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sheeeit
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Everything posted by sheeeit
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No you moron. I am suggesting that it is seriously ridiculous to think that the Russian spy team would try and start a massive conspiracy operation targeting the potential POTUS using random people that they have absolutely no idea how they would react or act or anything. It is comical. And lets be clear. I am not saying that this meeting proves there was no collusion. Mueller still has to say that. I am saying that there is no way that this meeting was the work of Putin and his spy team.
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Sweet. Mueller gets a lay up.
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You goofballs have the reading comprehension of an 8 year old. Trump co may indeed be monumentally stupid but that is not the point I was making. I was saying that if the plan to work a massive conspiracy between trump and russia was going to be hatched and there was going to be russian election help to Trump and then sanctions easing to russia that it is too stupid for any sane person to believe that Russia/Putin, who you guys have called the master minds of espionage, would kick off the plan in the manner that is being suggested. I do not think russia is that stupid. What a plan. I can just see the russian spy chiefs deciding they are going to perpetrate one of the biggest espionage operations in modern history and their collective plan was to have some unknown British music manager with a connection to a russian pop star send an email to Trump Jr on an open server and ask for a meeting. Then have that music manager (who has zero connection to the russian govt and zero connection to anything intelligence related) sit in on the meeting so he can hear the entire collusion plan and just hope he doesn't say anything. Then they are going to have a relatively unknown russian lawyer with zero history of spying conduct the meeting. Further, just to make it really spy like, they will have her invite another person to join the meeting the day of the meeting who has zero connection to any of this and hope he doesn't say anything. Then make sure there is another person there acting as an interpreter and hope he doesn't say anything. Then have them waltz right into Trump Tower with a horde of media and constant cameras present. Then just hope that Trump Jr does not have anyone on his side (considering they had no idea who would be attending the meeting from the Trump side) that will hear the pitch and hope they don't say something. Maybe triple is actually the head of the gru and came up with this plan.
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A few things here. I have read a bit of Hayden's stuff and I think he is pretty smart and pretty accurate. I agree with the bulk of what you wrote about Russia wanting greater global respect and a seat at the big table. I even agree that what you said about Russia wanting people to "think they did it" is true. But there is a massive distinction between wanting people to suspect you are behind something and having people know you are behind something. If someone is messing with me and I suspect I know who it is but I can do nothing to prove it, then I am vulnerable to them and I have to take them seriously. They have shown that they can mess with me and suffer no consequences. I can not retaliate against them because I have no proof. However, if I catch them red handed and have the facts to back it up, then I can go after them as hard as I want. Hayden has said the exact same thing. He has said that Russia hacking information from the US like the DNC hack was "artful" and something we would do to if we could. he said Russia could use that info to better understand how we think and then use that knowledge to continue to sow discord. However, he has said that when Russia made the emails public via wiki that it was a huge mistake because it now exposed Russia as the culprit and galvanised the countries at the big table against Russia. Russia, in no way, wanted to get caught in the election meddling. Everything that they hoped to gain from the meddling (increased global presence, respect, power, chaos etc) they have actually lost because they got caught. They now suffer from increased financial sanctions imposed by both the US and the EU. The EU is openly investing billions in order to get away from independence on Russian energy. Russia struggles to find trading partners and it is only getting worse. Current sanctions are crippling Russia's economy. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2018/08/06/heres-how-we-know-sanctions-against-russia-are-working/?utm_term=.423de6aeaf84 https://www.ft.com/content/cad69cf4-3e40-11e8-bcc8-cebcb81f1f90 As it stands now, the fact that Russia has been caught has effectively ended any chance Russia has of sitting at the big table. All of which goes back to what I have suggested. I have zero doubts that Russia meddled in the elections. I have little doubt that Russia wanted anyone but Hillary so they tried to help Bernie and then they tried to help Trump. What I believe is that there was no collusion/conspiracy between the Russians and Trump co. The Trump Tower meeting is a perfect example. Either Trump co was compromised before the meeting or not. If they were already compromised, then a meeting like that would be monumentally stupid. If they were not compromised, then attempting to compromise them in that way would be equally monumentally stupid.
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This just does not make any sense. When you describe what Russia wants I assume that includes what Putin wants. What benefit is it to Russia for the world to find out they undermined the electoral process in our elections? All that has resulted is additional financial sanctions on Russia, additional mistrust of Russia by the rest of the world, Germany publicly announcing they will move away from dependence on Russian gas, Brittain hitting them with sanctions etc. When Russia annexed Crimea and got involved in the Uraine, much of the world imposed sanctions on them but some did not. Russia was royally pissed and their economy suffered greatly. Do you think it is more or less likely that sanctions would continue or get stronger if the world found out that Russia is actively trying to undermine all of their elections? I will glady admit that Russia enjoys stirring up chaos. But it is absolutely illogical to think that Russia wants the world to know that they are behind the chaos. How does that help them at all? It just causes the rest of the world to distrust them more and makes the rest of the world willing to impose sanctions on them.
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Really? You still think something will come out of this meeting? Based on what? Did you actually read the transcripts? As usual you guys are so focused on gotcha that you just make yourselves look like fools. No one has ever said that the genesis of the meeting was not to get possible dirt on Hillary. What everyone has said is that at the actual meeting, there was no dirt shared or offerred about Hillary and that the meeting went straight to Magnisky Act stuff and adoptions. This is supported by the testimony of every participant in the meeting. What do you expect Mueller to do with this? Trump Jr. made an on the record statement back in July of 2017 saying the initial request for the meeting was to get possible dirt on Hillary. This has been out there for a long time. If you guys can find one single quote from Trump that indicates that he said the intent or genesis of the meeting was about adoptions then you might catch him in a lie. Trump has only commented previously about the actual meeting and what went on. I would love for any one of you to come up with a theory of how this meeting will hurt Trump with Mueller. It is alo still so funny to me that none of you can make any kind of answer out of the following: If Trump and co have been compromised by Putin for so long through shady financial dealings and a dossier of blackmail material and direct ownership of Manafort and possibly Flynn and all of that that you guys apparently believe, then why would Putin reach out to Trump via an email that every intelligence guy in both Russia and the US knows will likely be captured from some unknown agent like Goldstone? Why have them waltz into Trump Tower on various cameras? It is the most illogical thing ever. Why reach out to some underlings like Papa and Page? I don't think any of you can actually articulate what you actually think happened anymore. It is just Trump and everyone around him is a traitor. And it is based on exactly no credible public evidence. None. It is just Trump is going down and Mueller will get him. I have posted 100s of times that I fully support Mueller and will be one of the first in line to call for impeachments if there is evidence that Trump committed crimes. I have said that TRump should be impeached if he fired Mueller. I like Rod Rosenstein. I suspect that the vast majority of you will not accept the Mueller findings.
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lulz. Was a joke. Get a life. Still have not shown I have any socks because I don't. But keep it up.
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Obvious sock.
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I think this is largely correct with a few caveats. I think Manafort had a short term cash flow issue and needed to collect money from the Uks. So he wanted loans to bridge the gap. I think this because some of the potentially fraudulent loans have been paid back. I have to believe that the feds have him pretty cold as it would be unusual to bring the case without pretty iron clad evidence. It is an interesting case. He was really playing fast and loose with loans and income etc. I am having a hard time coming up with a plausible defense for him but he must have something. I do not see how blaming Gates will be a winner without some paper trail we do not know about. I could see him trying to play a semantics game on the foreign accounts. I suppose he could argue that he understood the disclosure rule to be foreign accounts in his personal name versus business accounts that he controlled. It is also not illegal or uncommon for individuals to take out loans from their businesses. It does need to be well papered though and sounds like his was not. But you can take loans from your business and not pay any taxes. You can also then declare the loan forgiven but then have to report the full amount of the loan as income but could time it to a year when you had losses to off set it or a surplus of cash. The bank fraud aspect is more interesting. Typically, these cases come when someone stops paying the banks back. As far as I know, he is not delinquent in his loans. Obviously does not justify falsifying docs but it is unusual. Especially if it is true that the loans are heavily collateralized and at market rates or above. My experience is that bankers get pretty easy with some of the regulations and paperwork when there is substantial collateral to cover the loan. It is also interesting that usually tax fraud like this gets uncovered when people either do not file or really file low. According to what I have seen, Manafort did declare $5-$6M in earnings on his return so he definitely paid some taxes. It will be interesting to see his defense. I think right now it is at least 95% that he is going down.
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You realize that what you posted has nothing to do with what I actually typed right? I have no narrative. I said I thought Manafort was guilty already. I am working a hypothetical. Businesses set up corps in foreign countries all of the time. US citizens are required to pay taxes on all income that they earn PERSONALLY wherever they reside. Foreign corps that do business in foreign countries are not subject to US income tax even if owned by US citizens. A US citizen could set up a business in Cypress and start selling stuff to Germany for millions of dollars and there is not tax due on anything in the US that is not paid to the US citizen personally.
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Been interesting so far. It is obviously early, but the prosecutors haven't actually pointed out any crimes yet. I am assuming they are setting up the lavish lifestyle so that they can then show how much income was reported on tax returns and there wont be enough. Got me to thinking about something that may not have anything to do with this particular case but is tangential. If a person sets up a corp in a foreign country and then does work under that company and the money is paid to the corp in the foreign country, I do not think that money would be subject to US taxation. Now any amounts that were transferred to the US would certainly be subject to taxation. What I do not know is what happens to purchases made from that foreign account for the benefit of that corp. For instance, if the corp had $5M in income then it should pay taxes on that income in the foreign country. But if that corp then buys real estate in the US, and the real estate is owned by the corp that is based in a foreign country, I am not sure there is any kind of tax due other than property tax. It would be complicated, but in theory, a person that earned significant income from outside of the US, could have their foreign corp own all of their assets (houses, cars, jewelry, furniture, art etc) and then "pay"themselves a nominal amount from the corp and then pay taxes on that amount only and be perfectly legal.
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LOL. Thanks for the tip Einstein. I am not confused about anything. We are using an overly simplified example to make a point. This is getting way in the financial weeds and I have zero interest in debating it with you. There are a myriad of things that maintain the dollar as the reserve currency.
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Of course. I was just commenting that deals are still offered during trial. If the prosecution appears to be winning then the deals get worse for Manafort or there are none at all. If Manafort's team comes up with some out of nowhere point then the deal might get better. I do not think Manafort has anything to offer. Based solely on what we know (which isnt much) I see no reason for the feds to offer him any kind of good deal. I think their case is probably pretty tight.
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No shit. You are selling them to someone else. You will have a NET surplus trade position. It is entirely normal and customary to have different trade positions with different people. If the US has a $100B trade deficit with China but a $200B trade surplus with everyone else then we do not have a problem. But we do not. We have a massive NET trade deficit that is unsustainable. In the example above the company will have a trade deficit with Hong Kong. In this example we are using, virtually every business will have a trade deficit with their suppliers, (unless there is some weird contract where suppliers buy back finished goods) they have to. But they then sell the manufactured goods to other people and they will have trade surpluses with those people and the net position will be a surplus.
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Pos rep. This point is so badly understood by the masses that it is comical.
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Calling out someone for being stupid and not understanding the issue is a bold strategy. You clearly have exactly no idea what we are discussing. In your scenario above, why in the hell would you say that your company has a "million dollar trade deficit" after being in the black? You do understand that when you manufacture and sell your rubber dogshit that you are entering into a trade surplus right? That is the whole point you dumbass. It is ok to have trade deficits when you are growing or are positioning yourself for future growth. Your company has a trade deficit in year 1 when you buy the million dollar gizmo. You spent more money bringing in goods than you made selling them. But when you start selling the dog shit in years 2 and 3 and making a profit your company now has a trade surplus. You are selling more items than you are buying and making a profit.
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I suspect Manafort will get convicted. He can always take a deal at any point before sentencing. Obviously the deal gets worse for him as time goes on.
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I am actually really curious who you think might have paid me for this?
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lulz. There was a time when I thought you were a fairly smart guy. Feel free to look up everyone who has ever repped me (it certainly will not take too long) and let us know who the socks are. It is amazing that people exist that absolutely believe something based on zero actual knowledge.
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You keep saying this and it is just too stupid. I have never used a "sock" of any kind. I can not think of too many more pathetic things to do. I type one post using the first person to make a point and you dorks go crazy. I am certain that the mods can track IP addresses fairly easily. I am happy to have them track mine anytime they want.
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It is not that simple. The cost difference right now is not nearly as high as you might think. Countries like Poland and the Netherlands already have signed deals with US nat gas companies to ship lng. The costs are coming down and Germany (the biggest user of Russian nat gas) is moving forward with very large investments in nat gas infrastructure to facilitate shipped gas. Also, there is a tremendous amount of investment being made right now to lower the costs associated with shipping lng. And the point is that anything the US is doing in this regard is going to hurt russia financially in a big way. In the short term, Russia will have to, and has, reduced their price for nat gas which obviously hurts their profits. In the long term, if the EU and the surrounding countries decide to use more shipped gas from the US and the middle east then Russia gets hurt even more. And there is a decision to be made. Trump is so bad at speaking clearly that most people missed the point of what he is doing. The EU and the surrounding areas are practically begging the US to stay strong in NATO. Lets be honest, NATO in the EU is protection from Russia. Yet, Germany is buying some 50% of its gas from Russia. So germany wants protection from Russia by the US and wants unfettered access to the US markets but still wants to buy the bulk of their energy from russia. The US should absolutely push them to buy more from us. And the bigger point as it relates to this thread on Trump/russia collusion is that ANY action by the US that has the potential to hurt Russia's profits from selling nat gas to the EU is going to be considered incredibly hostile by Putin. As mentioned above, going after Russia's energy exports is about the worst thing that you could do to russia from a financial standpoint. It is hard for me to believe that a Putin puppet would do it.
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I am not even sure where to put this stuff anymore. Been wanting to post this after the recent trade stuff with the EU. One of you conspiracy/russia guys is going to have to explain to me how Putin has Trump as his bitch while Trump is pressuring Europe to import more LNG from the US and is using access to all things US (our markets, our military, our expertise etc) to do it. There is no single bigger harm to Russia/Putin than a decline in their natural gas sales. It is the life blood of their entire economy and Putin's power. Any action by the US to curb its influence is a massive threat to them. Something like 65% of russian exports are oil and gas. Oil is already such a global commodity that russia profits no more or no less than anyone else but, natural gas is very different. Russia's pipeline system gives them an almost monopoly on selling natural gas in the region. Their profits from natural gas are actually higher than that from oil.
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Swam may get an F for some of his economic posts but the rest of you barely get Ds. You are basically just as guilty as swam for cherry picking data and then using the cherry picked data out of context. Using the BOP as an example of our current economic health is very deceiving and I actually expected some of you to know better. It is true that trade deficits are not always bad and not always a sign of economic sickness. As the CATO article pointed out, when an economy is growing and expanding, it often gets into trade deficits so that it can get the goods/materials/resources it needs to keep pace with its expansion. BUT, that is only good in the short term. The win comes when an economy expands enough and grows enough to eventually switch the balance of trade with other economies. Long term trade deficits are a death knell to any economy. Think of it like a small company that takes on a bunch of debt in order to add new machinery or expand a new product line or similar. In the short term, that company will be adding debt at a much higher rate than it is adding income. It will have a "trade imbalance" as it buys new expensive machinery or takes on new people to a point where the new stuff is more expensive than what it is currently producing. But that is ok as long as the company can then use the new machinery and new product line to eventually bring in more money than it cost to add the new stuff. Using the BOP graph is completely bogus. It is certainly correct that a surplus balance of payments is a good thing as long as the foreign investment is actually an investment. If the bulk of the balance was actually foreign govts and entities buying US real estate or US companies or US services then it would truly be a great thing. But it is not that. If we remove things like purchases of US treasuries from foreign govts from our BOP we would be way underwater. We are currently selling treasuries NOT to stimulate growth or make investment in our country. We are selling them to service our debt first and foremost and then to supplement our ability to make payroll. We are not adding new machinery to position ourselves to be the big dog in the future. We are simply taking on debt to stay alive. On tariffs, it is universally agreed that tariffs for the sake of tariffs is a bad idea and, ultimately counter productive. This is especially true if the tariffs are long term in nature. What trump is doing is using the threat of tariffs to get a more level playing field in our trade with other countries. This may or may not be a good strategy, it is way too early to tell. But it is not too early to tell that the course we have been on previously is not working at all. There is certainly a chance that trump's strategy will work. He may be able to leverage tariffs and access to the US markets to get fairer trade deals. I do not believe any country would ever agree to straight up free trade with no tariffs or subsidies. I think they know that the american machine and work ethic and ingenuity etc will win a fair fight more times than not. So we will never get to that point but we might get a lot closer which will certainly help america.
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This sure sounds like a fine ideal but it is just so naively stupid it is hard to take it seriously. If there is a vote to say open up more offshore drilling in the Gulf then it would be great for a lot of texans that work for oil/gas companies and great for the state to get more tax dollars. However, there are a group of conservationists that are worried that expanding drilling will hurt the ecosystem. How should the senator vote on this? How can he represent ALL Texans? You can never possibly represent ALL of anything. Make your platform known, make your ideology known and then follow those if you get elected. Vote for whoever matches closest to you and then hope.
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OK. Just be clear. If you watched wrestlers talking about it on TV and believe them (nothing wrong with that) then just say that. But you can not say you accept that there is a chance Jordan knew nothing but then assert there is no chance he is not in a morally bad position.
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