leh-nerd skin-erd

Sure, if you want to go down this road, that's fair. In a perfect world, Trump wouldn't send love letters to Korea, Biden wouldn't align with the Saudis, Obama wouldn't partner with Vlad, and so on. That said, one can look at the facts as they played out and conclude: Korea before Trump was Korea after Trump, and is no less Korea with Biden in office; Biden and his crew have almost singlehandedly caused the dependance on Saudi oil and the embarrassing debacle of Biden begging for assistance for the hard cold winter; Putin's relationship with the very flexible Obama resulted in the annexation of Crimea and revealed the impotence of Obama; On Trump's watch, for all the hype and bluster on his relationship with Putin, Putin stayed home; On Biden's watch, Putin quickly moved on Ukraine, with the completely predictable loss of human life and unimaginable suffering that followed; And now, this In less than 10 months, Putin engineered the release of a key ally, by all accounts a reprehensible and vicious human being. This in spite of :wink wink: outrage :wink wink: at Russia's devastating attack on Ukraine and commonly accepted wisdom that when dealing with a bad human being, it's the height of foolishness to send him more very bad human beings to assist him in his deeds. Putin knows Biden better than Biden know Biden, and all your manufactured concerns about 'love letters' don't change a thing about what happened and why. As for Otto Warmbier, it is abject numbskullery to compare his treatment and ultimate release to that of Brittney Grenier. The situations are not the same in really any way beyond terrorist nations and people being victimized. In retrospect, it must be heartbreaking for his family to know that the US Government will, in fact negotiate and acquiesce when it's politically advantageous to do so. I always wonder how far someone like you--the meme generating Hillary popcorn guy--will go to defend things you would criticize under the prior admin. Have some pride, man. This is great from Brittney Grenier, that is absolutely indisputable. It is not great for the world, that, too is indisputable. Both things can be true. Why can't you acknowledge that? It's like you're in...a cult...or something. Welcome back!

The Biden admin sends an international criminal called “The Merchant of Death” back to Russia, gets fleeced in the process, brags about caring about all Americans, and reveals his Administration is completely comfortable in negotiating with terrorists and terrorist nations as long as certain boxes are checked. Naturally, the follow up question form pro-Biden supporters who used to really distrust Russia (from late 2015-early 2021) is “Why didn’t Trump negotiate with the terrorists nation?”. Even for Billsy, Tibs and the crew, this is pretty dumb.

You asked a question at a third grade level but these issues are more complicated than that, Tibs. But you’re probably right. The “Merchant of Death” is probably retired and won’t be able to just walk right into the Leningrad Walmart and buy some tanks. Good to see Russia isn’t a concern again.

In no particular order: Great for Brittney Griener and her family. In spite of her naïveté and/or criminal behavior, the sentence she received was cruel, unjust and designed ultimately to result in this outcome; Great for the WNBA, they get their high profile star back and the positive news keeps the sport in the public forum; Great for the LGBT community showing an historically marginalized group that the world is changing and that when given the opportunity to choose freedom for two individuals, BGs life had more value than that of Paul Whelan languishing in prison for 4 years; Great for Putin and Comrade Bout. Putin knows Biden, knows the American people and knows that in spite of bluster and tough talk, it was only a matter of time before the Biden admin met Russian terms; Bad for Paul Whelan, jailed for 4 years. The message has been sent that his life is irrelevant in that the Americans held a known terrorist and Putin ally and still couldn’t/wouldn’t get him out. I would assume he’s devastated and just about out of hope; Bad for the American people generally. There are thousands and thousands of American citizens traveling the globe, and the stage is set again for another hostile nation to “arrest” an individual and go to work on shaking down the administration; Bad for the world. If the Russian is as bad a guy as the American government said he is, more deaths are sure to follow.

Less than 24 hours later, he backs down. In a move surprising no one, he returns the Merchant of Death to work with Russia and gets in return for one reefer smoking American who apparently didn’t pay attention to her surroundings. In the meantime, the other American detained for four years is left behind, presumably because he’s not a real, real good basketball player and probably an old white guy. On the other hand, maybe this is the flexibility Obama talked about to get some things accomplished…since he’s been in office, Russia has been invaded, Biden has cozied up to the Saudi Monarchy, and now Vlad gets his guy back.

I didn’t think about Herschel Walker much one way or the other, but it seems you did. I have no control over outcomes one way or the other. Trump followed the playbook on “illegitimate elections”, “coup” and “treason”. Sadly, supporters of the dem party willingly went along with the charade launched in 2015, and when that scheme failed badly, simply moved on to the next scheme. Had folks like you, presumably, demanded some accountability from your leadership team for getting you all worked up with unfounded allegations, chances are high that Trump would not have followed suit. Unfortunately, for people like you to come to grips with that, you come face to face with the fact that you were bamboozled by one of oldest political scams in the world. It takes a strong person to acknowledge that sort of thing, and most people just don’t have that capacity. Btw, it’s why the Dems launched the probe to begin with—they know you better than you know yourself. I support legal action against the participants in the 1/6 riots, support the actions of the police officer who shot the protestor, wonder how those nudniks overran the Capitol and who was responsible for the security that say, and why that person hasn’t been held accountable for the abject failure that day. Do you? As for “participatory”, that word means nothing in the context of the rest of your paragraph. It’s a weasel word as you used it here. I assume you don’t mean Trump physically assaulted officers, or that you’ve seen direct evidence that he orchestrated the plot to kill officers. It’s not that I think you couldn’t think that, it’s just that you would have said so if you did. Surely you can be more specific here.

No, wrong. The GOP recognized the political aspects of the impeachment proceedings for what they were…political shenanigans.

Game…set…match.

This is getting scary. I had something ready to go on the song being about Annie, Nancy and Heart, but deleted it. Next thing you know I’ll be talking all about my pigs in a French blanket recipe.

I think it was Annie, Mup. What people didn’t know—indeed what they couldn’t know—was that Annie’s middle name was Nancy.

Nancy are you ok, are you ok Nancy? Nancy are you ok, are you ok Nancy? I’d go on but in this case, it’s probably too soon.

There’s no need for information to be released. The people of Pennsylvania voted him in, it really doesn’t matter if he makes a recovery or not. It is what it is, and he’s obviously been significantly impacted.

You’re taking him out of context. That fan never smelt the field, and it was only one d.

And you played tennis!

Yes, exactly. He’s nearly 80 years old. He may be the most crafty serial criminal in the history of mankind.

Bigger question imo, is was it within their control to limit what they took to the documents they were authorized to seize? They had complete control of the area being searched, empowered to detain, arrest or dispatch anyone who did not comply or got aggressive. I believe Chi is a proponent of application of Occam’s Razor…in the calm light of day, the DOJ seized documents outside the scope of the investigation (some purported to include documents protected under attorney-client privilege) and is fighting tooth and nail to avoid an objective review of documents. What seems more likely….an “Oops” or “the full weight and power of the United States government” coming down on a political figure?

We keep having the same discussion, Chi. I’m not a lawyer, I don’t work for the government and am simply a citizen looking at what has happened. In your world, at least as far as Trump is concerned, it seems to me you’ll bend over backwards to defend practice without regard to optics and damage it does to the national psyche. In my world, if the DOJ is going to go to the extreme and raid the guys house, they should have the professionalism to avoid the appearance of impropriety and not seize documents outside the scope allowed. If it takes 10 hours, spend 10 hours. If it’s 40 hours to do the job “right”, spend 40 hours. If 75 people are needed, get 80. From a legal perspective, it seems reasonable to me that the law considers the appointment of a Special Master and a pause in review while things get worked out. Again, I’m not a lawyer, but a judge considered the argument and allowed for it to happen. Was this an egregious example of judicial misconduct, or an opinion allowed within the scope of the law? DOJ disagrees, within the context of the law, appeals and wins. The story there is “Trust us, all is fine.”. If you’re going to raid a guys house after 4 years of trumped up scandals, political manipulation and innuendo, do it right. I understand this barnyard explosion can happen legally, I just don’t think it should happen.

My God, you really were sorry. I've reconsidered everything. @716er is a total cry baby.

This is wrong on so many levels. Medically. Societally. Why, the Freudian aspects alone give one reason to pause.

It's a shame, really, that this is happening. Had the government been more diligent and disciplined in their approach, they could have avoided the appearance of impropriety and tyranny at work. Turns out they can get court permission to storm the castle, organize and dispatch law enforcement officials armed to the teeth, spend hours on site, photograph documents purported to be classified, provide them to the press, and yet still gather an enormous number of documents unrelated to the seizure. On top of that, they resist any objective review of the seized documents by an independent third party, in essence stating "You just gotta trust us.".

How could there be one of him born every minute, Ned? That's vaginically impossible.

Dark. Unsettling. Troubling. I don't think you're really apologizing at all.

And me, I think I need an apology as well. I’m hurting.

Some people have the ability to see an agenda, Tibs, see a narrative and push back or go around it. These people often defy the odds on societal expectations, intergenerational poverty, hold themselves accountable for what they can control is spite of injustice in whatever form it comes, and push forward in spite of all the reasons it makes sense not to do so. In less than 3 full pages, @JaCrispy has been lectured, accused of being a racist and been challenged as to whether or not he's Black. Along the way, he's responded in a thoughtful, reasoned way with facts as he sees them, and with good humor to boot. I don't know JaCrispy personally, but read what he shares in the threads I frequent. The people described in paragraph one frequently seem to behave like the person described in paragraph two. Maybe this time..listen, consider, and possibly learn something new?

We don’t say “cry baby” in here any more. It’s age-ist, hurtful and unnecessary. And, your language is offensive as we have ladies present!