Russia and our election

[*TheLeonardLeap*]

(07-11-2017, 03:15 PM)Au165 Wrote: A foreign national shall not, directly or indirectly, make a contribution or a donation of money or other thing of value, or expressly or impliedly promise to make a contribution or a donation, in connection with any Federal, State, or local election.


Other thing of value. There is value outside of monetary value and that is a real option here. He obviously valued it because he felt the need to acquire it. You can pretend it is "fake news" but even Fox News is being really frank about how bad this is.

Then I value hugs, smiles, handshakes, and moral support.

I'm positive that other thing of value is referring to physical monetary value, not abstract value. Paintings, cars, planes, boats, jewelry, etc.

Otherwise literally everything is of value. I value the oxygen that is produced by the Amazon rain forest. I value Canadian maple syrup on my pancakes. I value the Australian beef that is served in some fast food places. I value the foreign oil I put into a car.

Game on. We're putting EVERYONE in jail.

[Au165]

(07-11-2017, 03:31 PM)TheLeonardLeap Wrote: Then I value hugs, smiles, handshakes, and moral support.

I'm positive that other thing of value is referring to physical value, not abstract value. Paintings, cars, planes, boats, jewelry, etc.

Otherwise literally everything is of value. I value the oxygen that is produced by the Amazon rain forest. I value Canadian maple syrup on my pancakes. I value the Australian beef that is served in some fast food places. I value the foreign oil I put into a car.

Game on. We're putting EVERYONE in jail.

Do you value an attorneys time? What about the time it takes a mechanic to fix your car? Services have value. When people donate time, do you think there is not value in the time they donate to volunteering? The time and effort , financed by the Russian government, had value associated to them.

[*michaelsean*]

(07-11-2017, 03:32 PM)Au165 Wrote: Services have value. Hence why "Other thing of Value" still hold true.

Here's the law including the title.  I think it's pretty obvious what the law is doing, and if you want to believe otherwise that's fine, but I have nothing else I can offer by means of information.

https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/11/110.20

[Au165]

(07-11-2017, 03:34 PM)michaelsean Wrote: Here's the law including the title.  I think it's pretty obvious what the law is doing, and if you want to believe otherwise that's fine, but I have nothing else I can offer by means of information.

https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/11/110.20

Sorry deleted the quote to combine it with another response. Don't want you to think it was pulling it back for some other reason.

[*michaelsean*]

(07-11-2017, 03:34 PM)Au165 Wrote: Do you value an attorneys time? What about the time it takes a mechanic to fix your car? Services have value. When people donate time, do you think there is not value in the time they donate to volunteering? The time and effort , financed by the Russian government, had value associated to them.

I really think you are stretching here, but we will see.  i'm sure campaigns need attorneys so if an attorney gives ten hours of time at $500 an hour, that's $5000 the campaign doesn't have to spend. The law is about campaign financing, and this particular section is about foreign financing of campaigns. There may be another law somewhere that addresses this situation, but I don't think this is the one.

[*TheLeonardLeap*]

(07-11-2017, 03:34 PM)Au165 Wrote: Do you value an attorneys time? What about the time it takes a mechanic to fix your car? Services have value. When people donate time, do you think there is not value in the time they donate to volunteering? The time and effort , financed by the Russian government, had value associated to them.

You mean like when a when people are campaign volunteers? You think there's not a single foreign national or illegal immigrant who lives in America that volunteers in some form or fashion ANYWHERE in every single Presidential campaign? Or how about... if an illegal immigrant picked the lettuce that the candidate ate in their salad? Their work in the field has value, and they "indirectly contributed" to the campaign by fueling the candidate's stomach, allowing them to press on.

So I go back to every person going to jail.

You're stretching on this charge more than a contortionist doing yoga in a spy movie's laser security hallway. Get a real charge and I will happily agree with you, because it does seem shady. Just not illegal based off what you've shown.

[xxlt]

So, it goes without saying that Jr. is a pathological liar. No need for a DNA test, that apple was grafted straight from the tallest apple tree in the Lyingtown Apple Tree Orchard, Queen Trump.

But his latest slick maneuver was, upon being told by the NY Times that they were going to publish his e-mail exchange about colluding (or at least giving it the old college try) with Russians to influence the election was to release the emails himself.

Prediction: the Times next tells him that they are going to release the Russian Hooker Piss DVD collection and Junior immediately puts out a tweet saying he is selling a special director's cut of the DVD collection straight from the White House and if you order now for an extra $500 he'll have the star (QT) autograph the boxed set for you.

What's your prediction for Junior's next move?

The Queen's next lie?

[xxlt]

Maybe Melania and Ivanka can go on QVC and hock a Trump prison wear line of striped pajamas. Pre-order so you can be wearing what Trump will be wearing even before Trump! Talking about building the brand! The faithful will pay top dollar for that. Order now and we'll have the Queen lounge in yours for an hour while he tweets (Queen voice over in the advertisement: "Never sleep. Sleep bad! Tweet good!") for just an extra $10,000!

[GMDino]

(07-11-2017, 04:03 PM)xxlt Wrote: So, it goes without saying that Jr. is a pathological liar. No need for a DNA test, that apple was grafted straight from the tallest apple tree in the Lyingtown Apple Tree Orchard, Queen Trump.

But his latest slick maneuver was, upon being told by the NY Times that they were going to publish his e-mail exchange about colluding (or at least giving it the old college try) with Russians to influence the election was to release the emails himself.

Prediction: the Times next tells him that they are going to release the Russian Hooker Piss DVD collection and Junior immediately puts out a tweet saying he is selling a special director's cut of the DVD collection straight from the White House and if you order now for an extra $500 he'll have the star (QT) autograph the boxed set for you.

What's your prediction for Junior's next move?

The Queen's next lie?

I almost feel like he got involved to try and impress his daddy...seems they wanted to pass the info on to someone else but he said he would "handle it"...and then when there wasn't anything there he just lied about it.

Sr goes out and says he'll have stuff on Clinton, there isn't any.  Sr treats like anything else he's promised and moves along but it comes back later to bite Jr in the hiney.

[xxlt]

(07-11-2017, 04:08 PM)GMDino Wrote: I almost feel like he got involved to try and impress his daddy...seems they wanted to pass the info on to someone else but he said he would "handle it"...and then when there wasn't anything there he just lied about it.

Sr goes out and says he'll have stuff on Clinton, there isn't any.  Sr treats like anything else he's promised and moves along but it comes back later to bite Jr in the hiney.

Did you see the explanation that a meeting about "adoptions" is really a meeting about sanctions? In the immortal words of Comey, Lordy I hope there are tapes. We all know these two are no more capable of telling the truth than they are of teleporting, but just seeing them keep lying post tapes would be even funnier...

No, come to think of it, I don't think it can get any funnier. There is a finite amount of funny that pathological lying can be, and I think they've hit that threshold.

[Dill]

(07-11-2017, 01:30 PM)michaelsean Wrote: After thinking about it, my opinion, and I'm not speaking to legality, is that if someone has information and you had no part in helping to obtain it or asked for it to be done for you, and there is no quid pro quo, then I'm OK with it.

In this case there is automatically a quid pro quo, if the information helps Putin choose our president.

If you, as a Trump campaign operative, accept such information, then you become "part of the plan" so to speak, accepting a role in a Russian espionage operation for your personal advantage. Further, as Harvard Professor John Coates (in Bels' link) puts it, you"deprive another of the intangible right of honest services."

If you respond to and "hear out" the offer, as T jr. did, then you indicate your receptivity to treasonous actions.

[Au165]

(07-11-2017, 03:42 PM)michaelsean Wrote: I really think you are stretching here, but we will see.  i'm sure campaigns need attorneys so if an attorney gives ten hours of time at $500 an hour, that's $5000 the campaign doesn't have to spend.  The law is about campaign financing, and this particular section is about foreign financing of campaigns.  There may be another law somewhere that addresses this situation, but I don't think this is the one.

Okay so I finally found what I was looking for.


Foreign Nationals

Contributions and donations may not be solicited,14 accepted, or received from, or made directly or indirectly by, foreign nationals who do not have permanent residence in the United States (i.e., those without green cards). This prohibition encompasses all US elections; including federal, state and local elections. 11 CFR 110.20(b).

What Russia provided falls under an In-kind contribution.

[*michaelsean*]

(07-11-2017, 04:33 PM)Au165 Wrote: Okay so I finally found what I was looking for.


Foreign Nationals

Contributions and donations may not be solicited,14 accepted, or received from, or made directly or indirectly by, foreign nationals who do not have permanent residence in the United States (i.e., those without green cards). This prohibition encompasses all US elections; including federal, state and local elections. 11 CFR 110.20(b).

What Russia provided falls under an In-kind contribution. This is considered an illegal contribution as it pertains to a foreign government.

I don't see where that says that.  Again, this is about financing elections.  It is a law about financing elections.

[*michaelsean*]

(07-11-2017, 04:33 PM)Dill Wrote: In this case there is automatically a quid pro quo, if the information helps Putin choose our president.

If you, as a Trump campaign operative, accept such information, then you become "part of the plan" so to speak, accepting your role in a Russian espionage operation for personal advantage. Further, as Harvard Professor John Coates (in Bels' link) puts it, you"deprive another of the intangible right of honest services."

If you respond to and "hear out" the offer, as T jr. did, then you indicate your receptivity to treasonous actions.

That would be akin to me saying there is quid pro quo if I give money to a campaign and they win.  

[Au165]

(07-11-2017, 04:37 PM)michaelsean Wrote: I don't see where that says that.  Again, this is about financing elections.  It is a law about financing elections.

Contribution and Donation is part of the foreign government/national statute. Contribution on the federal election website is defined in a couple ways, but In-kind is one of the things it references as a type of contribution. For most people that in-kind contribution is valued at a reasonably agreed upon value and is applied towards contribution limits, however since no foreign national can make a contribution of value any value would automatically violate that.

It'll be up for a bunch of legal people to determine, but it is not even remotely a stretch to consider this an in-kind contribution to the Trump campaign.

[Belsnickel]

Here is an article from National Review on all of this, which I think is extremely well done: http://www.nationalreview.com/article/449376/donald-trump-jr-e-mails-proof-trump-campaign-attempted-collusion-russia

I encourage everyone to read it that has an interest in this story. For those on the left, it is a well reasoned article on the most recent activities of what has been going on. For those on the right, if you aren't familiar with this publication I encourage you to get better acquainted with it. I follow this and some of the editors online because they provide a very logical conservative approach to things. I don't always agree with them, but when I do disagree it is just because of ideological differences and not because they are whackadoodle like some of the other sources out there.

Anyway, enjoy.

[Dill]

(07-11-2017, 03:15 PM)Au165 Wrote: A foreign national shall not, directly or indirectly, make a contribution or a donation of money or other thing of value, or expressly or impliedly promise to make a contribution or a donation, in connection with any Federal, State, or local election.


Other thing of value. There is value outside of monetary value and that is a real option here. He obviously valued it because he felt the need to acquire it. You can pretend it is "fake news" but even Fox News is being really frank about how bad this is.

The law pretty much specifies contributions of FUNGIBLE value, things which can be priced and exchanged for money.  If a foreigner owns a hotel and donates rooms to the campaign for a week, that would count as a "contribution."   One cannot donate or price fresh air, hugs, or pancake syrup (once out of the bottle) as leonard listed. One cannot exchange them for money or other goods and services.

Also, the recipient has to KNOW the gift is from a foreigner, and show due diligence in sourcing contributions.

Dirt on Hillary might have a monetary value for some journalists or Trump supporters, but it is not really a market value.  It could not be considered logistical support the way hotel rooms or airline tickets or donated "Make America Great" hats could.

[ballsofsteel]

I think our Govt. should stop all these investigations about Russia and the Trump camp. Everyone knows he is dirty and a lying SOB, but it doesn't matter. He'll just deny everything. The gutless vaginas of the Republicans in congress won't impeach him anyway. They put party before country. Just move on and hope for the best.

[Au165]

(07-11-2017, 04:54 PM)Dill Wrote: The law pretty much specifies contributions of FUNGIBLE value, things which can be priced and exchanged for money.  If a foreigner owns a hotel and donates rooms to the campaign for a week, that would count as a "contribution."   One cannot donate or price fresh air, hugs, or pancake syrup (once out of the bottle) as leonard listed. One cannot exchange them for money or other goods and services.

Also, the recipient has to KNOW the gift is from a foreigner, and show due diligence in sourcing contributions.

Dirt on Hillary might have a monetary value for some journalists or Trump supporters, but it is not really a market value.  It could not be considered logistical support the way  hotel rooms or airline tickets or donated "Make America Great" hats could.

Services by skilled professionals is considered valuable. You can attach an hourly value to hackers like you can lawyers. White hat hacking firms do in fact have hourly rates for services. The services used to acquire that report would fall under the in-kind contribution definition for services.

[ballsofsteel]

Donald jr. is a weasel. Maybe that meeting was about adoption. Donald Sr. Might be looking to adopt another son to replace his Beavis and Butthead twins.