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It’s Mueller Time ....running thread

How the Trump specifically targeted people like you, I suppose. LOL
Wrong again silly Billy, I sought Trump out because I didn’t like all social justice warriors and the political correctness!
 
Yea, says the guy who thinks the Russians run active measures and fight hybrid wars by buying advertisements.

"Nacho Cheesier Fascism" ...
Do you think the Russians called Facebook customer support if their ads were not as effective as they liked?
 
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Nadler's asking for the Mueller grand jury filings. Gonna get uglier. Trump's weetle tweetie poos can't stop this juggernaut.
 
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WHy is impeachment imperative?

Rep. Mike Quigley (D-Ill.) finally asked the question about the error at the heart of Mueller’s intentionally cryptic report: “What if a president serves beyond the statute of limitations?”

The point is that the statute of limitations would let a two-term president run out the clock and avoid any future prosecution. Mueller’s reply (“I don’t know the answer to that question”) is troubling: He didn't have an answer for this problem. And the DOJ memo relied on this legal error: It assumed that a judge could stop the clock and allow late indictments, but the DOJ cited no actual precedents for this power (called “equitable tolling”) in any criminal case. And there appear to be no precedents, for good reasons. Courts are very unlikely to do the unprecedented when a prosecutor did not even attempt an indictment.

And thus, Quigley set up a new legal argument for impeachment: The statute of limitations means a president could be permanently above the law. A House impeachment could be the only opportunity to hold Trump accountable or even accuse him legally. Ever.

...

What difference would that have made? It’s the difference it could still make: in court. A formal inquiry could state potential high crimes and misdemeanors, and, in court, those clear legal statements would be much stronger claims to overcome executive privilege and attorney/client privilege, as well as to obtain tax returns and financial records. Without this good faith statement from the House, all of the House Democrats’ litigation is weaker. Courts want to hear the real reasons for these subpoenas, not pretexts. There is still time to open an impeachment inquiry and strengthen this litigation.
If the House doesn't impeach Trump and Trump gets re-elected, there may be no grounds for asking for equitable tolling of the statute of limitations.
 
WHy is impeachment imperative?

Rep. Mike Quigley (D-Ill.) finally asked the question about the error at the heart of Mueller’s intentionally cryptic report: “What if a president serves beyond the statute of limitations?”

The point is that the statute of limitations would let a two-term president run out the clock and avoid any future prosecution. Mueller’s reply (“I don’t know the answer to that question”) is troubling: He didn't have an answer for this problem. And the DOJ memo relied on this legal error: It assumed that a judge could stop the clock and allow late indictments, but the DOJ cited no actual precedents for this power (called “equitable tolling”) in any criminal case. And there appear to be no precedents, for good reasons. Courts are very unlikely to do the unprecedented when a prosecutor did not even attempt an indictment.

And thus, Quigley set up a new legal argument for impeachment: The statute of limitations means a president could be permanently above the law. A House impeachment could be the only opportunity to hold Trump accountable or even accuse him legally. Ever.

...

What difference would that have made? It’s the difference it could still make: in court. A formal inquiry could state potential high crimes and misdemeanors, and, in court, those clear legal statements would be much stronger claims to overcome executive privilege and attorney/client privilege, as well as to obtain tax returns and financial records. Without this good faith statement from the House, all of the House Democrats’ litigation is weaker. Courts want to hear the real reasons for these subpoenas, not pretexts. There is still time to open an impeachment inquiry and strengthen this litigation.
If the House doesn't impeach Trump and Trump gets re-elected, there may be no grounds for asking for equitable tolling of the statute of limitations.

Quigley needs to stick with shooting the bad guys in Australia. Impeachment isn’t a criminal process and it doesn’t hold POTUS accountable. There are no penalties or other sanctions. Impeachment removes him from office which no president (nor any office-holder) has a recognizable legal right to hold anyway.

I don’t think there is any doubt about SOL tolling during a time POTUS, or anyone, is temporarily immune.
 
Yes, the original post of yours that I quoted was deleted. I can’t imagine why.
So you have terrible reading comprehension, because my post that's still up talks about an attack on our electoral infrastructure, and not Facebook ads.

Also, paid ads were a tiny part of Russia's social media operation, as the Mueller report makes abundantly clear. If you'd read the report you wouldn't be embarrassing yourself by reposting easily rebutted Trumpbot talking points. Maybe you should try learning about a subject before you start talking about it.
 
So you have terrible reading comprehension, because my post that's still up talks about an attack on our electoral infrastructure, and not Facebook ads.

You still don’t know what you are talking about. “Attack” and “searching for vulnerabilities” says nothing. No tabulations were changed. No votes were changed. This all suggests the defenses are pretty good. Voter data is vulnerable but so what? You are one of those who claim voter registration should be simple and not used to suppress votes. So it’s easily accessible. Voter data is not election infrastructure anyway. Cutting and pasting material obviously doesn’t mean you understand it. As I said, government computers receive thousands of attacks. That isn’t news.
 
You still don’t know what you are talking about. “Attack” and “searching for vulnerabilities” says nothing. No tabulations were changed. No votes were changed. This all suggests the defenses are pretty good. Voter data is vulnerable but so what? You are one of those who claim voter registration should be simple and not used to suppress votes. So it’s easily accessible. Voter data is not election infrastructure anyway. Cutting and pasting material obviously doesn’t mean you understand it. As I said, government computers receive thousands of attacks. That isn’t news.
I listen to our intelligence community and not to trolls.
 
You still don’t know what you are talking about. “Attack” and “searching for vulnerabilities” says nothing. No tabulations were changed. No votes were changed. This all suggests the defenses are pretty good. Voter data is vulnerable but so what? You are one of those who claim voter registration should be simple and not used to suppress votes. So it’s easily accessible. Voter data is not election infrastructure anyway. Cutting and pasting material obviously doesn’t mean you understand it. As I said, government computers receive thousands of attacks. That isn’t news.
The voter data base is for sale to any willing purchaser. It is a public record. Both parties buy all or parts of it - depending on what races they need the info to contest. Even Rock could buy it and he'd have a duplicate of what his party has. He wouldn't know what to do with it, but he'd have it.
 
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Nadler's asking for the Mueller grand jury filings. Gonna get uglier. Trump's weetle tweetie poos can't stop this juggernaut.
He's asking for a felony to be committed. Its against the law for Jerry Nadler to have the grand jury information. Criminal juggernaut is what Jerry is trying to be. Go on - support criminal conduct - its within your sphere of hatred.
 
I listen to our intelligence community and not to trolls.

This whole position is so odd. I never thought I’d see the day where the parties cannot even agree that securing our elections should be non political.

This points to the fundamental change. The Russians have been doing these things forever. The GOP welcoming the interference in the new piece. It’s the most unpatriotic tact they could take.
 
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I saw lots of negative memes against Hillary which were shared by friends on Facebook. Friends which normally don't get involved in political discussions. In retrospect these memes could have originated from foreigners interested in defeating Clinton. I see social media as more vulnerable to meddling than altering voter counts.

I am prepared to accept that Russians attempted to influence the election in favor of Trump without being aided by the Trump campaign. What I don't know is whether these efforts actually made much difference in the results.

Finally when it comes to Americans losing faith in democracy (which dictators such as Putin want to achieve) I see our own negative political ads as being considerably more destructive than anything foreigners have done to date.
 
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This whole position is so odd. I never thought I’d see the day where the parties cannot even agree that securing our elections should be non political.

This points to the fundamental change. The Russians have been doing these things forever. The GOP welcoming the interference in the new piece. It’s the most unpatriotic tact they could take.

You’ve pretty much misinterpreted the whole discussion. Of course securing election is non political and we should do everything feasible. But to yammer about “attacks” or “searches for vulnerabilities” means zilch. People attack computer systems all the time. We have strong defenses in place. Maybe some systems can be made better. I’m all for that. But as you said, this isn’t about politics so stop making it so. It’s about technology.
 
This whole position is so odd. I never thought I’d see the day where the parties cannot even agree that securing our elections should be non political.

This points to the fundamental change. The Russians have been doing these things forever. The GOP welcoming the interference in the new piece. It’s the most unpatriotic tact they could take.
No matter what actions politicians take that people disagree with they mostly fall under policy arguments. This is the first (in)action that might truly qualify as a treasonable act.
 
You still don’t know what you are talking about. “Attack” and “searching for vulnerabilities” says nothing. No tabulations were changed. No votes were changed. This all suggests the defenses are pretty good. Voter data is vulnerable but so what? You are one of those who claim voter registration should be simple and not used to suppress votes. So it’s easily accessible. Voter data is not election infrastructure anyway. Cutting and pasting material obviously doesn’t mean you understand it. As I said, government computers receive thousands of attacks. That isn’t news.
"defenses are pretty good" says nothing when such defenses are adopted on a state or local level, meaning more or less vulnerabilities. We know that in Illinois votes could have been changed. Technology moves fast. We need to stay ahead of the curve or we lose. The price of freedom is constant vigilance.

Yes, this is about technology. Technology costs money. Legislation provides that money. Moscow Mitch stopped all legislation. Be honest.
 
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The Trumpbots say there's nothing to worry about. Here's the sort of thing the intelligence community is saying:

Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats raised the alarm on growing cyberattack threats against the United States, saying the situation is at a "critical point" and coming out forcefully against Russia.

"The warning signs are there. The system is blinking. It is why I believe we are at a critical point," Coats said, addressing the Hudson Institute in Washington, DC, on Friday.

"Today, the digital infrastructure that serves this country is literally under attack," he said.

Coats compared the "warning signs" to those the United States faced ahead of the September 11 terrorist attacks.

"It was in the months prior to September 2001 when, according to then-CIA Director George Tenet, the system is blinking red. And here we are nearly two decades later, and I'm here to say, the warning lights are blinking red again," Coats said.​
 
This whole position is so odd. I never thought I’d see the day where the parties cannot even agree that securing our elections should be non political.

This points to the fundamental change. The Russians have been doing these things forever. The GOP welcoming the interference in the new piece. It’s the most unpatriotic tact they could take.
These are the same people who happily disenfranchise likely Democrats to combat nonexistent voter ID fraud, but won't raise a finger to defend our elections against documented intrusions by foreign enemies.
 
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The Trumpbots say there's nothing to worry about. Here's the sort of thing the intelligence community is saying:

Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats raised the alarm on growing cyberattack threats against the United States, saying the situation is at a "critical point" and coming out forcefully against Russia.

"The warning signs are there. The system is blinking. It is why I believe we are at a critical point," Coats said, addressing the Hudson Institute in Washington, DC, on Friday.

"Today, the digital infrastructure that serves this country is literally under attack," he said.

Coats compared the "warning signs" to those the United States faced ahead of the September 11 terrorist attacks.

"It was in the months prior to September 2001 when, according to then-CIA Director George Tenet, the system is blinking red. And here we are nearly two decades later, and I'm here to say, the warning lights are blinking red again," Coats said.​
Intelligence is a liberal affliction. Symptoms include integrity, honesty, belief in science, rational argumentation, logic, reason, responsibility, caring, thinking for oneself, long attention spans, literacy, ability to differentiate, communication, sentience, and so on. It's believed to be both contagious and infectious.

Our Constitution allows the PUTIS to appoint staff according to his belief system and fortunately the Shriveling Shrimp is fastidiously avoiding intelligence in all his decisions.
 
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He's asking for a felony to be committed. Its against the law for Jerry Nadler to have the grand jury information. Criminal juggernaut is what Jerry is trying to be. Go on - support criminal conduct - its within your sphere of hatred.
Ever seen The Dog dog himself?
 
The voter data base is for sale to any willing purchaser. It is a public record. Both parties buy all or parts of it - depending on what races they need the info to contest. Even Rock could buy it and he'd have a duplicate of what his party has. He wouldn't know what to do with it, but he'd have it.
The Russians don't just have the ability to buy voter registration information (although the SIC report says they did steal it), they had the ability in 2016 to corrupt the voter registration database. Merely by changing voters' registered addresses the Russians could have created chaos at the polls when people's IDs didn't match their registrations. Is this also something I can do? If so, please let me know what precinct you vote in so I can start there.
 
The Russians don't just have the ability to buy voter registration information (although the SIC report says they did steal it), they had the ability in 2016 to corrupt the voter registration database. Merely by changing voters' registered addresses the Russians could have created chaos at the polls when people's IDs didn't match their registrations. Is this also something I can do? If so, please let me know what precinct you vote in so I can start there.
Actually an excellent idea. Use the GOP voter registration laws against the GOP. Fight fire with fire.

Might not work though. Most GOP voters are rural. Reminds me taking my wife to Nashville to get her driver's test. BLoomington had a three-week wait list. As I sat there in the Nashville office, waiting for her to return, a very old geezer approached the counter, failed his vision test, which the agent laughed off, told him to drive carefully and renewed his license.
 
He's asking for a felony to be committed. Its against the law for Jerry Nadler to have the grand jury information. Criminal juggernaut is what Jerry is trying to be. Go on - support criminal conduct - its within your sphere of hatred.

Are you sure the law you're referring to restricts that info from the head of the Judiciary Committee? Link with relevant citation please...
 
The Trumpbots say there's nothing to worry about. Here's the sort of thing the intelligence community is saying:

Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats raised the alarm on growing cyberattack threats against the United States, saying the situation is at a "critical point" and coming out forcefully against Russia.

"The warning signs are there. The system is blinking. It is why I believe we are at a critical point," Coats said, addressing the Hudson Institute in Washington, DC, on Friday.

"Today, the digital infrastructure that serves this country is literally under attack," he said.

Coats compared the "warning signs" to those the United States faced ahead of the September 11 terrorist attacks.

"It was in the months prior to September 2001 when, according to then-CIA Director George Tenet, the system is blinking red. And here we are nearly two decades later, and I'm here to say, the warning lights are blinking red again," Coats said.​

I read this morning that in the Illinois case, the SQL server itself was penetrated. I cannot vouch for that accuracy, but if true, it is a huge problem.

A smart person won't just delete everything all at once, that is easily noticed and backups restored. Rather they will delete or alter a few hundred records a day, maybe even fewer to start to throw off automated defense systems. Now if no one notices for 6 months, ask this question, how long are backups kept? In my previous job, we were limited to 90 days.

Imagine in 2020 if in every state 1000 eligible black voters are told they are not eligible to vote. That almost certainly will not throw the election, but the faith in the system will collapse to zero. Which is what Russia wants.

I do not get why there is even a debate on this. It would not take more than what I described above to lead to big riots. It is not a reason to panic, but it is far from nothing to worry about.
 
Right, I think 2016 was a test. I do not know when they will try something big, but it would be a mistake to assume they broke in as some sort of white hat hack.
I don't think Illinois is important to them. Aside from the ploy to undermine our democracy you described, there's also tilting things in favor of the candidate of their choice. 2016 is now a precedent for Trump winning despite all polling. He can be down 10% in the 2020 polls and miraculously win the electoral college by a few votes in selected states.

Why is he so confident he'll win?
 
I don't think Illinois is important to them. Aside from the ploy to undermine our democracy you described, there's also tilting things in favor of the candidate of their choice. 2016 is now a precedent for Trump winning despite all polling. He can be down 10% in the 2020 polls and miraculously win the electoral college by a few votes in selected states.

Why is he so confident he'll win?

It is hard to impact an election prior to it. Take PA, to impact it one might have to prevent 40,000 Dems from voting. But given the number of non- voters one would have to alter far more records. Even in the most D precincts, 10% will vote R. So another 10% has to be factored. Some vote early and might have time to straighten it out. So more need impacted. Each change is another chance to be caught.

It could happen, but frankly it would probably be easier to blackmail a few members of the Electoral College. I do not know if that exists in novel form, I once thought of it as a Jack Ryanesque novel. A real close EC election and a foreign power blackmailing/threatening EC voters to switch.
 
It is hard to impact an election prior to it. Take PA, to impact it one might have to prevent 40,000 Dems from voting. But given the number of non- voters one would have to alter far more records. Even in the most D precincts, 10% will vote R. So another 10% has to be factored. Some vote early and might have time to straighten it out. So more need impacted. Each change is another chance to be caught.

It could happen, but frankly it would probably be easier to blackmail a few members of the Electoral College. I do not know if that exists in novel form, I once thought of it as a Jack Ryanesque novel. A real close EC election and a foreign power blackmailing/threatening EC voters to switch.
Party affiliation of individual voters is public record, right? The hackers can be selective in who they disenfranchise.
 
Politico, more Republicans hanging up their hats:

WHILE WE WERE ALL watching ROBERT MUELLER and Democrats this week, here’s what happened to House Republicans: Three popular and well-respected members of Congress decided they weren’t going to run for reelection. Michigan Rep. PAUL MITCHELL, Texas Rep. PETE OLSON and Alabama Rep. MARTHA ROBY all said they were calling it quits. Republicans say they lost the House because of too many retirements last cycle, yet they are seeing a steady stream of lawmakers forgo reelection once again.
Also: A Strong Economy Will Actually Help Democrats in 2020.

But if you look at the Trump-voting districts that flipped to Democrats in the 2018 midterms, it starts to look like the conventional wisdom is wrong. Contrary to the perception that a rebounding economy will work to the president’s benefit, there is growing evidence in Michigan and throughout the Rust Belt that metro areas that are bouncing back—and there are a bunch—are turning blue again. Indeed, communities that continue to flounder—and unfortunately there are still many of those, too—are likely to double down on Trumpism.
More evidence that Trump is the Party of Losers.

 
Party affiliation of individual voters is public record, right? The hackers can be selective in who they disenfranchise.

Sure, but it still is not perfect. People cross over. In those rural counties that switched from D to R in 2016 it appears that happened.

Now, we know the Russians are involved in a lot of other hacks of personal data, including and up to this week's photo app, they probably have all they need to know who will vote Trump and who most certainly will not. Maybe all their other hacks are done to improve attacks on the voter system.
 
Quigley needs to stick with shooting the bad guys in Australia. Impeachment isn’t a criminal process and it doesn’t hold POTUS accountable. There are no penalties or other sanctions. Impeachment removes him from office which no president (nor any office-holder) has a recognizable legal right to hold anyway.

I don’t think there is any doubt about SOL tolling during a time POTUS, or anyone, is temporarily immune.
I'll take your assertion under advisement with a healthy dose of scepticism. Impeachment may not be a criminal process but it still shows a good-faith attempt to exercise the House's authority to effect justice. It's not a political position but a question of doing what's right. Mueller's report provides enough evidence to proceed with impeachment now and a criminal trial later, your denials notwithstanding.
 
You’ve pretty much misinterpreted the whole discussion.
90
 
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"defenses are pretty good" says nothing when such defenses are adopted on a state or local level, meaning more or less vulnerabilities. We know that in Illinois votes could have been changed. Technology moves fast. We need to stay ahead of the curve or we lose. The price of freedom is constant vigilance.

Yes, this is about technology. Technology costs money. Legislation provides that money. Moscow Mitch stopped all legislation. Be honest.

I think the biggest issue isn’t the Russians. Instead it’s the corrupt insiders who use any means to make sure their interests acquire and maintain political power. I don’t agree that the Feds hold all the answers. There is a lot of talent in state and local government.

I understated the attacks. The federal OPM took 10 million attacks every month and that was 3 years ago. Attacks on servers are not news.
 
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