What does a TRUMP presidency look like?

[Razgovory]

I think there is some merits in comparing Trump to Clinton.  I wouldn't consider Bill Clinton "shady" though. Narcissistic, self-serving, and slimy work well.  I would also put in there vindictive and back-stabbing in there.

[dps]

I think there is some merits in comparing Trump to Clinton.  I wouldn't consider Bill Clinton "shady" though. Narcissistic, self-serving, and slimy work well.  I would also put in there vindictive and back-stabbing in there.

The big difference between Bill Clinton and Donald Trump is that Clinton, despite his faults, came across as friendly and likeable.  Or as I put it once, Bill Clinton seems like a guy you'd like to have over to your house to shoot the breeze with while watching a ball game and knocking back a few beers--after locking up your wife, daughter, mother, and any female pets, of course.  Trump, OTOH, I wouldn't allow in my house.

[Admiral Yi]

There are tons of differences.  Bill thought his job was to be president.  He could read and write.  He didn't call everyone who disagreed with him a doo doo head.  He didn't try to put them in jail.  He cared about policy, he cared about America, he cared about the world.  He was capable of speaking without lying.  He balanced the budget.  He didn't look like a giant orange oaf in a fat man suit.  He didn't appoint crooks and thieves and retards to every open position.  He watched shows other than the gorilla channel.  He didn't have a hard on for dictators.  He didn't appoint Chelsea as special envoy to Bosnia.  He didn't fire his entire cabinet every week.

[dps]

Saw a great headline online:  "Trump admits he makes Barr's job harder, but vows to continue".  Hilarious.

[Syt]

According to CNN, together with Bloagojevich:

He pardoned Bernie Kerik, the former New York police commissioner who was convicted of tax fraud. And in another controversial move, he pardoned a fellow kingpin of 1980s New York, the junk bond entrepreneur Michael Milken, convicted of conspiracy to hide stocks and tax fraud.

[Admiral Yi]

Also Eddie Debartalo, (former?) owner of the 49ers.  I saw a clip of Jerry Rice at the White House thanking Trump for his beautiful service to mankind.

I didn't know Debartalo was in the can.  Same with Milken.

I think Trump just discovered a new toy.  He got tired of eating all the trade war crayons, so now he wants to see how many pardons he can shove up his nose.

[Tamas]

4 years from now, Ivanka will become the first female POTUS.

[The Minsky Moment]

I didn't know Debartalo was in the can.  Same with Milken.

They weren't - you can receive a retroactive pardon.

[Sheilbh]

Speaking of pardons:

Donald Trump 'offered Julian Assange a pardon if he denied Russia link to hack'
    WikiLeaks published emails damaging to Hillary Clinton in 2016
    Offer claim made at WikiLeaks founder's extradition hearing
Owen Bowcott and Julian Borger
Wed 19 Feb 2020 19.47 GMT
First published on Wed 19 Feb 2020 17.42 GMT

Donald Trump offered Julian Assange a pardon if he would say Russia was not involved in leaking Democratic party emails, a court in London has been told.

The extraordinary claim was made at Westminster magistrates court before the opening next week of Assange's legal battle to block attempts to extradite him to the US.

Assange's barrister, Edward Fitzgerald QC, referred to evidence alleging that the former US Republican congressman Dana Rohrabacher had been to see Assange, now 48, while he was still in the Ecuadorian embassy in August 2017.

Assange appeared in court on Wednesday by videolink from Belmarsh prison, wearing dark tracksuit bottoms and a brown jumper over a white shirt.

A statement from Assange's lawyer Jennifer Robinson shows "Mr Rohrabacher going to see Mr Assange and saying, on instructions from the president, he was offering a pardon or some other way out, if Mr Assange ... said Russia had nothing to do with the DNC [Democratic National Committee] leaks", Fitzgerald told Westminster magistrates court.

District Judge Vanessa Baraitser, who is hearing the case at Westminster, said the evidence is admissible.

White House spokeswoman, Stephanie Grisham, told reporters: "The president barely knows Dana Rohrabacher other than he's an ex-congressman. He's never spoken to him on this subject or almost any subject."

"It is a complete fabrication and a total lie," Grisham said. "This is probably another never ending hoax and total lie from the DNC."

Trump, however, invited Rohrabacher to the White House in April 2017 after seeing the then congressman on Fox TV defending the president.

In September 2017, the White House confirmed that Rohrabacher had called the then chief of staff, John Kelly, to talk about a possible deal with Assange.

Rohrabacher told the Wall Street Journal that as part of the deal he was proposing, Assange would have to hand over a computer drive or other data storage device that would prove that Russia was not the source of the hacked emails.

"He would get nothing, obviously, if what he gave us was not proof," Rohrabacher said.

The report quoted an unnamed administration official as saying that Kelly had told Rohrabacher that the proposal "was best directed to the intelligence community". The same official said Kelly did not convey Rohrabacher's message to Trump, who was unaware of the details of the proposed deal.

Rohrabacher said at the time he was sceptical of the CIA's impartiality, as it had been part of the US intelligence community consensus that Russia had meddled in the presidential election.

Until he was voted out of office in 2018, Rohrabacher was a consistent voice in Congress in defence of Vladimir Putin's Russia, claiming to have been so close to the Russian leader that they had engaged in a drunken arm-wrestling match in the 1990s. In 2012, the FBI warned him that Russian spies were seeking to recruit him as an "agent of influence".

Neither Rohrabacher, who now lives in Maine, nor his lawyer returned calls seeking comment on Assange's claims.

The publication of emails hacked from the Hillary Clinton campaign helped perpetuate an aura of scandal around the Democratic candidate a few weeks before the 2016 election.

WikiLeaks put them online hours after Trump had suffered an apparent public relations disaster with the emergence of a tape in which he boasted of molesting women.

Assange is wanted in America to face 18 charges, including conspiring to commit computer intrusion, over the publication of US cables a decade ago.

He could face up to 175 years in jail if found guilty. He is accused of working with the former US army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning to leak hundreds of thousands of classified documents.

The extradition hearing is due to begin at Woolwich crown court on Monday, beginning with a week of legal argument. It will then be adjourned and continue with three weeks of evidence scheduled to begin on 18 May.

The decision, which is expected months later, is likely to be appealed against by the losing side, whatever the outcome.

Assange has been held on remand in Belmarsh prison since last September after serving a 50-week jail sentence for breaching his bail conditions while he was in the Ecuadorian embassy in London.

He entered the building in 2012 to avoid extradition to Sweden over sex offence allegations, which he has always denied and were subsequently dropped.

Assange's claims of a deal emerged a day after Trump granted clemency to a string of high-profile figures convicted on fraud or corruption charges, including the former Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich and the "junk bond king" Michael Milken. Trump has not excluded pardoning Roger Stone, a former aide who was convicted in November of obstructing a congressional investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential race, and in particular for lying to investigators about his relationship with Assange and WikiLeaks.

Stone once boasted that he had dinner with Assange but later said the claim was a joke.

Ned Price, a former national security council spokesman said on Twitter: "It sure sounds like Assange's attorneys are prepared to back-up this claim with evidence. It's a another indication that Trump's assault on the rule of law isn't new; it's been ongoing throughout his term."

[Barrister]

While I certainly wouldn't put it past Trump, I'm afraid I'm going to need better evidence than just Julian Assange's good word.

[Sheilbh]

Yeah and that comment about backing up his claim with evidence might just be a witness statement. We'll see

[The Minsky Moment]

Rohrabacher did meet with Assange and it was reported that he did relay such a proposal to then Chief of Staff Kelly, who reportedly did not bring the proposal to Trump but told Rohrabacher to pursue proper channels. 

[dps]

Rohrabacher did meet with Assange and it was reported that he did relay such a proposal to then Chief of Staff Kelly, who reportedly did not bring the proposal to Trump but told Rohrabacher to pursue proper channels. 

Sooooo...., it wasn't Trump offered this deal to Assange, but rather that Assange proposed it?

[Admiral Yi]

Sooooo...., it wasn't Trump offered this deal to Assange, but rather that Assange proposed it?

It seems to me Rohrabacher was the instigator.  He wanted to play free lance international man of mystery and emminense grise fixer, like Nunes in Ukraine.

[PDH]

Those wacky California Republicans