[asabjorn]

> I'll flip the question around. Had Trump won, would the Democratic party be publishing content like this with the same lack of evidence? I think you know the answer to that.

After his win in 2016 we had Russia collusion claims about election collusion that is still ongoing, it even led to the Mueller investigation that extended beyond the 2018 election, so yes absolutely the Democrats would do this.

[p1necone]

I'm not sure how you can read the Mueller report and come away with the conclusion that there's a lack of evidence.

[rayiner]

Lack of evidence for what? Democrats were claiming Trump was a “Russian asset.” The rhetoric convinced 2/3 of Democrats that Russia had altered vote tallies: https://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.net/cumulus_uploads/inline.... There was talk of impeaching Trump before he took office. Heck, Hilary Clinton called Tulsi Gabbard, a fellow Democrat, a “Russian asset.”

This partisan dichotomy about all this is extremely hard to credit. For two years we were subjected to Rachel Maddow dropping one “bombshell” after the other about how Trump colluded with Russia to steal the 2016 election. What was proven in the Mueller Report was a fraction of that, with scant evidence linking Trump himself to wrongdoing.

What’s worse, a story that’s 90% made up or one that’s 100% made up? The latter, obviously, but I have zero sympathy for partisans trying to make hay out of that distinction.

[kthxbye123]

106 House Republicans have just joined in a lawsuit by 18 Republican AGs to overturn the results of the election. The Trump administration of course followed eight years of ferociously racist conspiracy-mongering about Obama's illegitimate birth. The GOP is a minority party that simply rejects the legitimacy of their political opponents to hold office. Why do you persist in these ridiculous false equivalences? They're not even 10% different, they're 100% different.

[rayiner]

I’m not drawing an “equivalency” and I don’t need to. Norms don’t work if you only try to enforce them against the other team. Democrats eroded norms about acknowledging the legitimacy of elections in 2000, 2004, and 2016. What Trump is doing is much worse, but Democrats primed the public to believe it.

Look at what Democrats said just this year. Nadler asserted that if he wasn’t impeached, Trump would “rig the 2020 election.” They ran with a conspiracy theory that USPS would manipulate mail delivery to delay mail in votes. Numerous outlets ran articles on voting machine security and how easy they are to hack. You don’t think all this primed voters to believe our elections were easily manipulated? If you consistently piss in the pool, it’s fair to complain when someone takes a dump in it. Like yes, I’ll acknowledge it’s not the same. Yes, one is worse! But my sympathy is minimal.

Separate rant: As to Republicans being a “minority party”—Democrats thinking they’re the “silent majority” is a misperception that causes them to overplay their hand. They imagine that if only we had a popular vote, or higher turnout, or whatever, they’d win decisive majorities. We just had an election with mass mail-in voting with historically high turnout and Trump increased his percentage share of the vote from 2016. If you look at the data, Biden’s margin is built on (1) Republican-leaning suburbs in Phoenix, Atlanta, etc. (https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2020/11/gop-wom...). Mine went +14 for Biden, but +38 for Hogan. (2) the collapse of the third party vote from over 5% to about 2% (https://www.vox.com/21561230/libertarian-party-third-party-2...). And (3) Trump suppressing his own vote by telling his supporters not to vote by mail in an election conducted primarily by mail: https://twitter.com/JustinGrayWSB/status/1328782492913033219...

When you’re the liberal party and you have to cash in Romney Republicans and Gary Johnson voters—while running against Donald Trump of all people—how smug can you possibly be?

It’s also worth looking down ballot. Despite historic turnout and the easiest voting ever, Republicans held Democrats to a razor thin House majority. They’ll finish within a couple of points in the Congressional popular vote. They regularly win the Congressional popular vote outright (in 2016 by a point, in 2014 by 6 points, in 2010 by 8 points). If we had a parliamentary system like other countries, that would allow them to regularly form the cabinet executive branch and select the prime minister.

Also, while I’m ranting, if we had a “popular vote” like France, Clinton never would have won because it would have gone to a run-off with Perot eliminated. And Trump may still have won, in a run-off with Johnson and McMullin eliminated.

[kthxbye123]

> Look at what Democrats said just this year. Nadler asserted that if he wasn’t impeached, Trump would “rig the 2020 election.”

How can you possibly say this is mere paranoia in the face of an active, ongoing attempt by both the President and a huge portion of the institutional GOP to do exactly that?

[asabjorn]

Declassified FBI documents indicate otherwise. Flynn actually notified FBI of all meetings with Russians and debriefed with them afterwards.

There is much that is puzzling about the judges treatment of this case considering: 1) The FBI agents in charge of the Flynn case wrote a 'case closure memo' on Jan. 4, 2017, concluding he had found "no derogatory" evidence that Flynn committed a crime or posed a national security threat. FBI management then ordered the closure to be rescinded and pivoted toward trying lure Flynn into an interview. 2) In an extraordinary interview with prosecutors this fall, the FBI agent who led the Flynn case, William Barnett, admitted there was never evidence of wrongdoing by the retired general or Russian collusion by Trump, but the probe was kept open by Special Counsel Robert Mueller because his team was obsessed with punishing the president. [2]

And there are a long list of other odd facts about the case that put into question Judge Sullivans extraordinary actions by acting as a prosecutor in this case. [3]

[1] https://justthenews.com/sites/default/files/2020-04/FBIFlynn...

[2] https://justthenews.com/sites/default/files/2020-09/04518073...

[3] https://justthenews.com/accountability/russia-and-ukraine-sc...

[TMWNN]

> Declassified FBI documents indicate otherwise. Flynn actually notified FBI of all meetings with Russians and debriefed with them afterwards.

My "favorite" example of this is Carter Page, whose name was raked over the coals for years because a FBI lawyer intentionally altered evidence (https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/09/us/politics/fbi-ig-report...) showing that far from being a Russian asset, Page had for years briefed the CIA every time he met with suspicious Russians. (Got to love how the Times describes said altering evidence as a "serious error".) For those who want an actual Russiagate-related indictment and guilty plea by an American, Kevin Clinesmith—said FBI lawyer—is your man.

[hcnews]

Mueller expressly said that Justice Dept doesn't go after a sitting President. Hopefully, he will get his day in court after Jan 20, 2021 (no resign + pardon shenanigans). That should set the record straight whether 2016 and 2020 are the same allegations (they are not!).

[meanderer]

If there wasn’t something fishy going on, Flynn and Stone wouldn’t need to be pardoned.

[asabjorn]

Declassified evidence and interviews of the FBI agents in charge of the case corroborate that they thought Flynn was innocent, and actually tried to close the case in January 2017. [1 - contains links to declassified evidence] FBI management overrode their decision, and tried to arrange another meeting to fish for something to nail him on.

Here is the declassified note of the agents in charge of case trying to close it from Jan 4 2017. [2]

[1] https://justthenews.com/accountability/russia-and-ukraine-sc...

[2] https://justthenews.com/sites/default/files/2020-04/FBIFlynn...

[adamsea]

You're assuming equivalence between the two.

What matters is evidence. Facts. Logic. Reason.

The two simply are not equivalent. Check out what Wikipedia says about the Mueller Report:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mueller_report

I'm not claiming the Democrats are perfect or that there aren't mixed motives.

But it's obvious to any thinking person not living in a poisoned media ecosystem that all of these election fraud claims are baseless and ridiculous.

The same is not true about Russian influence operations during the 2016 election and the Trump campaigns, let's say, benign support of them.

[asabjorn]

> But it's obvious to any thinking person not living in a poisoned media ecosystem that all of these election fraud claims are baseless and ridiculous.

If so, the facts around it should be freely discussable like the Russian collusion case was. Censoring the opposition seems fishy and anti-freedom.

[adamsea]

Facts are being discussed. They’re being discussed on CNN. The New York Times. Fox News. In courts of law.

And actually, when the facts are discussed in courts of law what we find every time is that there is no evidence of fraud in any meaningful way. And, that the legal arguments being made don’t make any sense and may actually be asking for something illegal.

The question of a private company choosing to censor right wing anti-democratic propaganda (I think that’s a precise description even if it’s an unpalatable one to you) at the urging of some politicians is a different and tricky question.

I think it’s important to note that there have been threats of violence against state-level civil servants and their families. Threats which YouTube videos like the ones we are discussing foment.

But to say it’s not being discussed is just another lie.