JUST the Stolen Documents/Mar-A-Lago/"Judge" Cannon Trial

[a fan]

Have you offered similar public displays of 'care and compassion' for the 650,000 Americans who die of heart disease every year

Nope. Are you kidding? 650K is fear porn, Pete. Totally unproven.

You DO know that hospitals get paid to inflate those heart disease numbers, right? And they don't run autopsies on everyone. How do we know that there wasn't some other underlying condition, and the heart didn't really have anything to do with it? And most of those deaths are for those over the age of 70, so they don't count.

Man. Get a grip, and stop with the Fear Porn, Pete. Don't be such a snowflake.

[a fan]

Hey, half of Beirut just blew up.

How many of those killed in the explosion were over 70, Pete?

And how many of them had underlying conditions, like obesity, or high blood pressure?

When you get the data on this, get back to us. Thanks!

[Peter Brown]

Have you offered similar public displays of 'care and compassion' for the 650,000 Americans who die of heart disease every year

Nope. Are you kidding? 650K is fear porn, Pete. Totally unproven.

You DO know that hospitals get paid to inflate those heart disease numbers, right? And they don't run autopsies on everyone. How do we know that there wasn't some other underlying condition, and the heart didn't really have anything to do with it? And most of those deaths are for those over the age of 70, so they don't count.

Man. Get a grip, and stop with the Fear Porn, Pete. Don't be such a snowflake.

So the answer apparently is you haven't offered similar woke displays of compassion? Orange Man Bad! Trump brought the virus in and purposely crushed the economy! I knew it.

[a fan]

Have you offered similar public displays of 'care and compassion' for the 650,000 Americans who die of heart disease every year

Nope. Are you kidding? 650K is fear porn, Pete. Totally unproven.

You DO know that hospitals get paid to inflate those heart disease numbers, right? And they don't run autopsies on everyone. How do we know that there wasn't some other underlying condition, and the heart didn't really have anything to do with it? And most of those deaths are for those over the age of 70, so they don't count.

Man. Get a grip, and stop with the Fear Porn, Pete. Don't be such a snowflake.

So the answer apparently is you haven't offered similar woke displays of compassion?

Where did I say one single word about Trump? Go ahead and look, Pete. I didn't. I blame the people, and American culture, and our unwillingness to sacrifice, even a little, for our fellow Americans.

And you think that because I'm worried about my fellow Americans, the only POSSIBLE reason for this is because of Donald Trump?

It is quite possible that you have the saddest worldview I've ever stumbled upon.

This, of course, means that the the reason you are so desperate to not care about 150K dead Americans, is because you think it reflects poorly on Trump. So you want to ignore what's happening entirely.

That's full on Froot Loops, Pete. Best let your "life coach" know about this line of thinking of yours.....

[Peter Brown]

Have you offered similar public displays of 'care and compassion' for the 650,000 Americans who die of heart disease every year

Nope. Are you kidding? 650K is fear porn, Pete. Totally unproven.

You DO know that hospitals get paid to inflate those heart disease numbers, right? And they don't run autopsies on everyone. How do we know that there wasn't some other underlying condition, and the heart didn't really have anything to do with it? And most of those deaths are for those over the age of 70, so they don't count.

Man. Get a grip, and stop with the Fear Porn, Pete. Don't be such a snowflake.

So the answer apparently is you haven't offered similar woke displays of compassion?

Where did I say one single word about Trump? Go ahead and look, Pete. I didn't. I blame the people, and American culture, and our unwillingness to sacrifice, even a little, for our fellow Americans.

And you think that because I'm worried about my fellow Americans, the only POSSIBLE reason for this is because of Donald Trump?

It is quite possible that you have the saddest worldview I've ever stumbled upon.

This, of course, means that the the reason you are so desperate to not care about 150K dead Americans, is because you think it reflects poorly on Trump. So you want to ignore what's happening entirely.

That's full on Froot Loops, Pete. Best let your "life coach" know about this line of thinking of yours.....

Apparently my sympathy isn’t needed since you’re at Stage 5 Caring.

[a fan]

Apparently my sympathy isn’t needed since you’re at Stage 5 Caring.

Because I care about 150K of my fellow American dying-----you think that's hysteria, do ya?

And wanting to keep that number from spiraling out of control is insane, is it, Pete?

Neat.

Meanwhile, Pete loses his mind over a man in a TuTu.

Sounds like you got your priorities perfectly aligned, Pete.


The hilarious thing is, if Trump had a little D by his name? Every poster here knows you'd be out of your mind, freaking out over every last death.

It's a sad, sad way to go through life, Pete. Little D's and R's, ruling everything you think, say, and do. Sad, sad stuff.....

[CU77]

Well, Pete gets to stand while singing the government-loyalty song. There's that.

[old salt]

Great post from Defense One today on NATO's E front, illustrating how Trump's proposed German drawdown, despite his political motives & rhetoric, fits into shifting our forces to the E, to best counter Russia (although that's not D1's intent -- they're very critical of Trump.)
The embedded links, & their embedded links, provide a lot of meaty details. Especially the William of Ockham Counterpoint.

The D Brief
August 4, 2020

It's official now: The U.S. Army is sending 200 troops to Poland, where its newly reactivated V Corps will deploy during the next fiscal year.

Army Chief Gen. James McConville travelled to Poland today to unfurl the unit's colors (photos here) alongside Corps Commander Lt. Gen. John Kolasheski, who just received his third star for the gig.

Background: "In February, the U.S. Army announced the reactivation of V Corps at Fort Knox, Kentucky, and identified Europe as the location for a forward command post," the Army said in a statement this morning. "The location of the V Corps Headquarters (Forward) was brought to fruition by the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement, announced July 31."

Of course, 200 soldiers alone can't stop Russia from a Baltic invasion, so the unit's job will focus more broadly on "operational planning, mission command and oversight of the rotational forces in Europe," the Army says. And the unit could see its first big action as part of next year's scheduled Defender Europe exercise, which typically starts in the spring — provided next year's drills are not delayed or cut short by the coronavirus.

The U.S. currently has as many as 50,000 troops and civilians in Europe, the Washington Post reported in late July; and that number is set to decline by 12,000 or so uniformed troops in the coming months following last week's "repositioning" announcement from Defense Secretary Mark Esper.

Counterpoint: "William of Ockham would like a word with those who worry more about a potential Russian invasion of the Baltics than ongoing interventions in the Balkans," writes Robert Hamilton, retired colonel and Army War College prof. Read his "NATO Needs to Focus on the Black Sea."

And here's some related news from the region: "Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko accused Moscow on Tuesday of lying in a row about the arrest of a group of Russian security contractors in Minsk, and said unnamed forces were plotting a revolution that would fail," Reuters reports from the Belarusian capital. Read on, here.

[Peter Brown]

Well, Pete gets to stand while singing the government-loyalty song. There's that.

If you’re disappointed in your country, or heck just don’t like her, you’re free to sit. Burn the flag. We see you.

For those of us who love the country, we’ll continue to adore her in small and big ways.

[CU77]

You're the one blowing snot into the flag.

[Peter Brown]

You're the one blowing snot into the flag.

There can be no way you are above the age of 10 writing a sentence like that.

Anyway, I have good news for American Democrats. Iranian professors are on your side; they hate America just as much!!

https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/irani ... ers-637405

Iranian professor calls for burning US flags in solidarity with American protesters. "I think that more people should burn American flags. We aren't burning enough American flags. We need to prioritize our target audience if we want to start acting in America."

[Matnum PI]

Yates and Russian Interference. Live. https://www.c-span.org/video/?474339-1/ ... estigation

[Matnum PI]

Yates and Russian Interference. Live. https://www.c-span.org/video/?474339-1/ ... estigation

[youthathletics]

I was watching earlier....she was throwing some shade at Comey.

[CU77]

[old salt]

In Syria -- SDF contracts with US company to develop new oil fields in NE Syria & retain the revenues. Assad & Russia object.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/05/politics ... %3A51%3A55

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-syri ... SKBN24Y0FD

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/08/0 ... oil-391033

If the SDF can pull this off, it parallels what the Iraqi Kurds are doing in their autonomous region.

[Typical Lax Dad]

They are mad that Hillary lost and don’t realize Trump was duly elected and he hasn’t been indicted.

[old salt]

German schadenfreude over US troop drawdown :

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions ... us-troops/

President Trump’s decision to withdraw 12,000 U.S. troops from Germany has prompted a surfeit of lamentation from foreign policy elites. Yet most of the commentaries overlook an important factor: the opinion of the German people themselves.

According to a poll released this week, 47 percent of Germans support reducing the number of U.S. soldiers on their territory. One in 4 are happy to say auf Wiedersehen to them all. Only 28 percent believe the figure should stay the same. And a measly four percent wish to see it increased.

Trump has been rather explicit in framing the redeployment as punitive. He doesn’t understand why the United States is “supposed to protect” Germany against Russia while Berlin pays Moscow for gas, and he doesn’t seem to like Chancellor Angela Merkel all that much. But is it really fair to describe something as punishment when the recipients are such gluttons for it?

That a large plurality of Germans want to scale down the U.S. military presence should come as no surprise, as they have been ambivalent about their country’s relationship with ours since the creation of the Federal Republic more than 70 years ago.

When Russian tanks rolled into nearby Hungary in 1956, nearly two-thirds of West Germans believed their country should “remain neutral” between the Soviet Union and the United States. It was not until the Red Menace literally reached their doorstep in the form of the Berlin Wall that a majority favored “good terms with Americans” over “remain[ing] neutral,” a ratio that fluctuates to this day.

In the early 1980s, the Bundestag came perilously close to rejecting the deployment of U.S. nuclear-tipped Pershing missiles. Some of the largest demonstrations in German history remain the 1983 protests against this defensive response to Soviet nuclear blackmail. And since the end of the Cold War, large pluralities have supported either partial or wholesale withdrawals of U.S. troops.

The mainstream media and its friends in the “resistance” have blithely overlooked this history in their shared indignation over this latest example of Trump’s perfidy. Yet this week’s poll results remind us that Germany’s pacifistic neutralism undermines the transatlantic relationship just as much as Trump’s America First unilateralism.

To be sure, Trump’s handling of the withdrawal bears all the hallmarks of his scattershot diplomacy. An important strategic decision undertaken out of spite and personal pique? Check. Blindsided allies and snubbed congressional leaders? Yup. A stubborn refusal to acknowledge basic facts, in this case, the difference between a recommended defense spending target and an imaginary “fee to NATO?” You betcha.

Trump loves to harp on how the United States is “protecting” Europe’s richest country, but U.S. troops are not stationed there to defend miserly and ungrateful Germans. We forwardly deploy our forces in Germany to deter a predatory Russia from upsetting the European security order — something manifestly in our interest — and because it’s closer to hot spots like Africa and the Middle East. In 2012 and 2013, President Barack Obama withdrew substantial numbers of soldiers from Europe — to muted reaction from those now condemning Trump — and Vladimir Putin responded the following year by invading Ukraine and annexing Crimea.

And yet if Trump’s troop withdrawals are a “gift to Putin,” what can be said of Germany? It continues the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, decried by a former Polish defense minister in 2006 as akin to the Nazi-Soviet Pact. It opposes arming Ukraine. And the state of its military is one of total “dysfunction.” Not that most Germans see any problem with this. Last year, six out of 10 said their country should not come to the aid of a fellow NATO member threatened by Russia, a repudiation of the core premise of the collective security alliance that Trump and Trump alone is blamed for weakening. And who can fault the Germans, when a similar number believe the United States would do the job for them anyway? Nor is this pacifism limited to Russia: 52 percent of Germans disagree with the statement that it is even sometimes “necessary to use military force to maintain order in the world.”

Finally, when discussing Germany, one should never discount the role played by good old-fashioned anti-Americanism. This is a land, after all, where more than 100,000 people poured into the streets this summer to protest racism in a country thousands of miles away, but in 2018 only saw some 2,000 decry the violent wave of anti-Semitism in its own backyard. I’ll leave it to you to ponder the reasons for this massive disparity in outrage.

Trump’s disdain for traditional alliances may have weakened America’s global leadership. But it has been a boon for a raft of German politicians and American partisans, a convenient alibi for overlooking serious and important divisions between their two countries in favor of simplistic morality tales. Those divisions existed long before Trump descended his golden escalator, and they will persist long after he leaves the White House.

https://www.dw.com/en/nearly-half-of-ge ... a-54427490

Nearly half of Germans in favor of US military withdrawal: survey
People in Germany are largely in favor of US troops withdrawing from their country, a recent survey has revealed. The data showed that voters and politicians tend to disagree on the matter.
Nearly half of people in Germany are in favor of a US plan to withdraw nearly 12,000 of its troops from the European country, according to a representative survey by the research institute YouGov shared Tuesday.

Some 47% of survey respondents said they supported reducing the number of US soldiers in Germany. One in four was in favor of all US soldiers leaving.
Just 28% thought the number of US troops should remain the same and only 4% were in favor of increasing their numbers.
Another 21% declined to answer.
The YouGov online survey took place between July 31 and August 3, 2020 and was commissioned by German news agency dpa, who published the results.

Of Germany's six parliamentary groups, five oppose US troops leaving Germany. Only the country's left-wing die Linke Party — which supports a complete withdrawal of all US troops — is in favor of the move.
Voter opinion, however, tended to differ from that of the parties they support.
People who generally vote for Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservative CDU/CSU were largely against the troops leaving, with more than 40% opposed.
Among supporters of all other parties, the majority was in favor of the withdrawal, to varying degrees.

Dobra !

https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your ... us-troops/

With the Germany withdrawal, Poland is set to be hosting a lot more US troops
The American military’s presence in Europe is shifting eastward, the Defense Department has confirmed, as a new agreement with Poland sets up a host of construction projects designed to support more U.S. troops in that country.

In addition to the 4,500 troops that currently rotate from the U.S., “Poland has agreed to fund infrastructure and logistical support to U.S. forces,” Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Tom Campbell told Military Times. An increase of 1,000 rotational troops is also still on tap.

The plan is part of an Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement completed Monday and awaiting signatures.
“Alongside the recently announced European strategic force posture changes, the EDCA will enhance deterrence against Russia, strengthen NATO, reassure our Allies, and our forward presence in Poland on NATO’s eastern flank will improve our strategic and operational flexibility,” Defense Secretary Mark Esper said in a statement.

Infrastructure projects will include
• A V Corps forward command post.
• A forward division headquarters
• Several combat training centers, starting with Drawsko and Pomorskie.
• An Air Force MQ-9 squadron.
• An aerial port of debarkation for loading and unloading troops and equipment.
• An area support group.
• A special operations forces facility to support air, ground and maritime operations.
• Facilities for a armored brigade combat team, a combat aviation brigade and a combat sustainment support battalion.

The Army’s V Corps had been deactivated since 2013, but the service announced it would stand the organization back up earlier this year. On Tuesday, that plan fleshed out. About 630 soldiers will be assigned to V Corps, 200 of whom will man the Poland outpost. The rest will remain at Fort Knox, Kentucky.
630 soldiers assigned to its main headquarters at Fort Knox, Kentucky, and another 200 rotating through the Poland outpost.

An Army Europe official told Army Times the service is still “unaware of the exact location” that V Corps will be set up in the country, and could “only confirm that it will be in Poland.” V Corps had previously been based in Germany.
The first command post rotation is expected to start in fiscal year 2021. V Corps’ primary mission will be operational planning, mission command and oversight of the rotational forces in Europe.
“The activation of an additional Corps headquarters provides the needed level of command and control focused on synchronizing U.S. Army, allied, and partner nation tactical formations operating in Europe,” Army Chief of Staff Gen. James McConville said in a statement.

The plan builds off of talks a year ago about cost-sharing with Poland to fund a greater U.S. troop presence, as it keeps an eye on deterring Russian incursion.
Last June, President Donald Trump announced a 1,000-troop plus-up, largely from a division headquarters rotation and the addition of the MQ-9 Reaper squadron, but stopped short of unveiling a rumored “Fort Trump,” or another standalone U.S. base in Poland.

When Esper announced a plan July 29 to withdraw just under 12,000 troops from Germany and partially redistribute them around Europe, he alluded to co-locating some of those troops in existing European countries’ facilities, including in Belgium and Italy.
That would include these new projects in Poland, which will house U.S. troops on Polish bases.

Esper presented the plan as a re-balancing, as post-Cold War Europe has shifted NATO’s border with Russia eastward.
Trump, meanwhile, has characterized withdrawing troops from Germany as a direct rebuke, in response to the country not meeting its goal of contributing 2 percent of its gross domestic product to NATO, a goal the organizations set for itself by 2024.
“Germany is not paying their bills,” Trump told reporters July 29. “They’re delinquent. It’s simple.”
Poland is one of the minority of NATO countries who meets that spending benchmark.

While about 5,600 troops will shift from Germany to other parts of Europe, another 5,300 will head back to the U.S., then potentially move into the pipeline for rotational deployments back to Eastern Europe.

Since 2016, the Army has been rotating an armored brigade combat team to Europe. While much of that deployment includes Poland, exercises and engagements with partner forces have seen American troops moving down to Bulgaria and up to Estonia.

[seacoaster]

Here is the caliber of security thinker and professional we once had in government service:

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/07/us/p ... e=Homepage

"Most closely associated with moderate Republicans like Ford, Howard H. Baker Jr. and Colin L. Powell, Mr. Scowcroft (pronounced SKO-croft) was a self-effacing former Air Force general who did not smoke or drink. He preferred working quietly in small groups.

In making foreign policy, a national security adviser coordinates the work of the National Security Council — the president, vice president, secretaries of state and defense and others, supported by a staff that writes papers and proposals — and makes sure the president hears all sides of the debate before making decisions.

Mr. Scowcroft called himself a traditionalist, who believed that the nation should work with allies and international organizations, as opposed to a “transformationalist,” like the second President Bush, who argued that America should fight terrorism by spreading democracy in the world — by force if necessary — and should be free to act swiftly without relying on overly cautious allies or a cumbersome United Nations.

After leaving government in 1993, Mr. Scowcroft headed the Washington-based Scowcroft Group, a consulting firm for international businesses, and was chairman of an advisory board that made policy recommendations to President George W. Bush.

Nevertheless, he was among the few prominent Republicans who challenged President Bush in 2002 as the administration made its case to go to war in Iraq.

In an op-ed article in The Wall Street Journal titled “Don’t Attack Saddam,” Mr. Scowcroft said there was “scant evidence” of ties between Iraq and Al Qaeda or the Sept. 11 attacks, as Mr. Bush claimed. And he argued that an invasion to oust the Iraqi leader, Saddam Hussein, would “seriously jeopardize, if not destroy, the global counterterrorist campaign we have undertaken.”

The Iraq war, he told the Op-Ed columnist Roger Cohen of The New York Times in 2007, had also undermined faith in America.

“Historically, the world has always given us the benefit of the doubt because it believed we meant well,” Mr. Scowcroft said. “It no longer does. It is easy to lose trust, but it takes a lot of work to gain it. Can the sense of confidence in us be restored? Sure. But not easily.”

Those last words should loom large given today's administration, and its grievances and lists of "wants."

[old salt]

Based on what Scowcroft's saying (above), we lost the trust of the world when we invaded Iraq & our charges of WMD proved to be unfounded.

The inconsistency of our entire post Cold War policy should give the rest of the world a case of whiplash.

I wonder if Scowcroft still thinks our first war with Iraq (which he helped orchestrate) was worth it, given all that followed, even before 9-11 ?
...likewise NATO expansion beyond German unification ? How long must we defend a EU that's not willing to defend itself ?
Scowcroft has a lot to answer for. What seemed like stunning successes at the time, were impossible to consolidate & sustain. Overreach.