According to the general legal outline that surfaced in the trial of Senator Bob Menendez, quid-pro-quo agreements between “abiding friends” can never be considered corruption or defined as ‘bribes’ because,.. just like non-public officials or business associates, close friends would do favors to help and repay each other.
In essence the legal definition of bribery for public officials now comes down to how long the two parties have known each other, and if they can show an abiding friendship. If two parties can show an “abiding friendship“, of undefined duration, no action taken by one party -to the benefit of the other party- can ever be considered bribery, regardless of the scope of the action.
You can bet a social networking strategy and Christmas Card lists of a whole bunch of politicians and public officials will be much longer this year. Everyone involved in paying-off public officials will now begin creating evidence of a much deeper friendship – which is now a proven legal defense.

(Reuters) – The corruption trial of New Jersey’s Democratic U.S. Senator Bob Menendez ended in a mistrial on Thursday, after the jury said it was hopelessly deadlocked on bribery, fraud and other charges.

Menendez, 63, a longtime fixture in the state’s political circles who first joined the Senate in 2006, was accused of accepting private flights, campaign contributions and other bribes from a wealthy patron, Florida ophthalmologist Salomon Melgen, in exchange for official favors.

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The attorney for Alabama Republican Senate Candidate Roy Moore appeared today for a brief press statement and provided material that strongly suggests the documents provided by the accusers attorney, Gloria Allred, were forged.  In a subsequent follow-up interview with Allred she refused to say the documents were not forged.
Apparently Judge Roy Moore was the presiding judge in the divorce case of Beverly Young Nelson.  The signature on the yearbook Mrs. Nelson provides as evidence, via Gloria Allred, looks like it was taken from the judge’s signature on her previously undisclosed divorce documents.
Roy Moore’s attorney Phillip L. Jauregui says Judge Roy Moore has been falsely accused, and wants Gloria Allred to release Beverly Nelson’s yearbook for handwriting analysis and inspection.  The key points to defend Roy Moore from the larger accusations are found within the motive of Allred and Mrs. Young falsifying documents.

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Additionally, Gloria Allred appeared on CNN (Wolf Blitzer) and twice refused to state the signature was authentic.  She sounds very sketchy and evasive (video below). (more…)

The Usual Suspects – Senator John McCain joins Senator Bob Corker demanding that Secretary of State Rex Tillerson spend more money or face being hauled up to congress for Senate investigative hearings on his excessive streamlining and productivity efforts.
According to their arguments, Secretary Tillerson has the audacity to think he is allowed to run the state department. Exactly who does he think he is?
If he doesn’t start spending more money, the Republicans in the Senate might just impeach him.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Two senior U.S. senators asked Secretary of State Rex Tillerson on Wednesday to explain “questionable management practices” at his department that they believe are weakening the country’s diplomatic power, adding to a chorus of concern in Congress.
Republican Senator John McCain and Democratic Senator Jeanne Shaheen delivered a letter to Tillerson asking him to begin consulting with lawmakers on decisions that have an impact on recruiting, retaining and staffing the State Department, removing a hiring freeze and resuming promotions.

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CTH has attempted to stay away from talking about the Alabama ‘clown show‘, all of it, since we made our position clear long before the primary run-off race.  Play stupid games, win stupid prizes etc.
My concern with the Alabama mess was a very simple MAGA issue: riding horses to polling stations does not establish a connection to the man or woman who hit the necessary alarm clock at 5:15am to pay the bills.  Those are MAGA people. That’s the essence of the Trump coalition.
The MAGA coalition I know has never been predisposed to racism, sexism, nativism, or any other kind of “ism” or “ist”, because we’ve never been not busy. It takes time to give a rats-ass about bathroom police, social justice etc. Time and energy for that, who has it?

The current position of the epic fiasco was/is entirely predictable…. warnings, deaf ears, blah-blah-blah; water under the bridge.  That said, the current race to the exits by all of the fly-by-nights (populist wallflowers) is embarrassing to see play out.
Factually, I feel sorry for Mr. and Mrs. Roy Moore… However, I don’t have a smidgen of sympathy for the noob-right financial opportunists: Steve Bannon, Laura Ingraham, Sebastian Gorka et al, or the political Roberts-The-Bruce: Ted Cruz, Mike Lee etc. Heck, I’m still waiting for the ‘Use El Chappo Money to Build The Wall‘ bill…  I digress.
So why engage now?  Well, today Rush Limbaugh weighs in in using the customary (passive aggressive/mamet principle) approach to frame the argument as: “The Roy Moore Soap Opera is Really About McConnell -vs- Bannon”.   No, no it’s not.
I understand the frame of reference, why Limbaugh views it that way, but that’s not an accurate assessment.
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Representative Jim Jordan (R-OH) frustratingly questions his good friend Attorney General Jeff Sessions about the standard for the DOJ to appoint a special counsel and/or investigate the brutally obvious legal issues/implications surrounding the “Steele Dossier”, the Clinton campaign and the weaponization of the intelligence community (FBI) to undermine political opposition (Trump).

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As you can see above, Attorney General Jeff Sessions is reluctant to investigate based on appearances. The end result of Sessions’ position is to extend the investigative responsibility to congress. The end result of congress conducting investigations is the road to nowhere, See: Fast and Furious, Benghazi, IRS, VA Scandal etc….
Sessions is advocating for the familiar; for the swamp retainment system, or as I prefer to call it: Flak and Countermeasures.
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Things could get a whole lot more interesting if Kimberley Strassel is correct in her research and analysis of how the Clinton Campaign paid for the creation of the “Steele Dossier”, pushed it to the FBI, and then used their influence to generate media coverage of it.   There’s a lot more questions to be asked; a lot more.

The basic outline as it appears is:  Clinton paid for the sketchy dossier to be put together; then pushed it to the FBI (Sally Yates); who then used it to open a counter-intelligence investigation; which was then used to begin wiretaps etc. on Trump; while simultaneously reporters were fed information -from Fusion GPS- about the dossier and intelligence investigation; to start the Russian conspiracy narrative, using leaks within the intelligence investigation which were created by the dossier.
Byron York lays out the timeline and asks a similar set of questions.  Additionally, there are strong indications Fusion GPS paid journalists to promote the dossier narrative along with other stories.
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When Senator Blunt rises from the darkest and deepest part of the swamp to talk about senate Tax legislation (always written by the biggest K-St donors) you know the sausage is rotten.  Decepticon Blunt is only visible when the little people are conscripted to wash the cigar residue from the Senate’s Corinthian leather.
Senators: Blunt, Cornyn, McConnell, Hatch, Portman, Thune, McCain, Cochran, Murkowski, Graham and Corker will NEVER allow the income tax position of common-folk to supersede their corporate porkulous-minded financial interests.
CTH needed to be patient to see the architecture, and see if they retained their traditional approach at swamp constructs,… Now it’s visible, I can guarantee you this bill is destined to fail.  Maria Bartiromo knows it… she knows, and she’s playing the game; but you can see it behind her eyes… she knows.

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Accepting that Donald Trump has exceptionally keen instincts, he had to know -in advance- where this was headed. The only purpose this bill serves is ammunition within the ‘big ugly’ to showcase, yet again, the corruption and ineptitude of the GOPe wing of the UniParty and how they are mere salespeople for their financiers on Wall Street/K-Street.
Forget tax reform; like the budget and O-care, it’s a moot point to discuss now.
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Last year against the backdrop of President Obama’s sanctions announcement against Russia, we closely reviewed the “Russian Malicious Cyber Activity – Joint Analysis Report”. This December 2016 intelligence report (actual document below) is the report where the media talking points “17 intelligence agencies agreed” and the Russian “hacking of the election” began.
The report was released to coincide with President Obama kicking out Russian diplomats as punishment for the content therein.  Everyone talks about this report, yet almost no-one talking about it has actually read it.  WE HAVE.


President Obama’s administration released the ‘Joint Analysis Report’ which various politicians and media claimed to outline details of Russia’s involvement hacking into targeted data, computer systems, and political networks during the election.
Except it doesn’t.
Not even a little.
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Curiouser and curiouser…  An interesting development amid the various swampy happenings both domestically and internationally.  With Robert Mueller focusing on foreign interest lobbying efforts within Washington DC; and amid Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman confronting corruption within the financing of foreign political influence; Podesta CEO Kimberley Fritts announces she is leaving to form her own firm.

Considering that Mrs. Fritts previously announced her intention of remaining at the Podesta group and rebranding the lobbying firm, sans Tony Podesta, questions arise as to what might have made Fritts change her mind.

(Via Politico) Kimberley Fritts, the longtime chief executive of the Podesta Group, is leaving the firm to start her own lobbying shop, according to three Podesta Group staffers.

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The role of Fusion GPS as an active participant in the 2016 election is growing in scale amid yet another report showing the scope of their involvement.
Two weeks ago the DNC and Clinton Campaign teams were forced to admit they hired Fusion GPS to engage in political activity and research against presidential candidate Trump.  That’s sketchy. Then last week we discovered that Fusion GPS head, Glenn Simpson, actually met with Russian operative Natalia Veselnitskaya immediately prior to her visit to Trump Tower and immediately after. That’s beyond sketchy.  Now we discover Glenn Simpson actually wrote the material that Natalia Veselnitskava used to pitch herself into a meeting with Don Trump Jr.  Wait,… what…

Yes, we are now in “ludicrous mode“.  It’s no longer a surprise why Glenn Simpson’s lawyers are trying desperately to keep him from a congressional subpoena. Clinton Lawyers, Perkins Coie, acknowledged they paid $1.02 million to Fusion for research related to candidate Donald Trump. However, the entire story now looks like the DNC and Clinton camp hired Fusion GPS to construct negative material, not “discover” it.
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