DOJ Initial Russia Hearings

[BigRedBuster]

I find that I have to explane to my republican friends that just because Hillary is someone I don’t want as president, that doesn’t mean Trump is a good option that I should have voted for. 

 

I have to point out to my Democrat friends that just because Trump is a disgusting human being, that doesn’t mean Hillary or the Dems are wonderful human beings that deserve my trust and respect. 

 

And, before I’m accused of it, I’m not demonstrating whataboutism. 

 

The  two are not related issues. 

 

I want to know everything about Trumps relationship with Russia and their involvement in our election. 

 

I also want to know who funded this dossier and it’s release. I also want it verified or proven to be false. This will show the motivation and extent to how who was involved will go to feed us full of s#!t to gain power in our elections. 

[Danny Bateman]

It's pretty well understood that Clinton lost to Trump and the myriad reasons why, BRB. He rose the middle finger to the establishment and won. It's forever engrained in our history. It's not really something I care to re-legislate. What matters now is where we go from here. 

 

My point is that paying for opposition research is neither a crime nor inadvisable. After all, PACs and orgs like the DNC/RNC do plenty of oppo research in house. Sometimes they contract that work out. 

 

As zoogs stated, this oppo research was originally commissioned by a rival GOP campaign (long rumored to be Jeb!, though his camp denies this as well) & merely taken over by the Democrats after the primaries. It was reported by progressive outlet Mother Jones back in October 2016 that they had done so, too.

 

Quote

This was for an opposition research project originally financed by a Republican client critical of the celebrity mogul. (Before the former spy was retained, the project’s financing switched to a client allied with Democrats.) 

 

I'd like to point out that the guy that collected this intel on Trump/Russia, Christopher Steele, is ex-MI6. As in, James Bond MI6. You don't make it into Her Majesty's Secret Service if you're an unreliable asset. Being an ex-spy is the only way Steele could have had the contacts to actually collect this info. Regardless, he seems to be a credible source.

We've always known that our own intel agencies didn't verify what he collected as certifiable fact because it was collected from Steele's own sources, which they can't directly verify. But they deemed it of high enough significance to brief both Obama & president-elect Trump on it last fall... AND pay him to continue gathering intel from his sources:

 

 

Regardless, Clinton made very little, if any, use of the allegations in this dossier. That's a far cry from Trump asking Russia to hack her emails. That's the other difference. With the former, Americans compelled an ALLY to help gather oppo on a rival campaign. On the other, Trump straight up asked a hostile ADVERSARY to damage his opponent and indeed both he & his family/inner circle went on to meet with them in furtherance of that end. Miles apart, IMO. 

 

And no, I don't want another Clinton investigation. The spineless morons who make up the House Judiciary & House Intel Committees have sat around with their thumbs up their butts for almost a year now, seeing nothing from Trump that warranted investigating. Devin Nunes, Chairman of the Intel Committee, ran to the White House in the dead of night to have the Trump White House feed him some nonsense trying to implicate Obama folks in "unmasking" & had to recuse from their Russia investigation when it was discovered the degree to which he was carrying water for Trump. Mind you, he continued issuing subpoenas & running interference after he recused because he thought no one would notice. Gowdy is the same weasely-looking moron from all the Benghazi investigations. They are some of the most explicitly partisan, tribal jackwagons imaginable. They have no business claiming to offer any type of real oversight. They're going to waste more taxpayer dollars on another fishing expedition designed purposely to damage partisan rivals (some of them have admitted as much on live TV!) while avoiding any kind of real oversight of Dear Leader. Anybody who thinks any of these chuckleheads are acting in good faith is sorely mistaken.

 

But instead, we'll get another X amount of months chasing the Clintons down rabbitholes and a complete abdication of any kind of duty to act as a check on the rampant, flagrant misbehavior of the man in the White House. Terrific.

[zoogs]

I think there's an important distinction between "curiosity about the Steele dossier and its validity" and "this should be given the Russia/Mueller treatment, and so should the Uranium story and Benghazi and Blackwater, or was it Whitewater, and everything else." I mean, it's not like there's controversy about the existence of opposition research, or that this is the first time we've been exposed to the fact that it happens -- though the media is treating it that way. That's frustrating, but it reflects the proclivity of media outlets (however sterling their reputation) towards hyping stuff up as dramatic. 

 

Also, this isn't even a revelation. The funding sources were covered from early on. From January:

 

If this were a bombshell, it would have been made into one then. It's not a bombshell of any kind. Recognize that we're in a reality where the White House is very good at controlling the news cycle and is fully willing to be completely disingenuous and dishonest whenever they need a distraction. Which is quite often.

 

Edited October 26, 2017 by zoogs

[zoogs]

Not liking Hillary is one thing, so let's talk around that. There's nonetheless an importance, even a responsibility, to not buy into the bulls#!t propped up and spammed out by the Trump agenda factory. Honestly, it's hard. Nobody has the time to dig on every story, and stuff that permeates the airwaves and the conversation...we soak it in. And it affects our perceptions. It can be exhausting to bat down the dung every single time. The worst of it is it can even feel unfair and unbalanced. But remember who's in charge here. "Balance" is meeting the Trump team halfway, and that's a losing proposition.

 

 

 

[Danny Bateman]

1 hour ago, zoogs said:

Not liking Hillary is one thing, so let's talk around that. There's nonetheless an importance, even a responsibility, to not buy into the bulls#!t propped up and spammed out by the Trump agenda factory. Honestly, it's hard. Nobody has the time to dig on every story, and stuff that permeates the airwaves and the conversation...we soak it in. And it affects our perceptions. It can be exhausting to bat down the dung every single time. The worst of it is it can even feel unfair and unbalanced. But remember who's in charge here. "Balance" is meeting the Trump team halfway, and that's a losing proposition.

 

 

 

 

Here's the thing.

 

I'd support Congressional investigations that are grounded in fact & merited by legitimate circumstances. 
 

But these yes-men running the House committees overlook hundreds & hundreds of reports of extremely poor, if not illegal or dangerous, behavior by the president & his men, and they decide to commit to an investigation of Clinton based on one WaPo piece that caught their eye? And then the Uranium One deal - the decision to reopen that boondoggle is based on God knows what... I'm guessing Gowdy's intuition?

 

How incredibly convenient. What a time for them to find their conscience.

 

The point is whatever standard this fellas are using just plain sucks. They can't be bothered to so much as give a fair quote about Trump for months on end and suddenly they decide to open dual investigations into Clinton magically on the same day? C'mon. Let's not be naive about what's going on here. 

 

These men are abusing the power of the Congressional investigation to target partisan enemies. They're frantically hammering the "eject" button and desperately want something to distract voters - so they won't notice their refusal to lift a damn finger to actually do their job & act as a check on the president. Oh, and please don't notice us passing garbage legislation that's not good for you, either.

 

It's the same cycle we've been through with these same players again, and again, and again. Nunes is a Trump bootlicker & Gowdy's sole purpose in life is to investigate Hillary Clinton. Again, presuming impartiality on the part of these goons is laughable.

Edited October 26, 2017 by dudeguyy

[Landlord]

4 hours ago, dudeguyy said:

It's pretty well understood that Clinton lost to Trump and the myriad reasons why, BRB. He rose the middle finger to the establishment and won. It's forever engrained in our history. It's not really something I care to re-legislate. What matters now is where we go from here. 

 

My point is that paying for opposition research is neither a crime nor inadvisable. After all, PACs and orgs like the DNC/RNC do plenty of oppo research in house. Sometimes they contract that work out. 

 

As zoogs stated, this oppo research was originally commissioned by a rival GOP campaign (long rumored to be Jeb!, though his camp denies this as well) & merely taken over by the Democrats after the primaries. It was reported by progressive outlet Mother Jones back in October 2016 that they had done so, too.

 

 

I'd like to point out that the guy that collected this intel on Trump/Russia, Christopher Steele, is ex-MI6. As in, James Bond MI6. You don't make it into Her Majesty's Secret Service if you're an unreliable asset. Being an ex-spy is the only way Steele could have had the contacts to actually collect this info. Regardless, he seems to be a credible source.

We've always known that our own intel agencies didn't verify what he collected as certifiable fact because it was collected from Steele's own sources, which they can't directly verify. But they deemed it of high enough significance to brief both Obama & president-elect Trump on it last fall... AND pay him to continue gathering intel from his sources:

 

 

Regardless, Clinton made very little, if any, use of the allegations in this dossier. That's a far cry from Trump asking Russia to hack her emails. That's the other difference. With the former, Americans compelled an ALLY to help gather oppo on a rival campaign. On the other, Trump straight up asked a hostile ADVERSARY to damage his opponent and indeed both he & his family/inner circle went on to meet with them in furtherance of that end. Miles apart, IMO. 

 

And no, I don't want another Clinton investigation. The spineless morons who make up the House Judiciary & House Intel Committees have sat around with their thumbs up their butts for almost a year now, seeing nothing from Trump that warranted investigating. Devin Nunes, Chairman of the Intel Committee, ran to the White House in the dead of night to have the Trump White House feed him some nonsense trying to implicate Obama folks in "unmasking" & had to recuse from their Russia investigation when it was discovered the degree to which he was carrying water for Trump. Mind you, he continued issuing subpoenas & running interference after he recused because he thought no one would notice. Gowdy is the same weasely-looking moron from all the Benghazi investigations. They are some of the most explicitly partisan, tribal jackwagons imaginable. They have no business claiming to offer any type of real oversight. They're going to waste more taxpayer dollars on another fishing expedition designed purposely to damage partisan rivals (some of them have admitted as much on live TV!) while avoiding any kind of real oversight of Dear Leader. Anybody who thinks any of these chuckleheads are acting in good faith is sorely mistaken.

 

But instead, we'll get another X amount of months chasing the Clintons down rabbitholes and a complete abdication of any kind of duty to act as a check on the rampant, flagrant misbehavior of the man in the White House. Terrific.

 

 

 

 

[BigRedBuster]

10 hours ago, dudeguyy said:

My point is that paying for opposition research is neither a crime nor inadvisable. After all, PACs and orgs like the DNC/RNC do plenty of oppo research in house. Sometimes they contract that work out. 

 

This is what Trumps claim they were doing when they met with the Russians.  It's even backed up by emails where the Russians claimed they had dirt on Hillary and how excited Donnie JR was about it.

 

I don't believe anyone (that is logical) has a problem with either side doing that.  What goes beyond that is the issue.

 

The Russians then paid for adds against Hillary in key states along with trying to hack various computer systems to help them accomplish their goals.

 

This foreign agent wrote a dossier that accused Trump of doing some pretty disgusting things, released it to members of the press to be published and nothing in it has ever been verified nor is it probably able to be verified.  But...the Dems loved it being released anyway.  

 

Yes, it was started by the Republicans.  So what?  It's the disgusting part of American politics that stuff gets put out into the press that is never verified and it becomes fact about opponents.  I, for one, don't have a problem when that gets exposed no matter what side is getting exposed doing it.

 

You call this "oppo research".  There is one hell of a big chance that there was no "research" involved.  Instead, a guy was paid to make a bunch of crap up and make it look top secret official in an attempt to bring an opponent down.

Edited October 26, 2017 by BigRedBuster

[TGHusker]

He is my frustration wt all of this - ok a few points of frustration:

1.  I can't trust the Dems or the Repubs to get to the bottom of both the Trump and the Clinton investigations without partiality, favoritism, and true justice winning the day

2.  The turn of events towards the Clintons now will only shield Trump more and more and give the Repubs 'cover' to not pursue the Trump issues (general unfitness for the

office not to mention what might be impeachable offenses). 

3. I don't want Trump to be kicked out of office due to political differences (ie: dems and certain republicans not liking his policies which are not grounds for impeachment - otherwise every president would face impeachment), however, I don't want political success (passing of budget, tax and health reform, etc) be reasons to ignore his unfitness for office.

4. I am  becoming convinced that Trump will escape all charges and that the Russian investigation will be going no where. This will only embolden him more, he'll become even more boorish, irreconcilable, and controlling.   With a few legislative successes he could easily be re-elected in 2020 as the Dem party continues to be fractured- which will continued if it is shown that the DNC was funding the dossier on Trump.  Senator Grassley is already talking about a separate special counsel to look at the latest allegations against the Clintons and the DNC.

5. My hope was that even if not removed from office through the impeachment process, that he'd be weakened to the point that a viable primary challenger would rise up to take him on in 2020.   This may not occur.

6.  If the Russian investigation fails, I see the core group of Trump supporters enlarging and becoming a more dominate voice in the Repub party.   As a result, bi-partisanship will become a lost art and DC will become even more divided and our government even more inefficient.

7.  More dangerous policies will be enacted as Repubs in Congress lose any backbones and will fail to act as a check on presidential power.  North Korea could become a scary situation.

8. While I may agree with the need for tax reform, immigration and border reform and security, health care reform - all issues that need to be addressed, I don't have to agree that Trump is the the right person to lead the change to reform those areas.  Trump is a self serving 'leader' so I cannot trust him to do things that are in the best interests of all Americans.

9.  Finally, even if Trump is not found guilty of any impeachable actions, I still believe he is unfit for office from a physiological perspective.   Of course, I'm not a psychologist nor do I play one on TV but it seems obvious to me, that Trump could very easily get us into an international calamity based on his 'issues'.  Much could be said about his physiological fitness for office but I'll leave it at that.

 

[TGHusker]

^^^^ follow up to the above, this article confirms my hunches that the GOP will value legislative 'success' over accountability and over ethics - they are circling the wagons around Trump in order to get the legislative success that they desire.

 

 

https://apnews.com/32ba75f6e70647cf83b5b50bfb3ead95/Senators-rally-behind-Trump-and-his-agenda-after-mini-revolt

 

There was no dam break of Republican rancor against Donald Trump, a day after a pair of the party’s prominent senators denounced their president and invited colleagues to join them. Instead, most GOP lawmakers rallied around Trump and his agenda Wednesday, with one all but saying “good riddance” to Jeff Flake of Arizona and Bob Corker of Tennessee.

“Maybe we do better by having some of the people who just don’t like him leave, and replace them with somebody else,” Sen. Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma told The Associated Press. “And I think that’s what’s happening.”   (My senator )

 

More grandiose statements from Trump:

“There is great unity in the Republican Party,” he contended as he left the White House for a hurricane briefing and other events in Texas. Claiming a show of affection at his appearance at a Senate GOP lunch a day earlier, Trump said: “I called it a lovefest. It was almost a lovefest. Maybe it was a lovefest.” He’s said repeatedly that he got multiple standing ovations.

 

A voice of reason gets ignored - tells me the state of the modern republican party:

Flake kept it up Wednesday with an opinion piece in The Washington Post. He likened the current moment to the red scare era of the early 1950s when Sen. Joseph McCarthy threw accusations of communism at a wide range of people. McCarthy’s career ended in disgrace, his downfall hastened when an Army lawyer, Joseph Welch, confronted him at a hearing with the question: “Have you no sense of decency, Sir, at long last?”

“We face just such a time now. We have again forgotten who we are supposed to be,” Flake wrote. “There is a sickness in our system — and it is contagious.”

“Nine months of this administration is enough for us to stop pretending that this is somehow normal, and that we are on the verge of some sort of pivot to governing, to stability. Nine months is more than enough for us to say, loudly and clearly: Enough.”

Flake has contended in interviews that the Republican Party is at a tipping point, or close to one, and others will start to speak out, too.

 

 

Evidence that Repub senators are circling the wagons, ignoring Trump 'issues' and are all about success in order to get re-elected.

There was scant evidence of that Wednesday on Capitol Hill, aside from the few Republicans in the House and Senate who have already made public their grievances with Trump. Nearly everyone else dodged questions on the topic, voiced unqualified support for Trump, or answered by saying that distractions aside, the GOP must remain focused on passing landmark legislation to simplify and reduce taxes.

After a drought of legislative accomplishments so far this year, a tax bill would give Republicans a major victory and a powerful argument for retaining their majorities in next year’s midterm elections, something the lawmakers desperately want.

“You know my answer. I’m focused on getting stuff done,” said Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio, when asked about his colleagues’ criticisms of Trump. “He was elected. I disagree with him fairly frequently, and I do so publicly and privately. But I want to work with him to get stuff done.”

Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina refused to discuss Trump’s standing.

“I am just not going to engage in that conversation at all. There’s no benefit to anyone,” Scott said. “At the end of the day the goal is for us to keep the focus on the American people and tax reform that will help them keep more of their money.”

Sen. David Perdue of Georgia was even more direct. “We’re all professionals here. These two guys can say and do what they want to do. But right now, we’ve got a bigger issue, and the bigger issue is to get this tax bill done,” he said.

In addition to their desire to get results on taxes, many GOP lawmakers confront the political reality that despite Trump’s relatively low poll numbers nationally, he retains the loyalty of a segment of the party’s base that nearly any Republican needs to win re-election. Trump has shown he can turn viciously on critics, and few want to find themselves in his Twitter crosshairs.

Flake and Corker raised the question: Will the GOP ever part ways with its mercurial leader? Certainly not today.  (TG: So Sad, So Bad)

[Danny Bateman]

1 hour ago, BigRedBuster said:

 

This is what Trumps claim they were doing when they met with the Russians.  It's even backed up by emails where the Russians claimed they had dirt on Hillary and how excited Donnie JR was about it.

 

I don't believe anyone (that is logical) has a problem with either side doing that.  What goes beyond that is the issue.

 

The Russians then paid for adds against Hillary in key states along with trying to hack various computer systems to help them accomplish their goals.

 

This foreign agent wrote a dossier that accused Trump of doing some pretty disgusting things, released it to members of the press to be published and nothing in it has ever been verified nor is it probably able to be verified.  But...the Dems loved it being released anyway.  

 

Yes, it was started by the Republicans.  So what?  It's the disgusting part of American politics that stuff gets put out into the press that is never verified and it becomes fact about opponents.  I, for one, don't have a problem when that gets exposed no matter what side is getting exposed doing it.

 

You call this "oppo research".  There is one hell of a big chance that there was no "research" involved.  Instead, a guy was paid to make a bunch of crap up and make it look top secret official in an attempt to bring an opponent down.

 

Agree to disagree. Steele is ex-MI6, the FBI felt he was trustworthy enough to have him continue gathering intel for them to look into & he had to go into hiding because of what he had done. To me that doesn't seem like the actions of someone who was just making stuff up. Plus, he wasn't the one to leak it to the press. Somehow a journalist got a hold of it and published it on Buzzfeed. I think it's fair to trace the leak to the media back to someone in the intelligence agencies once Steele had turned a copy over to them. Most likely somebody was concerned about the rise of Trump & wanted to damage him.

 

I will agree that this is the kind of ugly sausage making that lurks under the surface of modern day politics. But everyone does it because opposition research is so common. It may not be comfortable but I'm fairly sure just about any campaign for any position participates in this stuff.

 

The fact the FBI took up where he left off and continued trying to see what was verifiable & what was bunk is the biggest reason I feel like some of this is real. In addition to my feelings that Steele is not just BSing. I'm not about to bow down to the intel agencies, as they've had some pretty egregious overreaches over the year... but in this instance, I think the president is a clear & present danger to a peaceful, prosperous future & getting hm out of office, if indeed some degree of this is real, is objective numero uno on my list.

[Danny Bateman]

1 hour ago, TGHusker said:

He is my frustration wt all of this - ok a few points of frustration:

1.  I can't trust the Dems or the Repubs to get to the bottom of both the Trump and the Clinton investigations without partiality, favoritism, and true justice winning the day

2.  The turn of events towards the Clintons now will only shield Trump more and more and give the Repubs 'cover' to not pursue the Trump issues (general unfitness for the

office not to mention what might be impeachable offenses). 

3. I don't want Trump to be kicked out of office due to political differences (ie: dems and certain republicans not liking his policies which are not grounds for impeachment - otherwise every president would face impeachment), however, I don't want political success (passing of budget, tax and health reform, etc) be reasons to ignore his unfitness for office.

4. I am  becoming convinced that Trump will escape all charges and that the Russian investigation will be going no where. This will only embolden him more, he'll become even more boorish, irreconcilable, and controlling.   With a few legislative successes he could easily be re-elected in 2020 as the Dem party continues to be fractured- which will continued if it is shown that the DNC was funding the dossier on Trump.  Senator Grassley is already talking about a separate special counsel to look at the latest allegations against the Clintons and the DNC.

5. My hope was that even if not removed from office through the impeachment process, that he'd be weakened to the point that a viable primary challenger would rise up to take him on in 2020.   This may not occur.

6.  If the Russian investigation fails, I see the core group of Trump supporters enlarging and becoming a more dominate voice in the Repub party.   As a result, bi-partisanship will become a lost art and DC will become even more divided and our government even more inefficient.

7.  More dangerous policies will be enacted as Repubs in Congress lose any backbones and will fail to act as a check on presidential power.  North Korea could become a scary situation.

8. While I may agree with the need for tax reform, immigration and border reform and security, health care reform - all issues that need to be addressed, I don't have to agree that Trump is the the right person to lead the change to reform those areas.  Trump is a self serving 'leader' so I cannot trust him to do things that are in the best interests of all Americans.

9.  Finally, even if Trump is not found guilty of any impeachable actions, I still believe he is unfit for office from a physiological perspective.   Of course, I'm not a psychologist nor do I play one on TV but it seems obvious to me, that Trump could very easily get us into an international calamity based on his 'issues'.  Much could be said about his physiological fitness for office but I'll leave it at that.

 

 

I agree with you on all of this TGH. I don't want Trump kicked to the curb because I don't like his policies. I've lived through W & I can live through more orthodox conservative governance. But if he colluded with foreign powers to work against his fellow countrymen, or if he's not mentally or psychologically capable of leading the country, or if he's making decisions on the basis of enriching himself & his family rather than doing what's best for the country... these are are viable reasons to dump the guy. The chances any of those 3 are the case are greater than not, IMO...

 

Also, if the GOP indeed does shun the Corkers and Flakes sound the alarm and double down on defending Trump & declaring his greatness, you're right. Trumpism will have taken over the modern day Republican party, and bipartisanship will be even more broken. Ironically, though, Trump isn't solely to blame for the latter. Powerful faces like McConnell & Paul Ryan and even dating back the Contract with America days of Newt Gingrich had long ago began trampling the mechanisms that allow for bipartisanship. They believe in getting theirs and necessarily denying the other "team" theirs. None of them have any appetite for compromise, and Trump certainly isn't going to be the one to push them to have one.

The growing urban/rural or liberal/conservative divide, coupled with the increasing partisanship & decreasing political will to reach across the aisle, is going to drastically change the way our government works moving forward...

[QMany]

2 hours ago, BigRedBuster said:

You call this "oppo research".  There is one hell of a big chance that there was no "research" involved.  Instead, a guy was paid to make a bunch of crap up and make it look top secret official in an attempt to bring an opponent down.

 

Have you read anything about Steele that supports this speculation? Steele was an MI6 agent in Moscow, trained Special Forces against the Taliban, was head of the Russian Desk of MI6, and helped our FBI discover information tying Russian gangsters to FIFA. I don't think this is some random "guy" just paid to "make a bunch of crap up."

[RedDenver]

Somebody needs to ask one of the people pressing for an investigation into the funding of the dossier whether both the RNC and DNC should be investigated since both provided funding. Then you'll see the partisanship.

 

I think the dossier funding is about as relevant as Don Jr. meeting with the Russian lawyer to get dirt of Hillary. You can think both should be investigated or neither should be investigated, but you can't logically think only one of them should be investigated.

 

As for the Clinton Foundation and the uranium deal, I absolutely think it should be investigated by the FBI. Let the facts come out so we know what really happened. If all we're going to get is another Benghazi-esque circus, then there's no point since it'll all be smoke and mirrors without facts or substance.

[TGHusker]

2 minutes ago, RedDenver said:

Somebody needs to ask one of the people pressing for an investigation into the funding of the dossier whether both the RNC and DNC should be investigated since both provided funding. Then you'll see the partisanship.

 

I think the dossier funding is about as relevant as Don Jr. meeting with the Russian lawyer to get dirt of Hillary. You can think both should be investigated or neither should be investigated, but you can't logically think only one of them should be investigated.

 

As for the Clinton Foundation and the uranium deal, I absolutely think it should be investigated by the FBI. Let the facts come out so we know what really happened. If all we're going to get is another Benghazi-esque circus, then there's no point since it'll all be smoke and mirrors without facts or substance.

Regarding the bold  - the Dems and the Repubs will have a shared, bipartisan mantra at that point:

[BigRedBuster]

5 minutes ago, QMany said:

 

Have you read anything about Steele that supports this speculation? Steele was an MI6 agent in Moscow, trained Special Forces against the Taliban, was head of the Russian Desk of MI6, and helped our FBI discover information tying Russian gangsters to FIFA. I don't think this is some random "guy" just paid to "make a bunch of crap up."

Never meant to imply this is just some "random guy".  He obviously carries some weight by his ties to MI6.  But, it still remains that his dossier is nowhere close to being verified and probably will never be.

 

39 minutes ago, dudeguyy said:

Plus, he wasn't the one to leak it to the press. Somehow a journalist got a hold of it and published it on Buzzfeed.

 

Funny how those things work in American politics.  It's just mysteriously leaks out.

15 minutes ago, RedDenver said:

Somebody needs to ask one of the people pressing for an investigation into the funding of the dossier whether both the RNC and DNC should be investigated since both provided funding. Then you'll see the partisanship.

 

 

I am 100% all for that question being asked.