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Brisketexan

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Posts posted by Brisketexan

  1. i remember not long ago a certain segment of the population being in conniptions about our degraded standing in the world and the threat to the us-uk special relationship because obama took a bust of churchill out of the oval office and gave the queen an ipod.
    those were some good times...

    I recall being told over and over that these issues were quite important. I guess the transmission was garbled or something.
    • Like 1
  2. 28 minutes ago, Incredulity said:

    I haven't said word one that it should stop.

    However, firing blanks at foreign nationals with indictments isn't a good look, if the conclusion is taking down the Trump Administration.

     

    4 minutes ago, Huckleberry said:

    Did you miss the part where the indictment details communication and cooperation between the Russians and someone close to Trump as well as a Congressional candidate? Or do you just think that they're done with those strings and won't be unraveling them any further? You're the one with experience in the legal system, explain to me why those mean nothing and will go nowhere.

     

    3 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

    I was speaking in terms of this indictment, not things you might infer from it.  Kind of like it says.

    The indictment isn't an end.  It's a means.  It lets American folks know what Mueller knows....well, SOME of what he knows.  Mueller has pumped some smoke into the structure.  The play is not to get the folks he indicted.  The play is to watch and see what the rats in the building do.  Do they run?  Do they call each other in a panic?  Do they come to him, looking to make a deal?  The indictment isn't a scoring play.  It's a set-up play.

    • Like 4
  3. lulz at you seeing the KGB attack the U.S. and your reaction is to try to figure out how to get a partisan advantage on it.

    But that is EXACTLY where we are.

    The GOP is more interested in preserving their working relationship with our enemy than protecting our country. It is the party of treason.
    • Like 4
  4. 19 minutes ago, blackmarketbaby said:

    Where is the leverage though? 

    The leverage was that we had somethng they wanted - the legitimacy and image boost that meeting with our president would give them. That was the leverage,

  5. Just now, blackmarketbaby said:

    Good info.

    What leverage do you think the US lost? 

    The biggest thing we had to offer was the meeting itself.  Giving Kim the opportunity to meet with an American President and shake his hand as an equal.  And we gave it away without getting anything concrete in return.  

    We don't have a whole lot more to offer them.  We have some bits and pieces (again, relaxing sanctions, maybe supporting them joining up with the IMF, etc.), but those are piecemeal things.  The prize was the meeting, and we could and should have gotten more from it (which we might have done, had we planned it in advance, and had pre-meeting negotiations).

  6. So, I spend a week every year with a cousin by marriage who is one of our country's go-to guys on North Korea.  He's met Kim more than once, has toured certain nuclear facilities, negotiated for hostage releases, the whole deal.  He has briefed folks in the current administration several times.  He just got back from a recent meeting with one of the other nations that took part in the six party talks back in the day.

    He had both positives and negatives to say about where we are.

    1 -- The DPRK is a nuclear power.  It is going to remain a nuclear power.   They are never going to give up their weapons, and why would they?  Truly, we're the only nation that seems to still have that as a goal.

    2 -- now that they have nukes, they're probably SAFER to deal with than they were before.  They're not scared.  Everyone in the room has a gun, now they do too.  That makes them feel much less nervous.

    So, what should our goals be?  Most importantly, limit the number of nukes that they have.  That means letting them keep the weapons they have, but having them surrender fissile material and plutonium.  IF you have a limited number of nukes, the games you can play are limited.  If you have 100, you can play much more dangerous games (survive a first strike, counterstrike selected targets, and still have more weapons for a second counterstrike).

    How do we get there?  Well, it's a slow game, like it always has been. We  could trade a relaxation of sanctions, but that cat's already out of the bag (at least by South Korea and China).  Honestly, we don't have a whole lot of leverage -- Trump gave it away.

    BUT,  he also gave credit for Trump.  Sure, he'd have much preferred that  he went into the summit prepared, having spent time negotiating a pre-packaged deal that ended the war, expressed a commitment to denuclearize the peninsula, and actually had the DPRK surrender some fissile material (and of course, formal relaxation of some sanctions).  But he did say that only a Republican could meet with Kim, and an outlier like Trump was the kind of guy who could  do it.  And, even if no concrete terms were agreed to, the relationship created and general  commitments made should mean no war in the near future (and that's, you know, a good thing).

    He also observed that Pompeo's recent visit was a disaster, mostly because the admin wasn't listening to the experts.  Pompeo went to North Korea thinking he was going to meet with Kim.  He didn't, and it was embarrassing.  And the DPRK has the upper hand right now.  They can slow-play all of their "commitments," and there's not much we can do about it.

    Good news: war unlikely.

    Bad news: negotiations with this new nuclear power will take strategy and finesse, and the admin has demonstrated neither.

    So, there you go.  I plied him with several good Ballast Point beers to get this info.  Enjoy.

    • Like 5
  7. Random anecdote: I’m on vacation with some family, including someone who works in an aerospace facility (as in, part of their group is involved in active operations). One of my cousin’s co workers calls him over to see one line of a classified discussion (actually physically blocked the rest of his screen, so he could see just the one line). Someone in his group was pretty pissed: “Six months of operational planning...trashed by a fucking tweet.”

    The ops teams aren’t big trump fans.

  8. I've never heard of this pimple faced kid, but took a look at his profile anyway.   Earlier today he was making several tweets about how Trump should tell NATO to get lost and how we should forge a new prosperous alliance with Russia.
    He also bragged about how Putin is more popular with Republicans than Obama.
    Anyone not convinced yet that the GOP is an enemy of this country and our true allies?

    1 - yes, lots of people.

    2 - who are either ass-rippingly stupid or outright treasonous, or perhaps both.
  9. The EU has indicated that they would let the UK cancel. It's really better for all parties if the UK stays in. 

    Its the only thing that’s made any sense (in the real world) since the very beginning. Brexit only makes sense if you live in a fantasy world where the the EU just agrees to whatever you want. If you discount the fact that there’s an interested party on the other side, Brexit might make sense.
  10. It would seem to me that today's liberal is most concerned with what government can give them.  Today's conservative is most concerned with what government can take from them.

    And folks, there are millions of folks simple-minded enough to believe this.

    Kind of like how Emory told us for years that the GOP was going to save us from the looming deficit...and instead, they’ve accelerated it. Up is down, every accusation is a confession.
  11.  My girlfriends dad is Mexican and her mom is Asian. They don’t even know who Beto is.   They are too busy listening to whatever Fox News is telling them.   Cruz says words like “Christian values” and that’s enough for them.  

    That’s still the GOP’s best hook. They will run to the Cross every chance they get.

    But as to the Asians and south Asians, look at some traditionally GOP areas that have had a large influx of those folks - like Ft Bend county. Went for Hilary.
  12. Whatever.  This is who we are.  We wanted it, we got it.  End all the PC bullshit, and just be who we are.

    America isn't a shining city on a hill.

    America is an ignorant racist POS in a sleeveless t-shirt.

    Now, it's just laid bare for the entire world to see.

  13. "A serious constitutional question exists regarding whether a president can be criminally indicted and tried while in office," Kavanaugh, a D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals judge, wrote in an article in 2009.

    "One might raise at least two important critiques of these ideas," Kavanaugh acknowledged. "The first is that no one is above the law in our system of government. I strongly agree with that principle. But it is not ultimately a persuasive criticism of these suggestions. The point is not to put the president above the law or to eliminate checks on the president, but simply to defer litigation and investigations until the president is out of office.

    "A second possible concern is that the country needs a check against a bad-behaving or law-breaking president. But the Constitution already provides that check. If the president does something dastardly, the impeachment process is available."

    Trump is supposedly favoring Kavanaugh because of those views, per CNN.


    I actually don’t think that Kavanaugh is off target on that point (which, repeating for emphasis, is that he’s not opposed to an investigation). While the president is in office, the remedy is impeachment. Once removed...he is at full criminal jeopardy.

    If Trump thinks that Kavanaugh’s views are a path to skating scot-free, he’s wrong. Trump’s best path is to have a pliant senate full of fucking cowards...so he’s good.
    • Like 3
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