Meanwhile, on February 16 a meeting was held in Azerbaijan’s capital of Baku between Russian Chief of General Staff of the Armed Forces, Valery Gerasimov, and U.S. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Joseph Dundorf.
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That’s apparently easier said than done.
Chaffetz has also agreed with Democrats that the Office of Government Ethics should investigate a Trump aide, Kellyanne Conway, for her blatant pitch from the White House briefing room in which she promoted clothing and fashion accessories sold by Trump’s daughter, Ivanka – a violation of a longstanding ethics rule. On so many levels it is hard not to chuckle at this statement.
Priebus also denied a report that Trump advisers were in touch with Russian intelligence advisers during the 2016 campaign, and said he had assurances from “the top levels of the intelligence community” that it was false. While the Republicans in the Senate were holding hearings on the Trump nominees and their counterparts in the House were discussing arresting Hillary Clinton, Flynn’s actions were already being tracked by our national security teams, and they were also looking at what Trump knew (and when) and whether the president-elect was complicit in any of this. What would Trump have known about these issues? Flynn had at least five phone calls with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak after President Barack Obama placed sanctions on Russia for hacking American email accounts in order to influence the American presidential election. Senior White House officials explained to anyone who’d listen that Fox News was “not a news organization”.
Pelosi and Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, sent their own letter to acting Director of National Intelligence Michael Dempsey requesting “a comprehensive intelligence briefing on Russian Federation by February 28, 2017…” FBI Director James Comey, meanwhile, had decided against disclosing the bureau’s own pre-election investigation of possible links between Russian Federation and the Trump campaign. President Peña Nieto, and the meeting between the two leaders was cancelled. According to a Bloomberg columnist, who cited a White House official, there was nothing improper or illegal about the talks. That was the last thing Trump wanted, after campaigning by stroking and sweet-talking Putin.
Adding to the turmoil at the council, one of Mr. Trump’s appointees to the body was sacked Friday for criticizing the President. Flynn, like Trump, is a shoot-from-the-lip guy. “I don’t see how it’s directly affecting me now, but hearing all the stories about how it’s affecting other people definitely makes me feel that [Trump] might not really know what other people want and doesn’t really care what other people want”.
Flynn’s promise to review the case evidently encouraged Putin to forgo the usual tit-for-tat retaliation, despite an initial Kremlin statement that there was “no alternative to reciprocal measures”.
Donald Trump’s approval rating is allegedly up, with over half of likely US voters approving of his job performance.
Flynn has a history of being cozy with Russian Federation.
Trump won the election with low approval numbers so it is unsurprising they are still low, but the scandal over his team’s contacts with Russian Federation and his controversial travel ban have kept them falling. “Not a day has gone by when Trump or his staff have not lied or said something misleading”. The story is the White House cover-up following the intelligence briefing that detailed Flynn’s criminal activity and presented clear evidence of collusion with a hostile foreign government. Inevitably, there will be leaks, but that issue is a red herring.
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“Russia is fake news”. A recent Rasmussen poll shows that President Trump has an approval rating that’s 10 percent higher than his disapproval rating.
