation into her opponent. Comey claimed he had to be transparent on Clinton, but said he had to follow procedure on the Trump investigation into collusion with Russia. He’s been accused of tipping the election to Trump. He’s said he sure hopes he didn’t influence the election, but you have to be pretty naive to think he didn’t. It was Maddow who spelled it out. Comey was influenced by the right wing media that whipped up a frenzy with their “Lock Her Up” mantra.
Comey didn’t want to appear to be helping Clinton, but he didn’t mind sullying her reputation under the guise, (excuse?) , of transparency. All the while he knew of a much more disturbing investigation with much more evidence to suggest that the Trump campaign was colluding with a foreign power. For all his wanting to stay out of politics, he assumed Clinton was going to win, so he in fact did make his decisions based on a political outcome that he believed would happen.
Okay so that’s the Clinton email FBI investigation. But the takeaway is that the right wing and the Donald Trump camp are attacking the Justice Department and the FBI again over the Russia probe. Why? Because it worked! It worked on the Clinton email, why not do it for the Russia probe?
While that is going on, another lawsuit is brought against Trump. I gotta say this guy attracts lawsuits like pigpen attracts dirt. Much of this was known months ago in the New York Times reporting, which started out because Trump said he was raising all this money for veterans and that he himself was giving a million dollars to the cause. The NYT reporter asked a simple question of himself, “Who got the money?” Trump claimed to have raised six million dollars for veterans. Yet, the NYT reporter called dozens of veteran groups and asked if they were the ones who got money from Trump. None of them had. In fact it wasn’t until months after the claim by Trump that he had given money that he actually wrote a check, and only then because he was cornered by the reporting from the Times.
The stunning thing about the Trump Foundation and Trump’s use of the funds, by him and his campaign was the lack of any attempt to hide their criminality. In the charging document is a copy of a note from then Trump campaign chairman Corey Lewandowski directing the Foundation to cut checks on the Saturday before the Iowa Caucus. There is the evidence that Trump used the Foundation funds to buy a picture of himself, and sports paraphernalia, and to pay his legal bill related to his business – all illegal, all done in plain sight.
When Trump finally wrote a check (he hadn’t given any of his own money since 2008) he railed against the negative reports about him in relation to this. Why hadn’t they pointed out what a good thing he had done? Well, see Donnie, you hadn’t done sh*t to help any charity up to that point in time, and to be honest after you wrote the check to your own foundation there was no evidence that you had given any money to charity.
The States attorney wants Trump and his family members: Ivanka, Don Jr, and Eric to repay the money in double, to never be allowed to have a not for profit foundation again in the State of New York, and to not serve on any such non-profit board. She has also referred Federal charges to the IRS and other appropriate agencies. This is all based on the facts, not the hype, not the right wing attacks on our judicial system.
The amount of brazen criminality in this family, in this administration, and in the Republican party is stunning. Elizabeth Warren was pointing out last night how agencies of the Federal government have been stood on their head by this administration. The EPA no longer protects our environment but rather is a agency for polluters. The Education Department no longer looks out for the welfare of our public school system. The agency charged with protecting citizens from gouging by loan organizations is now those organizations accomplice.
Yesterday I read how the head of Yellowstone, a forty two year veteran, has been shoved out of his job. In fact the whole executive level of the National Park Service is under attack. Why? Why indeed.
It is surprising to me how quickly this country has fallen into such criminality. Will we be able to right the ship? How long will it take? Or will we succumb to this ever growing gang of thugs, criminals and ne’er do wells?
Hopefully only 1,066 Days to Go
PS Rabbit!
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