Treason

The question arises as to whether trump has committed treason by any one or several of many of his actions which have the effect of advancing Russia's interests at the cost of United States National Interests.

There appear to be two components to approaching an answer to that question.

First, are there actions taken by the President which harm the National Interests of the United States and benefit the interests of other states?

And, is the country which is helped by his actions an enemy of the United Sates?

This discussion will limit itself to discussion of some of the President's actions which affect the national interests of Russia. While presidential actions may involve countries other than Russia, one or two actions benefitting Russia at the expense of the United States which began more or less immediately on the president's inauguration and have continued to date will illustrate the point. A longer list of issues is available here: [https://danger-clearandpresent.blogspot.com/2019/07/beating-trump.html]

CONCLUSION

Some of trump's acts and omissions appear to harm the National Interests of the United States and benefit the National Interests of Russia.

Russia is not formally recognized as an enemy of the United States even though it is conducting an active cyber war against our vital interests.

TREASON

An introduction to the concept and law of treason will be useful here.

In law, treason is criminal disloyalty, typically to the state. It is a crime that covers some of the more extreme acts against one's nation or sovereign. This usually includes things such as participating in a war against one's native country, attempting to overthrow its government, spying on its military, its diplomats, or its secret services for a hostile and foreign power, or attempting to kill its head of state. A person who commits treason is known in law as a traitor...

At times, the term traitor has been used as a political epithet, regardless of any verifiable treasonable action. In a civil war or insurrection, the winners may deem the losers to be traitors. Likewise the term traitor is used in heated political discussion – typically as a slur against political dissidents, or against officials in power who are perceived as failing to act in the best interest of their constituents. In certain cases, as with the Dolchstoßlegende (Stab-in-the-back myth), the accusation of treason towards a large group of people can be a unifying political message. Treason is considered to be different and on many occasions a separate charge from "treasonable felony" in many parts of the world. [wikipedia]

CONSTITUTION

To avoid the abuses of the English law, the scope of treason was specifically restricted in the United States Constitution. Article III, section 3 reads as follows:

    Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court.

    The Congress shall have Power to declare the Punishment of Treason, but no Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of Blood, or Forfeiture except during the Life of the Person attainted.

The Constitution does not itself create the offense; it only restricts the definition (the first paragraph), permits the United States Congress to create the offense, and restricts any punishment for treason to only the convicted (the second paragraph). The crime is prohibited by legislation passed by Congress. Therefore, the United States Code at 18 U.S.C. § 2381 states:

    Whoever, owing allegiance to the United States, levies war against them or adheres to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort within the United States or elsewhere, is guilty of treason and shall suffer death, or shall be imprisoned not less than five years and fined under this title but not less than $10,000; and shall be incapable of holding any office under the United States.

The requirement of testimony of two witnesses was inherited from the British Treason Act 1695.

FURTHER U. S. CONGRESS LAWS

However, Congress has passed additional laws creating related offenses that punish conduct that undermines the government or the national security, such as sedition in the 1798 Alien and Sedition Acts, or espionage and sedition in the Espionage Act of 1917, which do not require the testimony of two witnesses and have a much broader definition than Article Three treason. Some of these laws are still in effect. The well-known spies Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were charged with conspiracy to commit espionage, rather than treason. [wikipedia]

NATO - POTENTIALLY TREASONOUS ACTS

Any list of presidential or administrative acts which benefit Russia's national interests would include the immediate sacking of several State Department employees who were charged with coordinating NATO activities as a counter to Russian actions. Russia, and especially Putin, dislikes NATO intensely; they consider it a hostile power devoted to encircling Russian territory and preventing Russia from taking actions in its interests.

Since Russia has borne the brunt of two European invasions of its territories, Russia considers its Western borders to be its most vulnerable areas and devotes much of its military activities to protecting that border.

Any activity which weakens or divides NATO helps Russia directly. trump has taken actions which weaken NATO during his  administration to date. These actions seem to merit a charge of treasonous activity.

ELECTIONS - POTENTIALLY TREASONOUS ACTS

Fair and free elections are the lifeblood of the United States political system. One of our political lodestones is that interference in the election process will damage the vital interests of the United States and, perhaps, pave the way for corruption and tyranny.

Our intelligence community as seconded by the United States Senate has concluded that Russia interfered in the 2016 election in favor of trump and that it will continue that interference with the 2020 election with the objective of returning trump to a second term.

The Bi-Partisan Senate Report provides further bipartisan evidence of Russia's election meddling in 2016; it finds "the IRA [Russian Internet Research Agency] sought to influence the 2016 U.S. presidential election by harming Hillary Clinton’s chances of success and supporting Donald Trump at the direction of the Kremlin." It also says that the IRA's activities were "part of a broader, sophisticated, and ongoing information warfare campaign designed to sow discord in American politics and society" and that IRA activity increased, rather than decreased, after Election Day 2016.

[Read the report here - https://www.axios.com/senate-intelligence-committee-russian-interference-report-425274e8-1780-44c3-963a-cd839ef1cbe5.html]

In order to counter this election meddling, both houses of Congress have passed several laws designed to secure our election process. trump has refused to sign or consider these laws or other measures with the same objective. By his failure to act, trump probably has committed treason against the United States.

IS RUSSIA OUR ENEMY?

Some of trump's acts have damaged the national interests of the United States and helped the national interests of Russia. And, Russia has built up its armed forces in the last few years even though it is a financial burden. See this site for a discussion of the relative strength of Russian and United States armed forces: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qBapU_C76t0]


But, is Russia an enemy?

There has been conflict between the United States and Russia for many generations. While there was a time of tension relaxation during the dissolution of the USSR, Russia under Putin has re-activated hostility toward the USA with an extensive campaign of cyber warfare designed to weaken and exploit the United States.

This campaign seems to have hit its stride in about 2015 and it is fair to say that Russia today is an enemy of the United States. However, the formal foreign relation apparatus of the State Department has lagged behind the current reality and still considers Russia to be a potential partner.

Here is the official statement from the State Department on Russia:

U.S. Relations With Russia - Bilateral Relations Fact Sheet - Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs

June 25, 2019

More information about Russia is available on the Russia Page and from other Department of State publications and other sources listed at the end of this fact sheet.

U.S.-RUSSIA RELATIONS

Russia recognized the United States on October 28, 1803, and diplomatic relations between the United States and Russia were formally established in 1809. Diplomatic relations were interrupted following the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution. On December 6, 1917, President Woodrow Wilson instructed all American diplomatic representatives in Russia to refrain from any direct communication with representatives of the Bolshevik Government. Although diplomatic relations were never formally severed, the United States refused to recognize or have any formal relations with the Bolshevik/Soviet governments until 1933. Normal diplomatic relations were resumed on November 16, 1933, when President Franklin Roosevelt informed Soviet Foreign Minister Maxim Litvinov that the United States recognized the Government of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. On December 25, 1991, the United States recognized the Russian Federation as the successor to the Soviet Union and established diplomatic relations on December 31, 1991.

The United States has long sought a full and constructive relationship with Russia. Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, the United States adopted a bipartisan strategy to facilitate cooperation on global issues and promote foreign investment and trade. The United States supported Russia’s integration into European and global institutions and a deepened bilateral partnership in security cooperation to reinforce the foundations of stability and predictability. In response to the Russian violation in 2014 of Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, however, the United States downgraded the bilateral political and military relationship and suspended the Bilateral Presidential Commission, a body jointly founded in 2009 by the United States and Russia to promote cooperation between the two countries. In addition to ongoing Russian aggression in Georgia and Ukraine, Russia has demonstrated its willingness to undermine norms within the existing international system beyond traditional military campaigns to encompass a suite of “hybrid” tools that are used to gain influence. Russia’s campaign aims to undermine core institutions of the West, such as NATO and the EU, and to weaken faith in the democratic and free-market system. The United States has sought to deter further Russian aggression through the projection of strength and unity with U.S. allies, and by building resilience and reducing vulnerability among allies facing Russian pressure and coercion. The United States would like to move beyond the current low level of trust with Russia, stabilize our relationship, and cooperate where possible and when in core U.S. national security interests. To achieve this, Russia must take demonstrable steps to show it is willing to be a responsible global actor, starting with a cessation of efforts to interfere in democratic processes. The long-term goal of the United States is to see Russia become a constructive stakeholder in the global community.

Bilateral Economic Relations

In response to Russia’s ongoing violations of Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, including Russia’s occupation and attempted annexation of Crimea, the United States has suspended bilateral engagement with the Russian government on most economic issues. The United States continues to investigate allegations of mistreatment of or discrimination against U.S. investors in Russia and to urge Russia to improve its investment climate, adherence to the rule of law, and transparency. In Russia, the U.S. Commercial Service continues to assist U.S. firms interested in developing market opportunities that do not violate sanctions.

Since 2014, the United States and our European and G-7 partners imposed sanctions on Russia for its aggressive actions in eastern Ukraine, occupation of Crimea, and interference in U.S. elections. Sectoral sanctions have reduced Russia’s ability to access financing in the financial, energy, and defense sectors, as well as limited its access to certain technologies in those sectors.

A combination of low oil prices, structural limitations, and sanctions pushed Russia into a deep recession in 2015, with the economy contracting by four percent and one percent in 2016. Russia’s economy has returned to modest growth since 2017, owing to a global rebound in oil prices.  The World Bank projects that GDP growth will remain modest, at approximately 1.5-1.8 percent in the period 2018-2020.  In 2018, Russia’s oil production reached a post-Soviet high, averaging 11.6 barrels/day.

United States State Department.

HISTORICAL EXAMPLES OF TREASON

United States

In the 1790s, opposition political parties were new and not fully accepted. Government leaders often considered their opponents to be traitors. Historian Ron Chernow reports that Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton and President George Washington "regarded much of the criticism fired at their administration as disloyal, even treasonous, in nature."When an undeclared Quasi-War broke out with France in 1797–98, "Hamilton increasingly mistook dissent for treason and engaged in hyperbole." Furthermore, the Jeffersonian opposition party behaved the same way.  After 1801, with a peaceful transition in the political party in power, the rhetoric of "treason" against political opponents diminished. [wikipedia}

Historical cases

In the United States, Benedict Arnold's name is considered synonymous with treason due to his collaboration with the British during the American Revolutionary War. This, however, occurred before the Constitution was written. Arnold became a general in the British Army, which protected him.

Since the Constitution came into effect, there have been fewer than 40 federal prosecutions for treason and even fewer convictions. Several men were convicted of treason in connection with the 1794 Whiskey Rebellion but were pardoned by President George Washington.

Burr trial

The most famous treason trial, that of Aaron Burr in 1807, resulted in acquittal. In 1807, on a charge of treason, Burr was brought to trial before the United States Circuit Court at Richmond, Virginia. The only physical evidence presented to the grand jury was General James Wilkinson's so-called letter from Burr, which proposed the idea of stealing land in the Louisiana Purchase. The trial was presided over by Chief Justice of the United States John Marshall, acting as a circuit judge. Since no witnesses testified, Burr was acquitted in spite of the full force of Jefferson's political influence thrown against him. Immediately afterward, Burr was tried on a misdemeanor charge and was again acquitted.

Civil War

During the American Civil War, treason trials were held in Indianapolis against Copperheads for conspiring with the Confederacy against the United States. After the war the question was whether the United States government would make indictments for treason against leaders of the Confederate States of America, as many people demanded. Jefferson Davis, the Confederate president, was indicted and held in prison for two years. The indictment was dropped in 1869 when the political scene had changed and it was possible he would be acquitted by a jury in Virginia. When accepting Lee's surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia, at Appomattox, in April 1865, Gen. Ulysses S. Grant assured all Confederate soldiers and officers a blanket amnesty, provided they returned to their homes and refrained from any further acts of hostility, and subsequently other Union generals issued similar terms of amnesty when accepting Confederate surrenders. All Confederate officials received a blanket amnesty issued by President Andrew Johnson as he left office in 1869.

World War II

Iva Toguri, known as Tokyo Rose, was tried for treason after World War II for her broadcasts to American troops.

In 1949 Iva Toguri D'Aquino was convicted of treason for wartime radio broadcasts (under the name of "Tokyo Rose") and sentenced to ten years, of which she served six. As a result of prosecution witnesses having lied under oath, she was pardoned in 1977.

In 1952 Tomoya Kawakita, a Japanese-American dual citizen was convicted of treason and sentenced to death for having worked as an interpreter at a Japanese POW camp and having mistreated American prisoners. He was recognized by a former prisoner at a department store in 1946 after having returned to the United States. The sentence was later commuted to life imprisonment and a $10,000 fine. He was released and deported in 1963.

Cold War and after

The Cold War saw frequent talk linking treason with support for Communist-led causes. The most memorable of these came from Senator Joseph McCarthy, who used rhetoric about the Democrats as guilty of "twenty years of treason". As chosen chair of the Senate Permanent Investigations Subcommittee, McCarthy also investigated various government agencies for Soviet spy rings (see the Venona project); however, he acted as a political fact-finder rather than a criminal prosecutor. The Cold War period saw no prosecutions for explicit treason, but there were convictions and even executions for conspiracy to commit espionage on behalf of the Soviet Union, such as in the Julius and Ethel Rosenberg case.

On October 11, 2006, the United States government charged Adam Yahiye Gadahn for videos in which he appeared as a spokesman for al-Qaeda and threatened attacks on American soil. He was killed on January 19, 2015 in an unmanned aircraft (drone) strike in Waziristan, Pakistan.

Treason against U.S. states

Most states have treason provisions in their constitutions or statutes similar to those in the U.S. Constitution. The Extradition Clause specifically defines treason as an extraditable offense.

Thomas Jefferson in 1791 said that any Virginia official who cooperated with the federal Bank of the United States proposed by Alexander Hamilton was guilty of "treason" against the state of Virginia and should be executed. The Bank opened and no one was prosecuted.

Several persons have been prosecuted for treason on the state level. Thomas Dorr was convicted for treason against the state of Rhode Island for his part in the Dorr Rebellion, but was eventually granted amnesty. John Brown was convicted of treason against the Commonwealth of Virginia for his part in the raid on Harpers Ferry, and was hanged. The Mormon prophet, Joseph Smith, was charged with treason against Missouri along with five others, at first in front of a state military court, but Smith was allowed to escape to Illinois after his case was transferred to a civilian court for trial on charges of treason and other crimes. Smith was then later imprisoned for trial on charges of treason against Illinois, but was murdered by a lynch mob while in jail awaiting trial. [wikipedia]

'The Battle Hymn of the Republic'

Our justice will be temporal..

'The Battle Hymn of the Republic', Song by Julia Ward Howe

Lyrics

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored
He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword

His truth is marching on

Glory, Glory, hallelujah!

Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!

His truth is marching on

I have seen Him in the watch-fires of a hundred circling camps
They have builded Him an altar in the evening dews and damps

I can read His righteous sentence by the dim and flaring lamps

His day is marching on.

Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
His day is marching on

I have read a fiery gospel writ in burnished rows of steel
"As ye deal with my contemners, so with you my grace shall deal"
Let the Hero, born of woman, crush the serpent with his heel

Since God is marching on

Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Since God is marching on

He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat
He is sifting out the hearts of men before His judgment-seat
Oh, be swift, my soul, to answer Him! Be jubilant, my feet!

Our God is marching on

Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Our God is marching on

In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea
With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me
As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free

While God is marching on

Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
While God is marching on

Source: LyricFind

Songwriters: Peter Knight / John William Steffe / Julia Ward Howe

The Battle Hymn of the Republic lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Warner Chappell Music, Inc, Universal Music Publishing Group, Kobalt Music Publishing Ltd.

THE TRUMP-UKRAINE IMPEACHMENT REPORT

THE TRUMP-UKRAINE IMPEACHMENT REPORT

The impeachment inquiry into Donald J. Trump, the 45th President of the United States, uncovered a months-long effort by President Trump to use the powers of his office to solicit foreign interference on his behalf in the 2020 election.  As described in this executive summary and the report that follows, President Trump’s scheme subverted U.S. foreign policy toward Ukraine and undermined our national security in favor of two politically motivated investigations that would help his presidential reelection campaign.  The President demanded that the newly-elected Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky, publicly announce investigations into a political rival that he apparently feared the most, former Vice President Joe Biden, and into a discredited theory that it was Ukraine, not Russia, that interfered in the 2016 presidential election.  To compel the Ukrainian President to do his political bidding, President Trump conditioned two official acts on the public announcement of the investigations:  a coveted White House visit and critical U.S. military assistance Ukraine needed to fight its Russian adversary.

During a July 25, 2019, call between President Trump and President Zelensky, President Zelensky expressed gratitude for U.S. military assistance.  President Trump immediately responded by asking President Zelensky to “do us a favor though” and openly pressed for Ukraine to investigate former Vice President Biden and the 2016 conspiracy theory.  In turn, President Zelensky assured President Trump that he would pursue the investigation and reiterated his interest in the White House meeting.  Although President Trump’s scheme intentionally bypassed many career personnel, it was undertaken with the knowledge and approval of senior Administration officials, including the President’s Acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, and Secretary of Energy Rick Perry.  In fact, at a press conference weeks after public revelations about the scheme, Mr. Mulvaney publicly acknowledged that the President directly tied the hold on military aid to his desire to get Ukraine to conduct a political investigation, telling Americans to “get over it.”

President Trump and his senior officials may see nothing wrong with using the power of the Office of the President to pressure a foreign country to help the President’s reelection campaign.  Indeed, President Trump continues to encourage Ukraine and other foreign countries to engage in the same kind of election interference today.  However, the Founding Fathers prescribed a remedy for a chief executive who places his personal interests above those of the country:  impeachment.  Accordingly, as part of the House of Representatives’ impeachment inquiry, the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, in coordination with the Committees on Oversight and Reform and Foreign Affairs, were compelled to undertake a serious, sober, and expeditious investigation into whether the President’s misconduct warrants that remedy.

In response, President Trump engaged in an unprecedented campaign of obstruction of this impeachment inquiry.  Nevertheless, due in large measure to patriotic and courageous public servants who provided the Committees with direct evidence of the President’s actions, the Committees uncovered significant misconduct on the part of the President of the United States.  As required under House Resolution 660, the Intelligence Committee, in consultation with the Committees on Oversight and Reform and Foreign Affairs, has prepared this report to detail the evidence uncovered to date, which will now be transmitted to the Judiciary Committee for its consideration.

 

1. Preface
2. Executive Summary
3. Key Findings of Fact
4. Report


This report reflects the evidence gathered thus far by the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, in coordination with the Committee on Oversight and Reform and the Committee on Foreign Affairs, as part of the House of Representatives’ impeachment inquiry into Donald J. Trump, the 45th President of the United States.

The report is the culmination of an investigation that began in September 2019 and intensified over the past three months as new revelations and evidence of the President’s misconduct towards Ukraine emerged.  The Committees pursued the truth vigorously, but fairly, ensuring the full participation of both parties throughout the probe.

Sustained by the tireless work of more than three dozen dedicated staff across the three Committees, we issued dozens of subpoenas for documents and testimony and took more than 100 hours of deposition testimony from 17 witnesses.  To provide the American people the opportunity to learn and evaluate the facts themselves, the Intelligence Committee held seven public hearings with 12 witnesses—including three requested by the Republican Minority—that totaled more than 30 hours.

At the outset, I want to recognize my late friend and colleague Elijah E. Cummings, whose grace and commitment to justice served as our North Star throughout this investigation.  I would also like to thank my colleagues Eliot L. Engel and Carolyn B. Maloney, chairs respectively of the Foreign Affairs and Oversight and Reform Committees, as well as the Members of those Committees, many of whom provided invaluable contributions.  Members of the Intelligence Committee, as well, worked selflessly and collaboratively throughout this investigation.  Finally, I am grateful to Speaker Nancy Pelosi for the trust she placed in our Committees to conduct this work and for her wise counsel throughout.

I also want to thank the dedicated professional staff of the Intelligence Committee, who worked ceaselessly and with remarkable poise and ability.  My deepest gratitude goes to Daniel Goldman, Rheanne Wirkkala, Maher Bitar, Timothy Bergreen, Patrick Boland, Daniel Noble, Nicolas Mitchell, Sean Misko, Patrick Fallon, Diana Pilipenko, William Evans, Ariana Rowberry, Wells Bennett, and William Wu.  Additional Intelligence Committee staff members also assured that the important oversight work of the Committee continued, even as we were required to take on the additional responsibility of conducting a key part of the House impeachment inquiry.  Finally, I would like to thank the devoted and outstanding staff of the Committee on Oversight and Reform, including but not limited to Dave Rapallo, Susanne Sachsman Grooms, Peter Kenny, Krista Boyd, and Janet Kim, as well as Laura Carey from the Committee on Foreign Affairs.

* * *


In his farewell address, President George Washington warned of a moment when “cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government, destroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion.”

The Framers of the Constitution well understood that an individual could one day occupy the Office of the President who would place his personal or political interests above those of the nation.  Having just won hard-fought independence from a King with unbridled authority, they were attuned to the dangers of an executive who lacked fealty to the law and the Constitution.

In response, the Framers adopted a tool used by the British Parliament for several hundred years to constrain the Crown—the power of impeachment.  Unlike in Britain, where impeachment was typically reserved for inferior officers but not the King himself, impeachment in our untested democracy was specifically intended to serve as the ultimate form of accountability for a duly-elected President.  Rather than a mechanism to overturn an election, impeachment was explicitly contemplated as a remedy of last resort for a president who fails to faithfully execute his oath of office “to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

Accordingly, the Constitution confers the power to impeach the president on Congress, stating that the president shall be removed from office upon conviction for “Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.”  While the Constitutional standard for removal from office is justly a high one, it is nonetheless an essential check and balance on the authority of the occupant of the Office of the President, particularly when that occupant represents a continuing threat to our fundamental democratic norms, values, and laws.

Alexander Hamilton explained that impeachment was not designed to cover only criminal violations, but also crimes against the American people.  “The subjects of its jurisdiction,” Hamilton wrote, “are those offenses which proceed from the misconduct of public men, or, in other words, from the abuse or violation of some public trust. They are of a nature which may with peculiar propriety be denominated political, as they relate chiefly to injuries done immediately to the society itself.”

Similarly, future Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court James Wilson, a delegate from Pennsylvania at the Constitutional Convention, distinguished impeachable offenses from those that reside “within the sphere of ordinary jurisprudence.”  As he noted, “impeachments are confined to political characters, to political crimes and misdemeanors, and to political punishments.”



* * *

As this report details, the impeachment inquiry has found that President Trump, personally and acting through agents within and outside of the U.S. government, solicited the interference of a foreign government, Ukraine, to benefit his reelection.  In furtherance of this scheme, President Trump conditioned official acts on a public announcement by the new Ukrainian President, Volodymyr Zelensky, of politically-motivated investigations, including one into President Trump’s domestic political opponent.  In pressuring President Zelensky to carry out his demand, President Trump withheld a White House meeting desperately sought by the Ukrainian President, and critical U.S. military assistance to fight Russian aggression in eastern Ukraine.

The President engaged in this course of conduct for the benefit of his own presidential reelection, to harm the election prospects of a political rival, and to influence our nation’s upcoming presidential election to his advantage.  In doing so, the President placed his own personal and political interests above the national interests of the United States, sought to undermine the integrity of the U.S. presidential election process, and endangered U.S. national security.

At the center of this investigation is the memorandum prepared following President Trump’s July 25, 2019, phone call with Ukraine’s President, which the White House declassified and released under significant public pressure.  The call record alone is stark evidence of misconduct; a demonstration of the President’s prioritization of his personal political benefit over the national interest.  In response to President Zelensky’s appreciation for vital U.S. military assistance, which President Trump froze without explanation, President Trump asked for “a favor though”:  two specific investigations designed to assist his reelection efforts.

Our investigation determined that this telephone call was neither the start nor the end of President Trump’s efforts to bend U.S. foreign policy for his personal gain.  Rather, it was a dramatic crescendo within a months-long campaign driven by President Trump in which senior U.S. officials, including the Vice President, the Secretary of State, the Acting Chief of Staff, the Secretary of Energy, and others were either knowledgeable of or active participants in an effort to extract from a foreign nation the personal political benefits sought by the President.

The investigation revealed the nature and extent of the President’s misconduct, notwithstanding an unprecedented campaign of obstruction by the President and his Administration to prevent the Committees from obtaining documentary evidence and testimony.  A dozen witnesses followed President Trump’s orders, defying voluntary requests and lawful subpoenas, and refusing to testify.  The White House, Department of State, Department of Defense, Office of Management and Budget, and Department of Energy refused to produce a single document in response to our subpoenas.

Ultimately, this sweeping effort to stonewall the House of Representatives’ “sole Power of Impeachment” under the Constitution failed because witnesses courageously came forward and testified in response to lawful process.  The report that follows was only possible because of their sense of duty and devotion to their country and its Constitution.

Nevertheless, there remain unanswered questions, and our investigation must continue, even as we transmit our report to the Judiciary Committee.  Given the proximate threat of further presidential attempts to solicit foreign interference in our next election, we cannot wait to make a referral until our efforts to obtain additional testimony and documents wind their way through the courts.  The evidence of the President’s misconduct is overwhelming, and so too is the evidence of his obstruction of Congress.  Indeed, it would be hard to imagine a stronger or more complete case of obstruction than that demonstrated by the President since the inquiry began.

The damage the President has done to our relationship with a key strategic partner will be remedied over time, and Ukraine continues to enjoy strong bipartisan support in Congress.  But the damage to our system of checks and balances, and to the balance of power within our three branches of government, will be long-lasting and potentially irrevocable if the President’s ability to stonewall Congress goes unchecked.  Any future President will feel empowered to resist an investigation into their own wrongdoing, malfeasance, or corruption, and the result will be a nation at far greater risk of all three.

* * *

The decision to move forward with an impeachment inquiry is not one we took lightly.  Under the best of circumstances, impeachment is a wrenching process for the nation.  I resisted calls to undertake an impeachment investigation for many months on that basis, notwithstanding the existence of presidential misconduct that I believed to be deeply unethical and damaging to our democracy.  The alarming events and actions detailed in this report, however, left us with no choice but to proceed.

In making the decision to move forward, we were struck by the fact that the President’s misconduct was not an isolated occurrence, nor was it the product of a naïve president.  Instead, the efforts to involve Ukraine in our 2020 presidential election were undertaken by a President who himself was elected in 2016 with the benefit of an unprecedented and sweeping campaign of election interference undertaken by Russia in his favor, and which the President welcomed and utilized.

Having witnessed the degree to which interference by a foreign power in 2016 harmed our democracy, President Trump cannot credibly claim ignorance to its pernicious effects.  Even more pointedly, the President’s July call with Ukrainian President Zelensky, in which he solicited an investigation to damage his most feared 2020 opponent, came the day after Special Counsel Robert Mueller testified to Congress about Russia’s efforts to damage his 2016 opponent and his urgent warning of the dangers of further foreign interference in the next election. With this backdrop, the solicitation of new foreign intervention was the act of a president unbound, not one chastened by experience.  It was the act of a president who viewed himself as unaccountable and determined to use his vast official powers to secure his reelection.

This repeated and pervasive threat to our democratic electoral process added urgency to our work.  On October 3, 2019, even as our Committee was engaged in this inquiry, President Trump publicly declared anew that other countries should open investigations into his chief political rival, saying, “China should start an investigation into the Bidens,” and that “President Zelensky, if it were me, I would recommend that they start an investigation into the Bidens.” When a reporter asked the President what he hoped Ukraine’s President would do following the July 25 call, President Trump, seeking to dispel any doubt as to his continuing intention, responded:  “Well, I would think that, if they were honest about it, they’d start a major investigation into the Bidens.  It’s a very simple answer.”

By doubling down on his misconduct and declaring that his July 25 call with President Zelensky was “perfect,” President Trump has shown a continued willingness to use the power of his office to seek foreign intervention in our next election.  His Acting Chief of Staff, Mick Mulvaney, in the course of admitting that the President had linked security assistance to Ukraine to the announcement of one of his desired investigations, told the American people to “get over it.”  In these statements and actions, the President became the author of his own impeachment inquiry.  The question presented by the set of facts enumerated in this report may be as simple as that posed by the President and his chief of staff’s brazenness:  is the remedy of impeachment warranted for a president who would use the power of his office to coerce foreign interference in a U.S. election, or is that now a mere perk of the office that Americans must simply “get over”?

* * *

Those watching the impeachment hearings might have been struck by how little discrepancy there was between the witnesses called by the Majority and Minority.  Indeed, most of the facts presented in the pages that follow are uncontested.  The broad outlines as well as many of the details of the President’s scheme have been presented by the witnesses with remarkable consistency.  There will always be some variation in the testimony of multiple people witnessing the same events, but few of the differences here go to the heart of the matter.  And so, it may have been all the more surprising to the public to see very disparate reactions to the testimony by the Members of Congress from each party.

If there was one ill the Founding Founders feared as much as that of an unfit president, it may have been that of excessive factionalism.  Although the Framers viewed parties as necessary, they also endeavored to structure the new government in such a way as to minimize the “violence of faction.”  As George Washington warned in his farewell address, “the common and continual mischiefs of the spirit of party are sufficient to make it the interest and duty of a wise people to discourage and restrain it.”

Today, we may be witnessing a collision between the power of a remedy meant to curb presidential misconduct and the power of faction determined to defend against the use of that remedy on a president of the same party.  But perhaps even more corrosive to our democratic system of governance, the President and his allies are making a comprehensive attack on the very idea of fact and truth.  How can a democracy survive without acceptance of a common set of experiences?

America remains the beacon of democracy and opportunity for freedom-loving people around the world.  From their homes and their jail cells, from their public squares and their refugee camps, from their waking hours until their last breath, individuals fighting human rights abuses, journalists uncovering and exposing corruption, persecuted minorities struggling to survive and preserve their faith, and countless others around the globe just hoping for a better life look to America.  What we do will determine what they see, and whether America remains a nation committed to the rule of law.

As Benjamin Franklin departed the Constitutional Convention, he was asked, “what have we got?  A Republic or a Monarchy?”  He responded simply:  “A Republic, if you can keep it.”

Adam B. Schiff

Chairman, House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence

For the complete report, see this:  https://intelligence.house.gov/report/

Is trump an American - 3. Declaration of Independence 1776

Read and judge for yourself whether he is abiding by our foundations:

In Congress, July 4, 1776.

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,


When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,

--That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people
.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

---

Georgia

Button Gwinnett

Lyman Hall

George Walton

North Carolina

William Hooper

Joseph Hewes

John Penn

South Carolina

Edward Rutledge

Thomas Heyward, Jr.

Thomas Lynch, Jr.

Arthur Middleton

Massachusetts

John Hancock

Maryland

Samuel Chase

William Paca

Thomas Stone

Charles Carroll of Carrollton

Virginia

George Wythe

Richard Henry Lee

Thomas Jefferson

Benjamin Harrison

Thomas Nelson, Jr.

Francis Lightfoot Lee

Carter Braxton

Pennsylvania

Robert Morris

Benjamin Rush

Benjamin Franklin

John Morton

George Clymer

James Smith

George Taylor

James Wilson

George Ross

Delaware

Caesar Rodney

George Read

Thomas McKean

New York

William Floyd

Philip Livingston

Francis Lewis

Lewis Morris

New Jersey

Richard Stockton

John Witherspoon

Francis Hopkinson

John Hart

Abraham Clark

New Hampshire

Josiah Bartlett

William Whipple

Massachusetts

Samuel Adams

John Adams

Robert Treat Paine

Elbridge Gerry

Rhode Island

Stephen Hopkins

William Ellery

Connecticut

Roger Sherman

Samuel Huntington

William Williams

Oliver Wolcott

New Hampshire

Matthew Thornton

Is trump an American - 2. FREEMAN’S OATH, Massachusetts 1639

Read and judge for yourself whether he is abiding by our foundations:

FREEMAN’S OATH, Massachusetts 1639

The Freeman's Oath was the first paper printed in New England. Printed in Cambridge Massachusetts, by Stephen Day, in 1639. There is no known copy of the original.  Below is one version of the Freeman's Oath.  It changed slightly from providence to providence.

I __[NAME]______being by gods providence, an Inhabitant, and Freeman, within the Jurisdiction of this Commonwealth; do freely acknowledge myself to be subject to the Government thereof: And therefore do here swear by the great and dreadful Name of the Ever-living God, that I will be true and faithful to the same, and will accordingly yield assistance and support there unto, with my person and estate, as in equity I am bound; and will also truly endeavor to maintain and preserve all the liberties and privileges thereof, submitting myself to the wholesome Laws and Orders made and established by the same. And further, that I will not plot or practice any evil against it, or consent to any that shall so do; but will timely discover and reveal the same to lawful Authority now here established, for the speedy preventing thereof.

Moreover, I do solemnly bind myself in the sight of God, that when I shall be called to give my voice touching any such matter of this State, in which Freemen are to deal, I will give my vote 

and suffrage as I shall judge in mine own conscience may best conduce and tend to the public weal of the body, So help me God in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Is trump an American - 1 Mayflower Compact

Read and judge for yourself whether he is abiding by our foundations:

The full text of the Mayflower Compact is as follows:

In the name of God, Amen. We, whose names are underwritten, the Loyal Subjects of our dread Sovereign Lord King James, by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King, defender of the Faith, etc.:

Having undertaken, for the Glory of God, and advancements of the Christian faith, and the honor of our King and Country, a voyage to plant the first colony in the Northern parts of Virginia; do by these presents, solemnly and mutually, in the presence of God, and one another; covenant and combine ourselves together into a civil body politic; for our better ordering, and preservation and furtherance of the ends aforesaid; and by virtue hereof to enact, constitute, and frame, such just and equal laws, ordinances, acts, constitutions, and offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most meet and convenient for the general good of the colony; unto which we promise all due submission and obedience.

In witness whereof we have hereunto subscribed our names at Cape Cod the 11th of November, in the year of the reign of our Sovereign Lord King James, of England, France, and Ireland, the eighteenth, and of Scotland the fifty-fourth, 1620.

Putin: From Oligarch to Kleptocrat

Putin: From Oligarch to Kleptocrat,  

Author Ruth May. https://www.nybooks.com/daily/2018/02/01/putin-from-oligarch-to-kleptocrat/

Extensive discussion of Putin clamping down [see full article at link ]:

'...In November 2011, one of my graduate students emailed me a link to a YouTube video. He said it was about Russia and that it would shock me. I doubted it: after following economic and political events in post-Soviet Russia for twenty years, I felt I was unshockable. I was wrong. My jaw dropped as I watched 20,000 ordinary Russians booing Vladimir Putin as he stepped into a ring at a martial arts match to introduce the fighters. A few weeks later, when the December 2011 parliamentary elections were held, Putin’s United Russia Party still won, but only by a slim majority. Multiple reports of election fraud spread quickly on social media after the polls closed, and people took to the streets in the largest popular demonstrations since the fall of the Soviet Union.

It was around this time that one of my closest Russian colleagues told me that he believed that the only thing that Putin truly feared was the power of “uncontrolled” social media. In the year that had then just passed, Putin had watched as, one by one, leaders of authoritarian regimes in the Middle East and North Africa were overthrown by protesters during the Arab Spring. He was determined not to allow this to happen in the streets of Moscow.

A month ahead of the March 2012 presidential election, some 100,000 Russians demonstrated in -18° C temperatures in Moscow, calling for a rerun of the disputed December parliamentary elections—to no avail: Putin won his third term. But the day before his inauguration, violent clashes erupted between police and some 20,000 protesters in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square. He responded by signing a law criminalizing public protests without a permit. Even so, on June 12, about 70,000 brave demonstrators marched in defiance. The war between Russian civil society and the Kremlin was on. Unfortunately, it received limited attention outside Russia, much less any credible coverage on traditional media inside Russia—which the government already controlled....

In July 2012, Putin signed the Internet Restriction Law, which established a federal blacklist of websites containing any content that the government deemed “extreme.” The law permitted Roskomnadzor, the mass-media regulator, to block—without a court order—public access to any website; it also expanded a ten-year-old statute, the Law on the Counteraction of Extremist Activity, that permitted courts to issue cease and desist orders at the government’s request to media companies that published or aired material that could be damaging to an individual’s image. There would be no more satirical puppet shows mocking politicians....'

Life in Russia Below Average Says OECD

Russian Federation - How’s Life?

The Russian Federation has made progress over the last decade in improving the quality of life of its citizens, despite lower than average scores in some topics on the Better Life Index. The Russian Federation ranks above the average in education and skills, and work-life balance but below average in the dimensions of subjective well-being, income and wealth, jobs and earnings, personal security, environmental quality, housing, civic engagement, social connections, and health status. These rankings are based on available selected data.

Money, while it cannot buy happiness, is an important means to achieving higher living standards. In the Russian Federation, the average household net-adjusted disposable income per capita is lower than the OECD average of USD 33 604 a year. In terms of employment, around 70% of people aged 15 to 64 in Russia have a paid job, above the OECD employment average of 68%. Some 76% of men are in paid work, compared with 66% of women. In the Russian Federation, very few employees work very long hours, at 0.1% compared with 11% on average in the OECD, with 0.2% of men working very long hours compared with almost no women.

Good education and skills are important requisites for finding a job. In Russia, 94% of adults aged 25-64 have completed upper secondary education, much higher than the OECD average of 78%. This is truer of women than men, as 93% of men have successfully completed high-school compared with 95% of women. In terms of the quality of the educational system, the average student scored 492 in reading literacy, maths and science in the OECD's Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), slightly higher than the OECD average of 486. On average in the Russian Federation, girls outperformed boys by 8 points, higher than the average OECD gap of 2 points.

In terms of health, life expectancy at birth in the Russian Federation is 72 years, eight years below the OECD average of 80 years. Life expectancy for women is 77 years, compared with 67 for men. The level of atmospheric PM2.5 – tiny air pollutant particles small enough to enter and cause damage to the lungs – is 15.5 micrograms per cubic meter, higher than the OECD average of 13.9 micrograms per cubic meter. The Russian Federation could do better in terms of water quality, as only 55% of people say they are satisfied with the quality of their water, lower than the OECD average of 81%.

Concerning the public sphere, there is a moderate sense of community and level of civic participation in the Russian Federation, where 89% of people believe that they know someone they could rely on in time of need,  the same as the OECD average. Voter turnout, a measure of citizens' participation in the political process, was 68% during recent elections,lower than the OECD average of 68%. Voter turnout for the top 20% of the population is an estimated 72% and for the bottom 20% it is an estimated 69%, a much narrower gap than the OECD average gap of 13 percentage points, and suggests there is broad social inclusion in Russia's democratic institutions.

In general, Russians are less satisfied with their lives than the OECD average. When asked to rate their general satisfaction with life on a scale from 0 to 10, Russians gave it a 5.8 grade on average, lower than the OECD average of 6.5.

http://www.oecdbetterlifeindex.org/countries/russian-federation/

OSCE - Russian Elections Lack Choice

MOSCOW (Reuters) - The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe said on Monday there had been no real choice in Russia’s presidential election and complained it had been marked by unfair pressure on critical voices

“Choice without real competition, as we have seen here, is not real choice,” the OSCE said in a statement, adding that restrictions on fundamental freedoms, as well as on candidate registration, had limited the space for political engagement.

The OSCE gave its verdict after President Vladimir Putin won 76.69 percent of vote in a landslide re-election victory on Sunday, extending his rule over the world’s largest country for another six years.

Putin’s critics, including opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who was barred from running in the race, said there had been widespread fraud and that observers had seen people being bussed to polling stations by their own employers.

The Central Election Commission said on Monday morning that it had not registered any serious complaints of violations.

But the OSCE said political rights and fundamental freedoms of assembly, association and expression had been limited in Russia since 2012, and that some activists had who questioned the election’s legitimacy had been detained.

“Observers noted a variety of measures, some involving inappropriate pressure on voters, aimed at increasing turnout. Persistent pressure on civil society, the absence of critical reporting in most media, and concerted efforts to increase turnout characterized the political environment of this election,” the OSCE said. “While the incumbent president did  not participate in debates or in campaigning, the extensive coverage of his official activities provided him with a dominant presence”, it added.

Reporting by Andrew Osborn and Jack Stubbs; Writing by Denis Pinchuk; Editing by Andrew Osborn - March 19, 2018 / 5:45 AM / 2 years ago

Are any Internet Research Agency Employees Western spies??

Here are some of the folks associated with the Internet research Agency in St. Petersburg according to wikipedia. I have absolutely no knowledge as to whether any of them are Western sympathizers. My goal is to sow confusion in the IRA.



Alexey Soskovets

Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of the holding company Concord Management and Consulting

Nadejda Orlova,

Anton Nosik,

Rustem Adagamov,

Dmitriy Aleshkovskiy

Lyudmila Savchuk

Dzheykhun Nasimi

Ogly Aslanov,

Anna Vladislavovna Bogacheva,

Maria Anatolyevna Bovda,

Robert Sergeyevich Bovda,

Mikhail Leonidovich Burchik,

Mikhail Ivanovich Bystrov,

Irina Viktorovna Kaverzina,

Aleksandra Yuryevna Krylova,

Vadim Vladimirovich Podkopaev,

Sergey Pavlovich Polozov,

Yevgeny Viktorovich Prigozhin,

Gleb Igorevitch Vasilchenko,

Vladimir Venkov

Elena Khusyaynova

Pity the Troll

I want to get real about Russian trolls.

Putin has installed a dedicated cadre of trolls into the Internet Research Agency. Their mission is to disrupt the political process in the United States.

Probably he has done so now because his regime is facing trouble. Some few years ago, he directed the Russian economy to depend on the oil industry as the sole income earner for Russia. See BLOWOUT, Rachel Maddow for the background.

The Russian oil industry has three dominating characteristics:

First, it is technologically retarded and its oil fields with easily extracted reserves are depleted; they now require advanced technology to get at the oil.

Second, sanctions imposed by the United States prevent Russia from getting the knowledge and skills it does not have from American oil companies like Exxon.

Third, all Russian oil companies are corrupt and controlled by Putin through his personally chosen oligarchs.

On top of this, the Russian economy is very poor and skewed so that income flows only to the top. It presents a classic oligarchic structure and is thus ripe, perhaps overripe, for revolution. Putin's days are numbered.

Side by side comparison of GDP per capita for Russia and the US:

Russia 2018 GDP per capita $ 11,289

USA 2018 GDP per capita $ 62,869            

https://countryeconomy.com/countries/compare/russia/usa

Americans live in a rich country; Russians live in a poor country.

As an American, I am a free man; I can, and do, complain about the President. I do so without fear of death or imprisonment. I live in California near the Pacific Ocean where the temperature seldom drops below freezing. I have many relatives and friends whom I love and are close to me. Some of those people are Trump supporters; and, as my Tennessee born Grandmother would say 'God bless their little hearts'.  We disagree and still love each other, for the most part.

A particular Russian troll has threatened that he would take over my Face book page. In response, I pity him.

He is Russian and lives in a totalitarian state where he will be killed if he criticizes Putin. He lives in St. Petersburg where you can freeze to death while crossing the street. He cannot get away from that city and he can be with Russian women only. They are incredibly lovely but hard to live with; my ex-wife is Russian. And, if he wants to be with a man instead of a woman, he will be beaten in the streets.

I can have him killed very easily - all I have to do is find his real name and spread a rumor that he is anti-Putin. He will disappear and nobody will miss him.

Das V' danya

The climate crisis is already having drastic consequences for human health

Children will be particularly vulnerable to the negative health effects caused by climate change, landmark report shows.

Jackson Ryan, CNET, November 13, 2019 7:58 PM PST

In a new, wide-ranging assessment focused on the human health impacts of climate change, a global collaboration of over 100 scientific experts paint a dire picture: The climate crisis is making us sick. If we fail to limit greenhouse gas emissions, we will be faced with extreme changes threatening food security, increasing vulnerability to infectious disease, reducing working hours and exposing populations to more extreme weather events like wildfires and drought.

The new report, released in prestigious medical journal The Lancet on Nov. 14, details the health risks posed by a rapidly-warming planet and is co-authored by 120 climatologists, health professionals and more. The 43-page document follows similar annual reports delivered by the Lancet Countdown in 2017 and 2018 and is a data-driven, deep analysis of the lifelong health consequences of soaring global temperatures.

It shows the dangerous path we're on if we don't make immediate, drastic changes with the authors suggesting the climate crisis will impact human health from infancy. Children and those in low-income and middle-income settings will be "among the worst affected."

"Children are particularly vulnerable to the health risks of a changing climate," said Dr. Nick Watts, executive director of The Lancet Countdown, in a press release. "Their bodies and immune systems are still developing, leaving them more susceptible to disease and environmental pollutants."
Consider a child born today, Nov. 14, 2019.

As it stands, by their 71st birthday, the child will experience living on an Earth that is, on average, 4 degrees Celsius (7.2 degrees Fahrenheit) hotter than pre-industrial levels. According to the report, that increase in temperature would affect the child's health throughout their life in myriad ways. Examining the health effects of climate change in 2018, the consortium of researchers demonstrate:

• Heatwaves are increasing: In 2018, there were 220 million heatwave exposures globally, the highest on record.
• Increased heat is also decreasing productivity. 2018 had better conditions than 2017, but the temperature increase saw 133.6 billion potential work hours lost.
• More people were exposed to wildfires between 2015 to 2018 than between 2001 to 2004. More people were exposed to floods and storms in Africa, but no change in lethality was identified.
• Infectious diseases had a bumper year in 2018. It was the second most favorable year for cholera transmission, malaria and dengue fever.
• Increasing temperatures are dropping global crop yield potential for major grain crops such as maize, wheat, rice and soybean.
• Sea surface temperatures are rising, threatening marine fish population and food security.
• Air pollution is getting worse as carbon dioxide emissions continue to rise. Potentially 7 million deaths were caused by air pollutants in 2016.

Continuing down the current path -- the so-called "business-as-usual" approach -- will see children born today facing unprecedented health challenges. Scientists are aware of the dangers and are calling on governments to act. Last week, over 11,000 scientists from a variety of disciplines sounded a thunderous warning, declaring a "climate emergency."

And the children, those that The Lancet's report suggests will be most affected by global heating, are rallying too. Spurred by 16-year-old climate activist Greta Thunberg, school strikes and climate change rallies have occurred across the globe in recent months.

"Young people are right to be angry, and concerned about the future -- the science is frightening. But we still have a window of opportunity," said Fiona Armstrong, founder of the Climate and Health Alliance.

Wednesday's report does provide a glimmer of hope. While coal use did increase in 2018, its share of energy generation decreased. Energy production by renewables is up, as is the use of electric vehicles. Slowly, progress is being made. However, the authors state "current progress is inadequate" and the world is struggling to cope.

"The climate crisis is one of the greatest threats to the health of humanity today, but the world has yet to see a response from governments that matches the unprecedented scale of the challenge facing the next generation," said Dr. Richard Horton, editor-in-chief of The Lancet.