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Watt-Zeefuik
26 minutes ago, JFK-1 said:

 

Indeed, they never speak of governance. What will we do about inflation? Dunno, too busy on more important matters like searching for Hunter Bidens laptop. Speaking of which the latest news is it's being held hostage by China. Don't ask me how that link up occurs.

 

Maybe a silver lining is surely this is making them unelectable for the foreseeable future. And we got lucky in some respects. Can you imagine what could be playing out right now if Trump actually had won the election then Putin launched his invasion?

 

It's disturbing to contemplate. When  it happened an out of office Trump called Putin a strategic genius while everyone else was calling him a psycho,, do you seriously think that would have been any different if Trump had still been in office? No chance, Trump is like the GOP, what you see is what you get, always.

 

They need to just let the whole house burn down and start again from scratch. Reinvent themselves back into just malevolent ****s rather than full blown cuckoo malevolent ****s.

 

I saw the current GOP described as basically run by online trolls. Whatever the latest crazy shite doing the rounds on right wing social media is, that's their focus.  They're pandering to a minority of internet wackos. The lunatics truly have taken over the asylum.

 

Yes, and at some level the GOP should have imploded a long time ago but it's kept afloat by a class of wealthy financiers and media moguls who use it to keep their taxes low and keep government oversight from stopping their unscrupulous practices, plus another set of wealthy financiers committed to white nationalism. There's enough cash slopping around in keeping the GOP staggering on to another election that a whole lot of incompetent hangers-on and grifters make bank doing the CPAC circuit and such.

 

One hopes that some percentage of them lose their stomach after this spectacle but that's probably vain hope. A better hope is that the threat of taking the debt ceiling hostage would destroy enough of their wealth that they start either pulling support or yanking leashes behind the scenes.

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1 hour ago, Led Tasso said:

 

Yes, and at some level the GOP should have imploded a long time ago but it's kept afloat by a class of wealthy financiers and media moguls who use it to keep their taxes low and keep government oversight from stopping their unscrupulous practices, plus another set of wealthy financiers committed to white nationalism. There's enough cash slopping around in keeping the GOP staggering on to another election that a whole lot of incompetent hangers-on and grifters make bank doing the CPAC circuit and such.

 

One hopes that some percentage of them lose their stomach after this spectacle but that's probably vain hope. A better hope is that the threat of taking the debt ceiling hostage would destroy enough of their wealth that they start either pulling support or yanking leashes behind the scenes.

 

Might be interesting to know where the George Santos overnight wealth came from.

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Boebert and Hannity Clash, Republicans Turn On Trump Amid GOP Speaker Chaos

 

A closer look at the humiliating Republican meltdown in the House leaving one of two chambers of Congress in total paralysis as Republicans and Fox News hosts bicker with each other, stab each other in the backs and call each other names.

 

 

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Unknown user

Second anniversary of the attempted insurrection and that fat prick still can't admit he lost the election.

 

In more important news though

 

739880927_Screenshot_20230106-1900592.thumb.png.1cc57e1b6326b02389d6e93ddbc869d2.png

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Watt-Zeefuik

13th round and he's up to 214, with two more reps who had to leave for family reasons coming back over the weekend. Looks like he's done enough to get over the line with some arm-twisting.

 

The whole thing portends utter chaos for two years though.

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2 hours ago, Led Tasso said:

13th round and he's up to 214, with two more reps who had to leave for family reasons coming back over the weekend. Looks like he's done enough to get over the line with some arm-twisting.

 

The whole thing portends utter chaos for two years though.

 

It looks like the circus will be over soon.  Thank goodness.  Now the Republicans can get busy on things that are important to Americans, plus fixing 'broken' Washington.  

 

First item on the agenda ... Hunter Biden's laptop.  :facepalm:

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Watt-Zeefuik
4 hours ago, Maple Leaf said:

 

It looks like the circus will be over soon.  Thank goodness.  Now the Republicans can get busy on things that are important to Americans, plus fixing 'broken' Washington.  

 

First item on the agenda ... Hunter Biden's laptop.  :facepalm:

The Hunter Biden stuff is ridiculous but I can't get too worked up about it. What really has me worried is that it sounds like McCarthy promised to do the debt ceiling nonsense to get the last of the hardliners on board.

 

It would in effect force a US debt default which could be catastrophic economically well beyond the US.

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Kalamazoo Jambo
19 minutes ago, Led Tasso said:

What really has me worried is that it sounds like McCarthy promised to do the debt ceiling nonsense to get the last of the hardliners on board.

 

It would in effect force a US debt default which could be catastrophic economically well beyond the US.


Yep.

 

Anyway, Matt Gaetz continuing the shit show. McCarthy and McHenry got their vote counts wrong apparently.

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Watt-Zeefuik
4 minutes ago, Kalamazoo Jambo said:


Yep.

 

Anyway, Matt Gaetz continuing the shit show. McCarthy and McHenry got their vote counts wrong apparently.

Yep. He voted "present" which they all thought was a win but all it meant was it put the count into stalemate.

 

He needed 217 with the "present" votes. He got 216.

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Watt-Zeefuik

That would be the same Matt Gaetz who was credibly accused of sex trafficking until prosecutors decided not to pursue for lack of sufficient evidence.

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Kalamazoo Jambo
1 minute ago, Led Tasso said:

That would be the same Matt Gaetz who was credibly accused of sex trafficking until prosecutors decided not to pursue for lack of sufficient evidence.


Just an all round terrible human being.

 

Anyway, I’m torn between laughing at McCarthy and weeping for America right now.

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Watt-Zeefuik
Just now, Kalamazoo Jambo said:


Just an all round terrible human being.

 

Anyway, I’m torn between laughing at McCarthy and weeping for America right now.

same

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2 minutes ago, Led Tasso said:

same

 

What does that mean to current Republicans? And Republican voters for that matter. This is a party and an electorate who voted a joke candidate into the highest office when it was obvious this guy was so unfit it was a disaster waiting to happen.


And would do it again despite the fact he's facing insurrection and espionage charges with an ocean of evidence to prove it. I'm beginning to see no way out of this aside from a total GOP implosion. And i'm not just talking about the speaker farce.

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Glad that's over, was becoming ever more tedious putting aside the spectacle of watching the clown car live. Who could seriously want to be governed by that? Well apparently maybe 30% of the electorate.

 

Wonder what's first up now. Hunter Biden's laptop or hold the government hostage fiscally.

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6 hours ago, Mikey1874 said:

The Trump legacy and playbook played out in Brazil today. 

They want military to intervene. Hopefully they do and set about them.

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periodictabledancer
On 07/01/2023 at 04:29, JFK-1 said:

 

What does that mean to current Republicans? And Republican voters for that matter. This is a party and an electorate who voted a joke candidate into the highest office when it was obvious this guy was so unfit it was a disaster waiting to happen.


And would do it again despite the fact he's facing insurrection and espionage charges with an ocean of evidence to prove it. I'm beginning to see no way out of this aside from a total GOP implosion. And i'm not just talking about the speaker farce.

Populism works - your words could be used against the Tories and Johnson. 

Meanwhile the usual right-wing nutters are on UK media saying that the actions in Brazil are a direct result of "the left" and remoaners in the UK and "Hilary" in the US. 

Populsim worked then and it's working now : look at the "Freedom" Caucus, all funded by major US corporations like Boeing who just don't care what damage they do by supporting this. 

Populism doesn't  care about fixing anything,  it's about the "enemy", the left, Biden or anyone else they can convince doesn't share their values (whatever they are). Populism's bitter angry approach appeals to bitter angry people. 

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16 hours ago, periodictabledancer said:

Populism works - your words could be used against the Tories and Johnson. 

Meanwhile the usual right-wing nutters are on UK media saying that the actions in Brazil are a direct result of "the left" and remoaners in the UK and "Hilary" in the US. 

Populsim worked then and it's working now : look at the "Freedom" Caucus, all funded by major US corporations like Boeing who just don't care what damage they do by supporting this. 

Populism doesn't  care about fixing anything,  it's about the "enemy", the left, Biden or anyone else they can convince doesn't share their values (whatever they are). Populism's bitter angry approach appeals to bitter angry people. 

 

To confound it further I suspect there may be a significant element among the most militant who aren't even in it for the ideology as such, the militias, proud boys etc. are a prime example.


These are populated by large numbers of basic gun nuts who never grew up, want to play soldiers all their lives. Who are then given an ideology the group is passionate about and they're in. Why not, the Dems will take your guns in the night. Tucker Carlson said they would.


Then outside the militias there are let's say 100% civilians, who probably don't care that much about guns. And who were the largest part of the invading mob on the day, a lot of them are not deeply ideological as such either. They're just people who want to be angry about something, anything, sort of Begbie characters. They look for something to be angry about.


And since they're GOP voters well this is heaven sent to glom on to and even better when you have the far right media whipping your frenzy up with a pile of utter shit on a daily basis. Hourly even.


There's a hard core and I couldn't put numbers on it, but they actually want a coup/revolution and the type of racist/bigoted and more authoritarianism Trump would have imposed if he could have. If he had free reign in an authoritarian state to do so. That would mean any press who critcised him would be in jail at best.


Trump actually said while in office that journalists should be jailed for disputing him, with the truth. These Begbies let's call them, they don't think deeply enough to envisage a complete Putin like state. Ask Russian men of fighting age what they think about it.


There's probably no way to get through to these Begbies, could be millions of them, maybe even tens of millions.

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I wouldn't apply the mentality I described above to Brazil, or at least not on such a large scale as in the US. But it is interesting to note the differing reaction from two populations who have recently experienced pretty much the same thing.

 

Quote

Tens of thousands of people in Brazil have held pro-democracy rallies, in an angry response to the storming of Congress by ex-President Jair Bolsonaro's supporters.


In the country's largest city of São Paulo, crowds chanted that Mr Bolsonaro must go to prison.   

 

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-64219119

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He's on top form in this one, hilarious stuff.

 

Unhinged House GOP Wants to Impeach Biden, Claims Left Is Canceling Cowboys: A Closer Look

 

Seth takes a closer look at the slim new Republican majority in the House trying to move on after last week's unprecedented meltdown with incredibly weak Speaker Kevin McCarthy, who has openly admitted he is indebted to Trump for his position.

 

 

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Now that classified documents have been found at offices previously used by Biden, and classified documents have been found at Biden's home, I would think that the chances of Trump being indicted for the classified documents stored at Mar-a-lago are now vanishingly small.

 

I'm well aware that the circumstances surrounding the two events are quite different, but the Republicans will claim it's the same thing, or maybe even worse in Biden's case.  You can be sure that they'll create an uproar about it.

 

The orange buffoon could be set to dodge another bullet.

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1 minute ago, jonesy said:

Neither of them come out of it looking very good, TBH. 

 

It seems like American politics these days involves two sides trying to outdo each other on a) dirt digging and b) incompetence.

So it seems.  The Republicans have been at it since Obama was elected, with their "Birther" nonsense.

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23 minutes ago, Maple Leaf said:

Now that classified documents have been found at offices previously used by Biden, and classified documents have been found at Biden's home, I would think that the chances of Trump being indicted for the classified documents stored at Mar-a-lago are now vanishingly small.

 

I'm well aware that the circumstances surrounding the two events are quite different, but the Republicans will claim it's the same thing, or maybe even worse in Biden's case.  You can be sure that they'll create an uproar about it.

 

The orange buffoon could be set to dodge another bullet.

 

He wont get away with it, as you say there's a world of difference there and the law doesn't care what the crazies say. If it did Trump would have pulled off the coup. They scream the big lie is true, they still scream it, does any judge fall for that infantile drivel?

 

They don't and this will be the same.  

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Sometimes It takes a comedian to poke through all the bullshit. And especially so when the bullshit is absurd.

 

A closer look at Attorney General Merrick Garland appointing a special counsel to look into the classified documents that were found at Biden's home and office from his time as vice president.

 

 

 

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10 hours ago, Maple Leaf said:

Now that classified documents have been found at offices previously used by Biden, and classified documents have been found at Biden's home, I would think that the chances of Trump being indicted for the classified documents stored at Mar-a-lago are now vanishingly small.

 

I'm well aware that the circumstances surrounding the two events are quite different, but the Republicans will claim it's the same thing, or maybe even worse in Biden's case.  You can be sure that they'll create an uproar about it.

 

The orange buffoon could be set to dodge another bullet.


 

I agree, to believe that’s it only Republicans that are up to no good is incredibly naive. 
 

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The Real Maroonblood
53 minutes ago, Des Lynam said:


 

I agree, to believe that’s it only Republicans that are up to no good is incredibly naive. 
 

It never ceases to amaze how naïve politicians are.

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1 hour ago, The Real Maroonblood said:

It never ceases to amaze how naïve politicians are.


They always leave a paper trail. 
 

Power tends to corrupt, absolute power corrupts absolutely. 
 

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The Real Maroonblood
6 minutes ago, Des Lynam said:

 


They always leave a paper trail. 
 

Power tends to corrupt, absolute power corrupts absolutely. 
 

Absolutely.👍

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2 hours ago, The Real Maroonblood said:

It never ceases to amaze how naïve politicians are.

Arrogant I'd say rather than naive a lot of the time.

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Seems yesterday Trump went on a rant about the special prosecutor investigating him, Jack Smith. Trump called him a thug, said he was mentally deranged, the irony, and went on to abuse his wife and entire extended family plus friends. Who in reality he wont even know a thing about, then demanded the investigation of him must stop.

 

The guy in this video I will post makes a good contrast of the differences between Trump's response to an investigation and Biden's, while he also contrasts the difference in the press response.

 

He's unhappy that the press are all over deconstructing every word Biden said, while pretty much ignoring Trump's rant.

 

He has much more experience and knowledge of such things than I do, and his attitude to it may be the correct one. But I was thinking wouldn't it be a good thing if the mainstream media started ignoring Trump?

 

Aren't we in a lot of the shit we're now wading through in part because they hung on his every incoherent ramble? Then broadcast it to those even dumber than he is to ramble over? How are we ever going to be done with Trump if the media keep supplying him with a platform to ramble his infantile spiel.

 

Incidentally I believe Trump as the net closes ever tighter will again try to assemble insurrectionist mobs, maybe outside courtrooms. The rant at Jack Smith, his entire family and anyone friends with them, is a level of assembling a mob he thinks he can get away with at this point.

 

He wants the same thing to happen to them as happened to the election workers he targeted, crazies turning up at their homes and the homes of anyone connected to them. Like also happened at Pelosi's home.

 

 

   

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Now it's established that Bidens son was using "the big guy"in reference to his Ukranian business. It's astonishing that msm are now using the excuse that due to Russian misinformation they didn't give proper exposure to the story.

 

I'm sure it was alluded to as fake news.

In a way Trump facilitated much more serious criminality by being such a clown.All eyes on a patsy sort of thing.

And what's even more disturbing is the troop movements during Bidens vice presidency and its effects on the present day conflict in the area.

 

Or is this thread still a no go for a different take?

 

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The miserable post presidency of Trump, every day is worse than the day before, and Friday noon will be a real bad day.

 

They're going to release, by noon latest, it could be anytime prior to noon, "significant portions" of an FBI affidavit they submitted prior to the search of Trumps premises for the classified documents..

 

There are redactions in it to protect witnesses and agents names and maybe investigative techniques too. But there's still expected to be damning evidence against Trump in that affidavit.

 

 

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2 hours ago, Des Lynam said:

There's no doubt that this matter is embarrassing for Biden, and he definitely has egg on his face after his critical remarks about Trump.

 

However, in my view, there's at least one significant difference between Biden's case and Trump's case.  Trump ordered the removal of the classified documents, and he hasn't denied it.  He claims that the documents belonged to him.  

 

The indications are that Biden was unaware of the documents in his former office and in his garage.

 

But this will keep the pundits talking for weeks.

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5 hours ago, Maple Leaf said:

The indications are that Biden was unaware of the documents in his former office and in his garage.

 

But this will keep the pundits talking for weeks.

 

At the end of the day it's annoying but irrelevant. The law sees the differences even more clearly than we do.

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6 hours ago, Maple Leaf said:

There's no doubt that this matter is embarrassing for Biden, and he definitely has egg on his face after his critical remarks about Trump.

 

However, in my view, there's at least one significant difference between Biden's case and Trump's case.  Trump ordered the removal of the classified documents, and he hasn't denied it.  He claims that the documents belonged to him.  

 

The indications are that Biden was unaware of the documents in his former office and in his garage.

 

But this will keep the pundits talking for weeks.

Also, crucially, when called about it he told his attorneys to go through everything and turn over anything untoward.

 

Trump stonewalled the archives for well over a year, routinely defied court orders about it, and signed a false affidavit saying he’d turned over everything.

 

 

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4 hours ago, Led Tasso said:

Also, crucially, when called about it he told his attorneys to go through everything and turn over anything untoward.

 

Trump stonewalled the archives for well over a year, routinely defied court orders about it, and signed a false affidavit saying he’d turned over everything.

 

 

 

He denied having documents at all, while has own security videos show the documents being moved after denying they existed.

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The two cases are not equivalent. For starters, let’s consider the two stories through the lens of the statutes cited in the Mar-a-Lago search warrant approved by a federal court.


Individuals violate the Espionage Act when, among other things, they willfully retain national-defense documents and fail to return them to a proper government official upon request. In November, Biden’s personal lawyer discovered the classified documents and returned them to the government without a request. So that statute does not apply. Biden has denied knowing that he had the documents.

 

The contrast with Trump is stark. The National Archives and Records Administration first asked him to return missing documents in May 2021. The following January, Archives officials retrieved 15 boxes of government records, and on June 3, 2022, his lawyer signed a sworn statement that all documents responsive to a grand jury subpoena were being returned after a “diligent” search.

 

(That any lawyer would do so without conducting the search herself raises serious ethical questions, and strongly implies that she was instructed by someone to make the statement.)

 

In August, a federal court was provided evidence that the lawyer’s statement was likely false, and the court issued the search warrant that allowed the FBI to seize upwards of 11,000 documents from Mar-a-Lago.

 

They included more than 70 documents marked “Secret” or “Top Secret,” some apparently containing information whose disclosure could conceivably endanger the lives of American intelligence sources overseas.

 

The apparent obstruction of justice—with evidence pointing to Trump’s direct involvement—make up the serious misconduct here, more serious than a former president simply having removed documents from their proper place. Trump’s lawyers repeatedly asserted in court that the Mar-a-Lago documents were “personal,” effectively admitting that Trump took them and kept them.

 

The centrality of concealment to the case is made even clearer by the second statute cited in the Mar-a-Lago affidavit. It subjects to prosecution anyone who “knowingly … conceals [or] covers up … any record, document, or tangible object with the intent to impede [or] obstruct … the investigation or proper administration of any [federal] matter.”

 

By contrast, in Biden’s case, no evidence yet exists of concealment or of intent to impede or obstruct the proper administration of any federal matter. With Trump, a federal judge has already determined, in approving the Mar-a-Lago warrant, that there was probable cause to believe that Trump intended to impede or obstruct an investigation or NARA’s proper administration of government records, and likely both.

 

Full article

 

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/01/biden-classified-document-investigation-trump-mar-a-lago/672720/

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While Biden's mishandling of documents isn't criminal in any way, you still have to think man wasn't that incredibly negligent. Makes you wonder how common it is across all administrations. 

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On 15/01/2023 at 01:52, Ked said:

Or is this thread still a no go for a different take?

 

 

Weren't you complaining about snide last night?

 

Anyway, what are you actually taking about? 

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This stuff spreads.

Look at that DeSantos, lied his way into the job, republicans are furious about it.  His CV's riddled with lies.

 

But all he's doing is following trump's example - lie, lie, lie, bluster and never take responsibility.

 

Of course, that's on the surface - in the background there's shady stuff,

I read that before he stood for election he was earning c.$50k a year.

He then started his company, which loaned his campaign $700k, with no sign of where that money came from.

 

And the real problem is that the republicans can't really do anything about it - numbers are so tight they can't risk booting him and an election.

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>Old company boss methodically steals company secrets on an industrial scale, then loses his job. Nobody knows what he's planning to do with the company secrets, he pretends he hasn't stolen anything, but gets caught red handed trying to hide them, then makes up conspiracy theories about it, then claims that as company boss he personally owns all the secrets as he decided to transfer ownership of them from the company to himself. The old boss has links to dodgy people who'd love to destroy the company. Many people believe that he has either sold some of the company secrets to competitors or was negligent enough to leave them in places known to be frequented by competitor employees.

 

>New company boss used to work for the boss previous to the one that stole all the documents. During that time a small number of files were taken off company premises and were later found in a box in a secure garage.

 

Old boss screams that the two situations are the same.

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13 hours ago, Smithee said:

 

Weren't you complaining about snide last night?

 

Anyway, what are you actually taking about? 

 

My thoughts exactly, what is this "different take" we're all neglecting.

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Deranged rant from Trump calling a right wing radio show.

 

Trump Freaks Out over Criminal Probes, Calls Special Counsel "a Terrorist"

 

 

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