Twice during the testimony of Mr Comey and Admiral Michael Rogers today did I hear mention of a “cloud” hanging over the White House and our country. There are a few good articles out there that detail what happened in the FBI and NSA testimony today. In a nutshell, Trump and some of his administration or past or current contacts (we aren’t really sure who) are under investigation to see if treason or other illegal activity happened during the campaign or election of Mr Trump in conjunction with Russia. We don’t know much more than that. We know that the FBI and intelligence departments have no evidence of any “wire tapping” order by President Obama as claimed by Trump in tweets. And for the first time in history we saw the head of the FBI debunk a Trump tweet live and under oath. It was quite a day. Not a great one if you are Mr Trump. If you need to get caught up on the details of what is happening I suggest this article from the New York Times and this one by the Washington Post, if for nothing else than to hear (or read) Rep. Adam Schiff of California’s opening statement:
From that WaPo article:
Democrats are suggesting that Russia’s involvement in the election and Trump officials’ lack of disclosure about their ties to Russia point to something more. In a 15-minute opening statement, Schiff laid out a series of ties between Trump’s campaign and Russia, citing former British spy Christopher Steele, who compiled an unverified dossier on Trump and Russia. They included accusations that:
•One of Trump’s national security advisers during the campaign, Carter Page, has ties to Russia and has praised its president, Vladimir Putin.
•Former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort had been on the payroll for pro-Russian interests in Ukraine.
•Trump officials met with the Russian ambassador to Washington during the Republican National Convention. At that convention, Republicans changed their platform to remove a section that supported giving weapons to Ukraine as it battles Russia for territory.
•Former Trump adviser Roger Stone boasted in a speech that he knew of impending WikiLeaks documents related to Hillary Clinton’s campaign before they were published.
•And Flynn and Sessions would go on to avoid disclosing their conversations with the Russian ambassador during or shortly after the campaign.
After spelling all that out, Schiff (rhetorically) asked this:
“Is it possible that all of these events and reports are completely unrelated and nothing more than an entirely unhappy coincidence? Yes, it is possible. But it is also possible, maybe more than possible, that they are not coincidental, not disconnected and not unrelated, and that the Russians use the same techniques to corrupt U.S. persons that they employed in Europe and elsewhere. We simply don’t know. Not yet. And we owe it to the country to find out.”
Good stuff.
Yes, there is a dark cloud hanging over the White House, its name is Trump.
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