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Trump Speech Writer Richard Burt Contradicts Testimony of AG Sessions

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posted on Jun, 15 2017 @ 06:20 PM
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a reply to: theantediluvian

It is strange that congress seems to go after the little fish and does not go after Manafort. Does he have something over many people in congress or something? Does he have something over the FBI? How come they do not investigate him?



posted on Jun, 15 2017 @ 06:20 PM
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a reply to: theantediluvian

If you are not against Russia, would you support lifting of the sanctions hurting so many countries for politcal only gains by the elites that hate Russia and love the Ukraine and the EU.??



posted on Jun, 15 2017 @ 06:22 PM
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originally posted by: rickymouse
a reply to: theantediluvian

It is strange that congress seems to go after the little fish and does not go after Manafort. Does he have something over many people in congress or something? Does he have something over the FBI? How come they do not investigate him?



They are, but they have found zero evidence to suggest he colluded with Russia to influence the election, just like zero evidence has been found for any other person linked to the Trump campaign.



posted on Jun, 15 2017 @ 06:26 PM
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originally posted by: theantediluvian

originally posted by: Grambler
Also, was Burt a lobbyist at the time of his dinner with Sessions? If not, then there seems to be nothing to this story at all.


Yes, he was.


I believe you but do you have a source for that?



posted on Jun, 15 2017 @ 06:29 PM
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a reply to: rickymouse




It is strange that congress seems to go after the little fish and does not go after Manafort. Does he have something over many people in congress or something? Does he have something over the FBI? How come they do not investigate him?


Manafort volunteered to testify. Carter Page is insisting he testify. After all the accusations, many of which include treason, and many of which are punishable by death, it sounds like they want nothing more than to clear their names.
edit on 15-6-2017 by LesMisanthrope because: (no reason given)



posted on Jun, 15 2017 @ 06:59 PM
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a reply to: Grambler


Well I came by that info about Podesta on a thread me and you discussed it on.


Gotcha. The source there was Pamela Gellar (ugh) whose source was Truth Revolt (ugh) whose source was Daily Caller (specifically, Richard Pollak).

I don't know why the OP of that thread wouldn't just go directly to Daily Caller? Just a side note because it's something I notice from a few posters and it's really just... odd. Anyway. To your original point, if you look at any of the three, including Daily Caller which unlike the other two is an actual news site, they're not covering this or anything remotely like it.


I am not claiming you are saying this is collusion, I understand that. But as we both no and lament, washington critters go in and out of the lobbying business all of the time.


It's disgusting. And FTR, I have no love for either Podesta.


From my reading of the article in the OP, it does not seem as if Burt was a lobbyist at the time of his dinner with Sessions. For sessions to have to dredge up if he ever had dinner with anyone who ever lobbied for any company owned partly by russians would seem to be very difficult.


He was. It's in the Politico article who got the information from the disclosure:


In the first two quarters of 2016, the firm of former Reagan administration official Richard Burt received $365,000 for work he and a colleague did to lobby for a proposed natural-gas pipeline owned by a firm controlled by the Russian government, according to congressional lobbying disclosures reviewed by POLITICO.


I kinda think that it was precisely that expertise that he was brought on for. He was brought on by Manafort and there's no way that Manafort didn't know.


These people are not concerned with the greater truth, which is was sessions involved in any shay dealings. Nope, they are just hoping that they could get him because he forgot to mention any little meeting with anyone that ever had any connections to Russians.


You make a good point though I think McCain's question was entirely relevant to the issue of possible collusion. It seems to me that you believe Sessions is not involved in anything untoward (I have no proof that he was) and to me at least, that you sympathize with him... how to put this? Not being entirely honest? Because he shouldn't even be subjected to these questions anyway? Something along those lines?

To that I will say that a very serious thing happened in this election. As an American, I don't want to see a repeat of it in future elections regardless of who the target is, what the intent, etc. Our politics is f'd up enough on its own. So to me, these investigations are important and I don't see them as being nothing but a partisan witch hunt anymore than I'm sure you wouldn't see the dozen plus Benghazi investigations as a partisan witch hunt. Yet, that's how it's being framed. And you know what, it is what it is. That's politics.

However, the fact remains that these questions will be asked and answered. Nobody is going to really hold Sessions to task in any meaningful way for his inaccurate answer (despite Sen. Franken getting a little fiesty) unless it can be proven that he lied which I think would be next to impossible. Nobody would have crucified him for having acknowledged having Burt there. In fact, the dinner meeting seems secondary to the white papers in terms of significance but I digress. What I was trying to get at before I started rambling (I'm watching the Congressional baseball game now too — maybe unity will break out?) is that if Sessions isn't being truthful because of optics, the optics only get worse when you get caught making a false statement.

And that seems to me to be a running theme with this administration. Another example would be the handling of Flynn. Yet another example would be the handling of the firing of Comey. (the recommendation narrative Trump immediately blew up in the Lester Holt interview).

This is s# we learn when we're little kids. Honesty is the best policy and all that right? There might be no there, there, when it comes to collusion and I'm not betting any money that there is but are those of us who aren't Trump supporters supposed to ignore the fact that every lie, every innacurate statement, makes it looks like there's something amiss?


Meanwhile, we know for an absolute FACT that the Podesta group lobbyed on behalf of Russia to get sanctions removed, and not on person on the left seems to give two hoots about that (not including you I mean media and politicians).

If we are so concerned with Russian collusion, why isn't that being investigated?


Frank answer? By all appearances, the goal of the meddling was to hurt Clinton and the DNC. Whether or not Putin loves Donald (joke), now President Trump stood to benefit from their active measures. Because of that, there's naturally suspicion.

Had none of that happened, none of these investigations would be occuring and nobody would be asking Sessions about the Russians/agents of Russia that he communicated with. Then again, the overarching narrative from President Trump and some of his people is that there was no Russian meddling at all and this is all and if you believe that, then it's not hard to believe this is all a sham.

I don't believe that. I believe the Russian government meddled in our election and meddled hard and I want my government to thoroughly investigate the matter and determine what's what and then I want our government, presumably still headed by Donald Trump, to take steps to ensure that it doesn't happen again.



posted on Jun, 15 2017 @ 07:09 PM
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a reply to: Grambler

That's a fair point but it's based on our limited information, assumptions of rational actors and the benefit of hindsight. Why would Donald Trump go on Lester Holt and blow up the carefully orchestrated Comey firing narrative? People do bizarre things.

Maybe he didn't know about the article? Maybe he knew about the article and hoped nobody would call him out for it? Maybe he knew about the article and judged the benefit of getting away with lying about it to be great enough that it was worth the risk of being accused of lying? After all, who can prove he knew that Burt was a Russian lobbyist? Who can prove that he didn't forget that Burt was at the meetings?

I dunno. Like I said, it's a fair point. If he's questioned again, maybe they'll ask him specifically he recalled the meeting or not and if so, if he knew whether or not Burt was a lobbyist. He could say no to either.



posted on Jun, 15 2017 @ 07:12 PM
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a reply to: Grambler

It's in the Politico excerpt in my 2nd to the last post:


In the first two quarters of 2016, the firm of former Reagan administration official Richard Burt received $365,000 for work he and a colleague did to lobby for a proposed natural-gas pipeline owned by a firm controlled by the Russian government, according to congressional lobbying disclosures reviewed by POLITICO.


Somwhere around here I have another source that I was reading that said his lobbying continued into 2017.



posted on Jun, 15 2017 @ 07:26 PM
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a reply to: theantediluvian

Good posts.

I will just hit on a couple of points.

First I don't mind the question from Mccain. What I mind is that it is clear by the gotcha nature of this that these people are more concerned with winning a politcial argument than keeping our country safe from hacking. And I mean both sides.

For gods sake, if this hack did happen, what have we done to make sure it can't happen again?

I have no idea how trust worthy sessions is, or if he did any wrong doing. But anyone with half a brain knows he wasn't setting up collusion in dinners in public with russian operatives, or at meetings set up by Obama. It would be fine to point out that perhaps Sessions had a lapse in memory, but for papers like the guardian to sensationalize headlines (as lesmisanthrope has pointed out) is ridiculous.

As far as podesta, I admit your stance on him has been fair all along. I think we are both in agreement that people on all sides that may have had inappropriate contact with Russians should be looked at.

I don't buy the fact that Podesta isn't looked at because the russians wanted trump to win. How do we know that they weren't playing both sides, or that podesta didn't set up Hillary to fail for personal gain, etc. If this investigation is truly about finding fats, then political party membership should not be a factor in who to look at.

On your second post, I agree I made a good point, lol.

I don't know. I am not saying that this testimony isn't important, and the truth shouldn't be demanded. But it just seems like knitpicking, and I think all of us if we are honest can see this in no way shows any collusion.



posted on Jun, 15 2017 @ 07:47 PM
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a reply to: theantediluvian

Quite appropriate that Sessions is using the Reagan "I don't recall" defense.



posted on Jun, 15 2017 @ 08:31 PM
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a reply to: Grambler


First I don't mind the question from Mccain. What I mind is that it is clear by the gotcha nature of this that these people are more concerned with winning a politcial argument than keeping our country safe from hacking. And I mean both sides.


I don't know that it can be avoided. It's worthy of disdain but... politics ya know? It's interesting I just McConnell and Shumer interviewed together and McConnell said something I agree with which is unusual. They both also sidestepped something but I'll circle back on that.

Essentially what he said was that as bad as our politics seem, there are several times in our history as a nation where the political environment has been substantially worse. He referenced something along the lines of "The Representative from SC crossing thefloor to beat up the Senator from MA" and Shumer chuckled and chimed in something somethig "caning" They were talking about the caning of the abolitionist Sen. Charles Sumner by Rep. Preston Brooks.

In a nutshell, Sumner had given an anti-slavery speech and in part of it he made a comment about another politician who was Butler's cousin (yeah, the elite have always been the elite and don't forget that) and a couple days later Brooks caught up with him in the Senate chambers and after a couple words hit him with the cane before he could get to his feet. It was brutal. Sumner was caught off guard, hit in the head, fell to the ground and was trapped under his desk and being attack. He heaves the desk over and gets out from under but he's blinded by his own blood. Brooks continued to beat him. When the cane broke. He beat him with the pieces. When Sumner was unconscious, Brooks held him up by his shirt and beat him some more, eventually dopping the pieces in the blood before exiting.

You think we know polarization? This was the 1850s. Sumner was held up by those in the North as the abolitionist martyr. Brooks? He was the champion of the pro-slavery South. Brook's pals in Congress actually took pieces and had them chopped up and made into rings that they wore around their necks in support of Brooks.

What we have here pales by comparison but it's still ugly and it's a big regressive step backward. Anyway, I'm rambling again but it's a fascinating story and really serves as an important example of what happens when civil discourse completely breaks the hell down.


For gods sake, if this hack did happen, what have we done to make sure it can't happen again?


That's a complicated issue because there are those that say nothing. In fact, as your own comment indicates, there are millions of (mostly Trump supporters) who aren't convinced that there was a hack, a social media campaign involving trolls, so-called "fake news" or anything else. You might believe all or part of these things to me true but a lot of people don't and that's one of the things I lay at the feet of Trump fully. Who else from the federal government is really denying that these things happened?

Essentially nobody as far as I can tell. The only real point of contention is the attribution of the hacks to Russia (the rest nobody even seems to be disputing) and that's really not pervasive from what can be gathered either. There's a reason that the Senate voted 97-2 to limit Trump's ability to ease the sanctions on Russia in response to their meddling.

The principal holdout in terms of politicians, agency heads, etc is the President. Depending on the day and whether he's talking behind closed doors to Comey or tweeting to his Twitter followers, he might express belief in all of it or none of it. Usually the latter.

Can we really expect making sure something the President doesn't believe happened or won't admit publically that he believes happened from happening again is really a priority? If he said what is alleged to the Russian diplomats, what does that tell you? For folks like me, it's really really frustrating. I don't even think he colluded. I just think his ego is getting in the way of him admitting that anything happened in the first place and so he keeps lashing out and doing dumb s# that makes him look guilty of something.

And that lashing out, the repeated attempts to dismiss or encourage an end to the investigation, however you feel comfortable phrasing it, just proves to me that he isn't fit.


I have no idea how trust worthy sessions is, or if he did any wrong doing. But anyone with half a brain knows he wasn't setting up collusion in dinners in public with russian operatives, or at meetings set up by Obama. It would be fine to point out that perhaps Sessions had a lapse in memory, but for papers like the guardian to sensationalize headlines (as lesmisanthrope has pointed out) is ridiculous.


I agree to the point about collusion. I don't see this having any bearing on any possible collusion and as I said, Sessions doesn't strike me as a likely candidate for that anyway. I do believe that he's not being forthcoming.


As far as podesta, I admit your stance on him has been fair all along. I think we are both in agreement that people on all sides that may have had inappropriate contact with Russians should be looked at.


You'll get no argument from me. I have a very low opinion of Podesta and what I know of his brother doesn't make me think any more highly of him. Do I think they are crazy pedophiles who kidnapped Madeleine McCann as the hoaxer Jack Posobiec and liar Cernovich and their other Dan Scavino controlled peers would have the world believe? F no. That doesn't mean they're not guilty of ethical violations, perhaps criminal activity and should be spared scrutiny by investigators. Bring it on.


I don't know. I am not saying that this testimony isn't important, and the truth shouldn't be demanded. But it just seems like knitpicking, and I think all of us if we are honest can see this in no way shows any collusion.


Well. Look at this thread. I think there's a lot of nitpickers in the world and we're included in that number!



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