America The Beautiful

In the wake of Donald Trump being elected President, I decided to start a blog to keep track of my thoughts on the matter.

[1765liberty]

A Trickle of a Trickle

The announcements by AT&T, Wells Fargo, Fifth Third Bank and others to bonus their employees this year is a very nice gesture, and I don’t want to discount what that may do for the families receiving these bonuses, but this is not trickle down economics yet.  At this point, this is a PR stunt.  Let me explain.

First, the tax cuts do not even go into effect until 2018.  This means that the money these companies say they will be paying out to their employees this Christmas is coming from existing (already record-breaking) profit, not tax cuts.

Next, 

Last year AT&T’s operating income was $24.8 Billion, for which they paid $6.5Billion in tax, or about 26.6% tax rate.  With this new tax bill, on that same income they would owe $5.1B in tax (assuming they pay the 21%) or a savings of $1.4Billion.  If this is a one-time bonus, AT&T is paying out $200 Million, or about 14% of the money they will save the first year of this bill.  And the tax savings is “permanent”.  AT&T is also the beneficiary of the recent decision on Net Neutrality.  Given those changes, AT&T stands to make a lot of money on increased fees for internet service.

Wells Fargo’s operating income last year was $32.1Billion for which they paid $10.1B in tax or 31.5%.  Assuming they pay the 21% tax rate, they would pay $6.7B next year in tax, or a savings of $3.4Billion per year for which they are promising to increase their hourly wage to $15 (from $13.50).  Assuming every single Wells Fargo employee (269,000 of them) receives this increase that would equate to $726 Million in additional salary (about $2,700 per employee), or 21% of the savings.  Note: given the average WF worker makes $61,500/year, (~$34/hour) the number of employees benefitting, and Wells paying, is likely much less.

Fifth Third Bank’s income last year was $2.1B for which they paid $505M in tax or 24.4%.  Even with their (by comparison) relatively modest savings of 3.4% in taxes, they stand to save $71 Million in taxes for which they are promising 13,500 employees a bonus of $1,000 ($13.5Million).  That’s a pretty good 19% of the profits from the first year savings, but where is the other 81% going?

Again, these are nice, but it’s okay to remain skeptical that this will actually result in a majority of profits finding their way to the middle class.  I’m much more interested to see what will happen to C-Level salaries once corporate profits go up.

[1765liberty]

Please consider sharing widely.

There has been increased pressure from the GOP and FOX lately on Mueller and his team and even rumors that Trump might try and fire Mueller and the GOP might try and shut down the House Intelligence Committee's investigation. There has also been a PR push by FOX and Sean Hannity to both discredit Mueller and try and claim his team is biased. Both FOX and the GOP have claimed that there is not a shred of evidence of collusion and that this is a witch hunt and a PR stunt.

Seth Abramson (who I've mentioned before) has gone and compiled the top PUBLIC evidence (not including what Mueller has available through his investigation) for you to provide any of your friends/family who claim this is all just made up:

#1: In March of 2016, Papadopoulos reveals to Trump—face-to-face—he's a Kremlin intermediary sent to establish a Trump-Putin backchannel (he says Putin is favorably disposed to Trump's candidacy). Trump then and there orders Gordon to coordinate a pro-Kremlin GOP platform change.

#2: In June 2016, Don Jr. knowingly attends a meeting with—and set up by—Kremlin agents. He asks the Kremlin for what he has reason to believe is illegally acquired Clinton material. Afterwards, he (allegedly) tells no one. When caught, he lies about every aspect of the meeting.

#3: In April, July and September of 2016 Sessions meets Russian Ambassador Kislyak in settings in which Russian sanctions are discussed. He holds the latter two meetings *after* it's known Russia is cyber-attacking America. He lies about these contacts under oath before Congress.

#4: Kislyak egregiously violates longstanding diplomatic protocol to attend—as a guest of the Trump campaign—a major Trump foreign policy speech. Having been invited to the speech as a VIP, Kislyak sits in the front row as Trump promises Putin's Russia "a good deal" on sanctions.

#5: Flynn—aided and abetted by Kushner and the full Presidential Transition Team—illegally conducts sanctions and resolution negotiations with Russia during the 2016 transition. When asked about it by the FBI, he lies. When the lies are published, no one on the PTT corrects them.

#6: Carter Page travels to Moscow under the guise of an academic conference—in fact, he meets with top Kremlin officials and top Rosneft executives, speaking with both about Russian sanctions just as the Steele Dossier alleges. When questioned about his activities, he lies on TV.

#7: Trump campaign manager Manafort and Sessions aide Gordon aggressively push to change the GOP platform to benefit Putin under direct orders from Trump. When asked about Trump's involvement, they lie to the media; when asked about their own involvement, they lie to the media.

#8: Shortly after the inauguration, it's revealed that Trump has been holding onto a secret plan to unilaterally drop all sanctions against Russia for months—a plan he's never before revealed, which would *reward* Russia for cyber-attacking America during a presidential election.

#9: When Trump learns the FBI Director plans to indict his ex-National Security Advisor, he fires him—first lying about his reason for doing so, then eventually admitting he did it due to "the Russia thing." Later—in an Oval Office conversation with Russians—he repeats the claim.

#10: In an Oval Office meeting into which no U.S. media are allowed (foreshadowing a meeting with Putin in which no U.S. translators would be allowed), Trump deliberately leaks classified Israeli intelligence to the Russians, who are allies of Israel's (and America's) enemy—Iran.

#11: In late 2016, Kushner and Flynn smuggle Kislyak into Trump Tower to secretly discuss the creation of a clandestine—Kremlin-controlled—Trump-Putin backchannel only a few principals would know about. The men don't disclose the meeting or plan, which would constitute espionage.

#12: In May 2016, Trump NatSec advisor Papadopoulos makes secret trips to Athens to make contact with Kremlin allies. During the second trip, Putin's also there—to discuss sanctions. It's his only trip to an EU nation during the campaign. Papadopoulos meets the same men as Putin.

#13: In 2013, Trump and Putin's developer sign a letter-of-intent to build Trump Tower Moscow—a deal requiring Putin's blessing that only goes forward when Putin dispatches to Trump his permits man and banker. Trump and principals lie about the deal—and events at the Ritz Moscow.

#14: Just before Trump's inauguration, Trump's lawyer Cohen and ex-Russian mobster Sater secretly meet with a pro-Russia Ukrainian politician to help ferry a secret Kremlin-backed "peace deal" to Flynn, Trump's National Security Advisor. All involved then lie about their actions.

#15: After it's publicly revealed Russia is waging cyberwar on America, Trump publicly and in all seriousness invites the Kremlin to continue cyber-attacking America if doing so will result in the theft and release of his opponent's private emails. He never retracts the request.

#16: Trump advisors Bannon, Prince, Flynn, Don Jr., Giuliani and Pirro are involved—to varying degrees—in leaking, sourcing, disseminating, and legitimizing a false "True Pundit" story that seeks to use fraud to blackmail the FBI into indicting Clinton. Russian bots pump it also.

#17: Trump's top advisors—including Manafort, Sessions, Flynn, Clovis, Page, Papadopoulos, Cohen, Sater, Don Jr, Kushner, Prince, Dearborn, Gordon, Gates, Stone and others—lie about or fail to disclose Russia contacts or key conversations on Russian efforts to collude with Trump.

#18: For many months after Trump begins his run, he is secretly working under a letter-of-intent with Russian developers to build Trump Tower Moscow. The deal—brokered by Cohen and Sater—allegedly falls apart only when Putin's top aide won't return an email from Trump's attorney.

#19: In 2008, Don Jr. privately tells investors that "a disproportionate percentage" of the Trump Organization's money comes from Russia—a fact later confirmed by Eric Trump. Trump Sr. then becomes the first presidential candidate in decades to refuse to release his tax returns.

#20: Though he's fully briefed on Russia's cyberwar against America in August 2016, Trump publicly denies it—calling the U.S. intel community Nazis—while accepting Putin's denials he's done anything wrong and proposing the U.S. create a cybersecurity task force with the Kremlin.

#21: Trump NatSec advisor Erik Prince secretly traveled to UAE at the command of the UAE's Royal Family so he could have a clandestine meeting *on Russia sanctions* with a top and Putin ally—the Russian Direct Investment Fund manager. Prince lied to Congress about all aspects of this.

#22: Trump NatSec advisor Flynn secretly worked with Trump pal Thomas Barrack and Iran-Contra criminal Robert "Bud" McFarlane to lobby Trump to drop Russia sanctions—the better to make money off a deal to bring nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia via Russian-built nuclear reactors.

#23: In 2002, Trump tried to rig the Miss Universe pageant—by leaning illegally on judges—to award the title to Miss Russia, whose two boyfriends at the time were a) one of the top real estate developers in Saint Petersburg, a market Trump wanted access to, and b) Vladimir Putin.

#24: In 2003, Trump was saved from bankruptcy by the sudden, miraculous appearance of Russian mobster Felix Sater in his orbit. Sater found Trump new partners and tenants—often, Russians—and they helped make Trump rich again. Trump then perjured himself over whether he knew Sater.

#25: Trump Campaign Manager Paul Manafort was secretly contacting Putin ally Oleg Deripaska during the 2016 presidential campaign, at one point promising him special access to the Trump campaign—and to Trump's thinking on Russia policy—via clandestine "briefings" on those topics.

#26: After it was revealed Don Jr. met Kremlin agents at Trump's house—Trump Tower—at a time Trump was in the building and meeting with Don, Jared, and Manafort on the same topics they met the Kremlin agents to discuss, Trump witness-tampered by writing his son's false statement.

#27: Trump's campaign hired Bannon/Mercer-run Cambridge Analytica to target voters via "psychographics." There's evidence Cambridge Analytica leaked its data to the Kremlin to aid its massive propaganda campaign. Emails *from Cambridge Analytica to WikiLeaks* have been discovered.

#28: *After* it was known Trump's NatSec team had met to talk Russia policy and receive orders from Trump on sanctions, Sarah Huckabee Sanders lied—from the White House—on how many times the team met. She said once—it was three times, plus innumerable group calls and email chains.

#29: Trump National Security Advisor Flynn dined with Putin in Moscow during the presidential campaign—*while he was advising Trump*. He admits they discussed Russia policy. The chances he didn't brief the man he was advising on what Putin said—and what Flynn said back—are *nil*.

#30: Trump selected as Secretary of State a man who didn't want the job, wasn't qualified, and has revealed himself to be as bad at it as anticipated. But Tillerson had one qualification—he's not just a Putin pal, but had received the *Russian Order of Friendship Medal* from him.

#31: During the presidential campaign—while he was a Trump NatSec advisor—Trump's future National Security Advisor Mike Flynn received tens of thousands of dollars directly from Kremlin propaganda network RT. He then lied about it on TV and failed to disclose it on federal forms.

#32: Months ago, both houses of Congress voted overwhelmingly—517 to 5—to impose new sanctions on Russia for its massive election interference campaign (correctly classified as "cyber-war") on the United States. Trump is now protecting Putin by refusing to impose those sanctions.

#33: Three of Trump's top NatSec advisors—Schmitz, Gordon, Page—went to Budapest in 2016. Budapest is the European HQ for Russia's FSB. It was Gordon's sixth trip to the tiny EU nation in recent years; Page admits meeting an unnamed Russian; *no one knows* what Schmitz was doing.

#34: In 2013, the Trumps developed close business and personal ties with the Agalarovs—a Kremlin-linked family of oligarchs who've acted as Putin agents before (including delivering gifts to Trump from Putin). Trump stayed in touch with them throughout the presidential campaign.

#35: Alexander Torshin—a Putin-linked Russian banker and "long-time Trump acquaintance"—met Trump at an NRA conference weeks before Trump announced his run, then tried to set up a secret Putin-Trump meet in May 2016. He then tried to secretly meet Trump at an event this February.

#36: At a time it was *widely known* that the way to reach Trump was to send an email to Hope Hicks—Trump doesn't use email—Russian intelligence did so several times, suggesting they felt Hicks and Trump would be amenable to the contacts. The FBI had to warn Hicks not to respond.

#37: In 2004, Trump bought a Miami mansion no one wanted for $40 million. After making no improvements to either the land or the property and failing to sell it for *four years*, in 2008 Russian billionaire Dmitry Rybolovlev—facing no competing offers—gave him $95 million for it.

#38: In 2014, Eric Trump told reporter James Dodson his father got "all the funding he needed" for his golf courses—a big part of his financial portfolio—from Russian banks. Dodson had no reason to lie, but Eric denied it vehemently—underscoring how dangerous that truth would be.

#39: Trump made his Campaign Manager a man who'd been out of politics for years and is known largely not just for working on behalf of Putin allies in Ukraine but having angled for years to do direct propaganda work for the Kremlin itself—outreach which has since been documented.

BONUS: Though he knows by August 2016 that Russia is committing crimes against America, Trump still lets his top NatSec advisor, Sessions, negotiate sanctions with Kislyak—presumably Trump's plan for a unilateral dropping of sanctions. This is Aiding and Abetting Computer Crimes.

BONUS: During the transition, Trump's son-in-law Kushner secretly meets with Putin's banker—after which discussion the two men disagree wildly as to what they discussed, suggesting that whatever the topic was, it was clandestine. Kushner won't reveal the meeting for many months.

BONUS: Advisors to the Trump campaign, including Trump Jr. and Stone, have contacts with WikiLeaks and/or Russian hackers—the timeline of which conversations dovetails perfectly with consequential changes in behavior by one or both of the parties (including Trump's stump speech).

BONUS: When Acting AG Yates warns Trump that Flynn—his National Security Advisor—has been compromised by Russia, Trump fires her and keeps Flynn on board for 18 days. Either he lies to Pence about what he knows on this or both Trump and Pence lie to America about their knowledge.

BONUS: Fears that the Kremlin recorded "kompromat"—blackmail—on Trump at the Ritz Moscow in November 2013 have been stoked by Trump's repeated lies about his trip, his bodyguard's confession it could've happened, and as many as eight witnesses found by the BBC and intel agencies.

BONUS: After Trump's son Don began engaging in a back-and-forth correspondence with Russian front-operation WikiLeaks in September 2016, the Trump campaign responded to WikiLeaks' pro-Trump overtures by inserting praise of WikiLeaks into then-candidate Trump's daily stump speech.

BONUS: The 4 ambassadors Trump invited to the VIP event before his first foreign policy speech (Mayflower Hotel, 4/27/16)—that'd be 4 of a possible 195—all *breached diplomatic protocol to attend* and were all from nations involved in Russia's sanctions-impacted Rosneft oil deal.

BONUS: Trump has repeatedly angled—almost *desperately*—for private meetings with Putin, including orchestrating pretenses for them. Each time they've met, they've exceeded the allotted time for such a meeting by 300% and breached protocol in how the meetings have been conducted.

[1765liberty]

The Plot Against America

Re-reading (listening/audiobook) to "The Plot Against America" by Philip Roth. Take the time, if you can.

When it first came out, the NY Times called it, "a fable of an alternative universe, in which America has gone fascist and ordinary life has been flattened under a steamroller of national politics and mass hatreds. Hitler's allies rule the White House. Anti-Semitic mobs roam the streets." Substitute Charles Lindbergh for Trump and Hitler for Putin and it quickly becomes all too real.

One passage that particularly resonated was when a noted Rabbi (Bengelsdorf) came out and endorsed Charles Lindbergh for President. To paraphrase the book, the endorsement sealed the victory for Lindbergh over Roosevelt, not because Jews would vote for Lindbergh, but because it gave non-Jews an excuse to vote for him with a clean conscience. Think about that the next time Trump stays silent during a KKK rally, or states that he asked Putin (or Roy Moore) if he did it and the man denied it. Trump is not seeking to change the mind of his opponents, he's merely trying to strengthen the resolve of his base, who might be wavering (rightly so) in their support of him. He's not trying to bring America together, or MAGA, he's just trying to maintain status quo long enough to fleece us.

[lafix]

This is the bill they’re trying to sneak through before the end of the month. Don;t let them do it. Call your senators.  [phone]

[lafix]

Gonna keep reblobbing because it’s so damn important.

[lafix]

Seriously, please call. They want insurance companies to decide what they cover and how much they pay. YOU DON’T GIVE THE FOX THE KEYS TO THE HENHOUSE! Call! Call! Call!

[1765liberty]

Patriot

Seth Abramson has been tweeting quite a bit about Trump’s sudden inclusion of “loyalty” in all of his speeches.  He thinks it might be a precursor to a last ditch effort by Trump to create unrest between his supporters and the rest of the country, and I completely agree.  I feel like Trump supporters are trying to own words like “patriot” and “American” and imply that moderates and people on the left are not those things because they don’t support him.

I encourage everyone on the left to begin taking back these terms.  Being a patriot and an American and despising Trump should be synonymous, not mutually exclusive.

I am an American and a patriot.  I believe in free speech, equal rights and defending the Constitution.  I believe Donald Trump does not stand for any of these things and is a cancer on this country that should be removed immediately.

[ithelpstodream]

[almostcleverblogname-deactivate]

Out all these pieces of trash and let them all fucking burn

[vanpocalypse-deactivated2018041]

👆🏼👆🏼👆🏼

[macencheeze]

I fucking love that people are able to identify them and out their

[1765liberty]

Rule of Law

The most recent struggles of the Republican Party to construct an adequate replacement for the ACA is frustrating for everyone (everyone wants to make it better, we just disagree on how to do it). Republicans have been complaining about the ACA since its inception, but have yet to publicly acknowledge that ANY replacement from a conservative party will dramatically increase uninsured and raise rates.  Universal healthcare is a progressive idea, and one of few ways to change healthcare in the US that would both lower rates and lower the uninsured.

But this is not about that.  The repeated failure of this bill (and others, like the Muslim Ban) connotes an even bigger problem, and that is Trump's all-out assault on the Rule of Law.  What is the Rule of Law?  The World Justice Project defines it by 4 main characteristics:

1. The government and its officials and agents as well as individuals and private entities are accountable under the law. 2. The laws are clear, publicized, stable, and just; are applied evenly; and protect fundamental rights, including the security of persons and property and certain core human rights. 3. The process by which the laws are enacted, administered, and enforced is accessible, fair, and efficient. 4. Justice is delivered timely by competent, ethical, and independent representatives and neutrals who are of sufficient number, have adequate resources, and reflect the makeup of the communities they serve.

The Republican Party controls all three branches of government, yet they have struggled for 6 months to agree on major policy changes.  Trump's solution is to demand the  laws be changed to make the hurdles easier to overcome, rather than to demand legislation that the populace and its representatives can agree on.  THIS is the beginning of authoritarianism.

Remember, authoritarianism means demanding total obedience to those in positions of authority at the EXPENSE of personal freedom.  Tell me again why Americans, who cherish the ideal of freedom, would want to give that up?

[1765liberty]

This video disgusts me. This is an ad from the NRA and its spokesperson Dana Loesch. The NRA has gone from an organization that defends the rights of gun owners to a terrorist organization, promoting violence as a a course of action. I hope that all of the folks on here that claim to be "responsible gun owners" are concerned by this. Already this year there have been over 31,000 gun incidents, 7,000 gun deaths and 175 mass shootings in the US. This ad is intended to do one thing...incite fear, resulting in increased gun purchases. This video is intended to re-establish who the "enemy" is, and to justify violence against that group. Take it one level deeper. Listen to the exact words she chooses. "They use THEIR media to ASSASSINATE real news." First, she's implying that media is us vs. them, rather than reporting. If you believe that CNN or MSNBC is 100% fake news, intellectually how can you believe there is no equivalent on the right? How can you believe that the left is the ONLY source of false information? Please be smarter than that. Second, she intentionally uses the term "ASSASSINATE", which is a very inflammatory and violent term. Next, "They use their schools to teach children that their President is the next HItler." First, where is this being done? Where is there a school curriculum teaching students Trump=Hitler? Next, why is it "their schools"? "...All to make them march, make them protest, make them scream racism and sexism and xenophobia and homophobia..." MAKE us march? How do you MAKE tens of millions of people march? (oh, that's right, Soros is supposedly sending us all checks). These protests are grass roots and built upon actions of our President and his administration. Was there some violence during these protests? Yes. Do 99.99% of liberals support that violence? No. And we certainly don't incite future protests and protesters to do it. The VAST majority of protests and protestors have been peaceful. Moms and dads and families speaking out against the travel ban, or environmental deregulation or the fact that Trump has refused to speak out against anti-semitism or mass shootings or violence against minorities by the police. "Bully and terrorize the law-abiding" Again she implies only conservatives are law-abiding, which is clearly rhetoric. "The only option left is for the police to do their jobs and STOP THE MADNESS." What is she implying here? And what madness are we talking about? If we scale the issue, of the tens of millions of protestors since January, how much violence has there been? Maybe a few dozen people? I'm NOT saying that's not significant and important, but if you're referring to a need for the police to do their jobs, and you compare that to 7,000 gun deaths SO FAR THIS YEAR, it is a rounding error. The police should be protecting ALL people, not just conservatives. And the single biggest thing we need protection against is guns. "The ONLY way we stop this, the ONLY way we SAVE OUR COUNTRY AND OUR FREEDOM is to FIGHT this violence of lies with the CLENCHED FIST of truth." How much more violent can you get? She is openly inciting violence by seeking to FIGHT what she just referred to as the "violence of lies" from the left with the "CLENCHED FIST" of truth. Did any of that sound peaceful? Did any of that sound like "hey, we should really seek to prove what is real and what is fake and have an open dialog"? No it sounded like an NRA spokesperson stirring the pot, making an us vs. them mentality even worse, inciting fear with EXTREMELY violent imagery (I didn't even reference the Armageddon-like imagery) and suggesting that like-minded folks should arm themselves against the left. I have seen hundreds of people, responsible gun owners and NRA members, speak out against this video. If you include yourself in that group (and have made it this far), I hope you will too. Ugh.

[1765liberty]

Supreme Court strikes down North Carolina congressional district maps

The Supreme Court struck down two congressional district maps in North Carolina Monday, holding that the state had engaged in an unconstitutional racial gerrymander.

This is important. In addition to foreign countries meddling in our voting, some really big factors in preventing a strong foundation for our elections are gerrymandering, Citizens United, laws aimed at voter suppression and term limits. Change those things, and you create a system that is much more reflective of the will of the people. Keep them and you get career politicians serving the lobbies and wealthy donors.

[1765liberty]

Trump & Russia - A timeline

Having trouble keeping up with it all?  Constantly being asked to “show me some facts”?  Can’t keep the order of events straight?  Well, here you go.  I’ve included as many data points regarding Trump’s ties to Russia (or background) as I can find to date.  I’ll keep adding.  Feel free to share widely.

July 1991 -Trump's Taj Mahal files for bankruptcy protection.

March 9, 1992 - The Trump Castle and Trump Plaza both file for bankruptcy protection.

November 22, 2004 - Trump Hotels & Casino Resorts files for bankruptcy protection, claiming $1.8 Billion in debt.

2005 - Konstantin Kilimnov meets Paul Manafort in the early 2000s and begins working for him in the Ukraine in 2005 through President Yanukovych’s presidential campaign in 2010. Manafort would work for Yanukovych from 2004 to 2014.

2007 - Carter Page is working as Vice President, COO for the Moscow office of Merrill Lynch's energy and power dept, working on transactions involving Gazprom and other leading Russian energy companies.

July 15, 2008 - Dmitry Rybolovlev, a Russian billionaire and investor in Bank of Cyprus, purchases a beach house from Donald Trump for $95m.  Trump purchased the home at auction in 2005 for $41 million.  Rybolovlev would later demolish the house without moving in and sell off the land.

February 17, 2009 - Trump Entertainment & Resorts field for bankruptcy protection.

April 2009 - Sergei Millian (born Sergei Kukut), President of the Russian American Chamber of Commerce (an organization that bailed Trump out after his last bankruptcy when no bank would loan him money) states “We have signed formal agreements with… The Trump Organization… to jointly service the Russian clients’ commercial, residential and industrial real estate needs, [After meeting Michael Cohen] Trump Organization & Related Group […] signed an exclusive contract with me for promoting their companies in Russia and CIS countries,” Millian said. Millian was quoted in an ABC News interview as saying Trump benefitted to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars from business dealings with Russia.

September 16, 2011 - The Russian Direct Investment Fund, a government-backed investment fund, was started by Putin in 2011. A high-powered board of international advisers was brought in to oversee its activities, a group that included American private equity executives David Bonderman of TPG and Stephen A. Schwarzman of the Blackstone Group. After the United States and Europe imposed economic sanctions on Russia over the Ukraine conflict in 2014, many board members distanced themselves (Schwarzman was one). The fund had been known to make numerous LARGE investments ($1B+) in Russian businesses with equally large conflicts of interest.

April 18, 2012 - In a joint announcement by Exxon/Mobil’s CEO Rex Tillerson and Rosneft Executive Chairman Igor Sechin, Exxon and state-owned Russian oil company Rosneft unveil an offshore exploration partnership that could invest upward of $500 billion in developing Russia's vast energy reserves in the Arctic and Black Sea. Sechin, a close ally of Russian Prime Minister and President-elect Vladimir Putin, hailed the partnership, saying it had already added $7 billion to Exxon and Rosneft's combined market capitalization since it was announced.

March 21, 2013 - The Guardian reports that TNK-BP agrees to sell to Rosneft for $55Billion that will make the Russian state-owned oil company by far the world's largest listed oil producer.  BP collects $16.7bn cash and 12.5% stake.  The deal takes BP's stake in Rosneft to 19.75%, and BP gets two seats on the Russian company's board - one of whom would be Bob Dudley, CEO of BP and the other Donald Humphreys, then CFO of Exxon Mobil, serving under Rex Tillerson.  BP's partners in the TNK-BP joint venture – billionaires Mikhail Fridman, German Khan, Viktor Vekselberg and Leonard Blavatnik, known collectively as AAR (Alfa-Access-Renova) – collect $27.7bn for their stake.  In 2017, Leonard Blavatnik would donate $1 million to the Trump Inauguration through his company, Access Industries.

April 14, 2013 - The government of Cyprus announces relaxed restrictions on foreigners seeking citizenship.  Non-residents who invest at least 3 million Euros in Cyprus real estate will be eligible for citizenship within 6 months (formerly 5 million euros).  The program sparked over 4B in investments and by 2017, Cyprus had issued over 2,000 passports.

May 3, 2013 - Russian mob boss and Senator Alexander Torshin attends NRA Annual Meeting in Houston. Torshin was deputy governor in Russia’s Central Bank. Maria Butina was his aide at the bank. One of his superiors was Deputy Governor Sergey Aleksashenko, who was a former head at Merrill Lynch in Moscow (at the time Carter Page was there) and is now a senior fellow at the Brookings Institute in Washington.  

June 21, 2013 - Vladimir Putin awards Rex Tillerson the Order of Friendship.The Order of Friendship is awarded to Russian and foreign nationals for special merit in strengthening peace, friendship, cooperation and understanding between nations.

June 26, 2013 - Glencore founder, Marc Rich dies in Lucerne Switzerland of a stroke. In 1983, he was on the FBI’s 10-most-wanted list indicted for tax evasion, fraud and racketeering. He remained under threat of a life sentence in a U.S. jail until Bill Clinton pardoned him during the last hours of his presidency. Rudolph Giuliani, who had worked as a prosecutor on the Rich case before becoming New York Mayor, said in a statement: “Marc Rich committed serious crimes against the United States and then fled the country when he was called to account for his conduct. He should never have been pardoned.”

October 24, 2013 - Stephen Schwarzmann announces at a groundbreaking ceremony for Schwarzman College at Tsinghua University in Beijing that $260 million has been raised for Schwarzman Scholars (including a $100 million contribution from Schwarzman), an elite international scholarship program in China.  Among the new donors supporting the program were Ivan Glasenberg, founding partner of Glencore and Viktor F. Vekselberg (Bank of Cyprus).  

November 19, 2013 - Trump holds Miss Universe pageant in Moscow. During this trip, the later published “Steele Dossier” would suggest the KGB/FSB filmed Trump watching Russian prostitutes perform "golden showers" in his hotel room and began compiling compromising financial and personal information on Trump.

December 17, 2013 - A treaty between the President of Ukraine (Viktor Yanukovych) and Russian President Vladimir Putin is signed whereby it was agreed Russia would buy $15 billion of Ukrainian Eurobonds and that the cost of Russian natural gas supplied to Ukraine would be lowered to $268 per 1,000 cubic metres (the price was more than $400 at the time). The deal relinquished Crimea's Kerch peninsula to the Russian Navy, granting Russia highly desirable warm-water ports and strategic access to the Mediterranean and beyond.  The treaty became defunct months later when Russia halted its purchase of Eurobonds and ousted President Yanukovych on February 22, 2014 and the Russian natural gas discount was cancelled in April 2014.

February 20, 2014 - Ukrainian riot police open fire on demonstrators in central Kiev. They were protesting President Viktor Yanukovych’s decision to back out of entering the EU.  In a series of hacked texts sent by Andrea Manafort (daughter of Paul Manafort) to her sister Jessica, the Ukrainian authorities claim Andrea said "You know he has killed people in Ukraine? Knowingly, as a tactic to outrage the world and get focus on Ukraine. Remember when there were all those deaths taking place. A while back. About a year ago. Revolts and what not. Do you know whose strategy that was to cause that, to send those people out and get them slaughtered."

February 5, 2014 - Leonid Lebedev sues Viktor Vekselberg and Leonard Blavatnik for $2Billion for his share of TNK-BP, an oil company sold to Rosneft on March 21, 2013.  Lebedev would win his case to proceed with litigation in a NY Appeals court on October 6, 2016.

February 22, 2014 - Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych flees Kiev during a series of violent protests. Later, Vladimir Putin admits to helping Yanukovych escape Ukraine to Russia.

February 28-March 18, 2014 - Russia invades the Ukraine and annexes Crimea and Sebastopol.

March 3, 2014 - Vitaly Churkin, Russian Ambassador to the UN, shows a letter to the UN council purportedly from Viktor Yanukovych to Putin asking Putin to use Russian military to restore order to the Ukraine. The letter was dated March 1, 2014.

March 6 & 17, 2014 - The US, the EU and Canada introduce the first round of specifically targeted sanctions against Russian the day after the Crimean referendum and hours before Vladimir Putin, by signing a decree recognizing Crimea as an independent state, laid the groundwork for its annexation by Russia. The sanctions lead to the Russian financial crisis with losses estimated at $100 Billion Euros and individually sanction: Yelena Mizulina, Leonid Slutsky, Andrei Klishas, Valentina Ivanova Matviyenko, Dmitry Olegovich Rogozin, Vladislav Yurievich Surkov & Sergey Glazyev.

March 24, 2014 - In interviews with Fox and NBC News, Trump suggests imposing sanctions to hurt Russia economically and then later supports such sanctions. Trump also says (about Mitt Romeny) "Well, Mitt was right, and he was also right when he mentioned in one of the debates about Russia, and he said, 'Russia's our biggest problem, and Russia is, you know, really something."

April 28, 2014 - The United States imposes a ban on business transactions within its territory on seven Russian officials, including Igor Sechin, executive chairman of the Russian state oil company Rosneft, and seventeen Russian companies. The result includes a block of the formerly announced partnership between Exxon and Rosneft worth $500 billion.

October, 2014 - An investment fund led by Wilbur Ross invests $734 million in the Bank of Cyprus. Ross becomes Vice Chairman.  Another Vice Chairman of Bank of Cyprus is Vladimir Strzhalkovsky, a former KGB agent who served as CEO of Russian mining Company Norilsk Nickel.  In 2012, Strzhalkovsky negotiated an end to a $1.4B dispute between Oleg Deripaska and Vladimir Potanin over the rights to Norilsk and received a $100 million golden parachute for his efforts.

November 11, 2014 - Former CEO of Deutsche Bank, Josef Ackermann is nominated as Chairman of the Bank of Cyprus. Backing him were Wilbur Ross and Viktor Vekselberg, the 2nd richest man in Russia. At the time, Ross said, "Ackermann is key. We made up a very small list of names, and the most prominent on the list was Josef Ackermann.

February 27, 2015 - Russian opposition politician Boris Nemtsov is shot dead near the Kremlin as he was walking home.  Nemtsov had written a sensitive report on Russian soldiers secretly fighting in Ukraine.

May 28, 2015 - Nemtsov's report was published with the help of friends Ilya Yashin and Vladimir Kara-Murza. The report alleges that Russian troops were taking part in the Ukrainian conflict – with at least 220 killed – and that Russia was covertly supplying the rebels with military hardware, intelligence and training. Putin denied Russian forces were involved in the war.

May 27, 2015 - Kara-Murza is hospitalized from an attempted poisoning. He would survive, only to be hospitalized from a 2nd attempted poisoning in 2017 following a trip to Russia.

June 16, 2015 - Donald Trump announces he will run for president of the United States.

July 2015 - A hacking group possibly linked to the FSB, the main successor to the K.G.B., entered Democratic National Committee servers undetected for nearly a year, security researchers said. The group was nicknamed Cozy Bear, the Dukes and/or A.P.T. 29 for “advanced persistent threat.”

September 28, 2015 - Qatar Investment Authority, Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund with $300 Billion in assets, holds a NY launch event. Attendees include Stephen Schwarzmann (head of Trump’s economic advisory board), BlackRock Chief Larry Fink (a member of Trump’s business council) and Citigroup CEO Mike Corbat.

November 6, 2015 - Pter Aven (Alfa Bank) invites Putin's press minister, senior adviser (and founder of RT) Mikhail Lesin to Washington, DC. Aven was due to collect an award from the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in recognition of his "Corporate Citizenship" and his contribution to U.S.-Russian relations.

November 7, 2015 - Mikhail Lesin is found dead in a hotel room in Washington. Russian media called the cause of death a heart attack but the medical examiner claimed he died from “blunt force injuries”.

December 10, 2015 - Lt. Gen Michael Flynn sat at Putin's table for the 10th anniversary gala of Russia's state owned television network, RT.  Flynn had made a paid appearance on the network.  It would later be discovered Flynn was paid $68,000 in fees for the trip including $11,250 from Kaspersky Labs, a Russian cyber-security firm.

December 11, 2015 - David Keene, then-President of the NRA flies to Moscow to attend the “Right to Bear Arms” gun event and meet with Alexander Torshin. Also at that meeting were NRA First Vice President Pete Brownell, CEO of the world’s largest firearm accessories supplier; NRA funder Dr. Arnold Goldschlager and his daughter, NRA Women’s Leadership Forum executive committee member Hilary Goldschalger; Outdoor Life channel head Jim Liberatore and Milwaukee County Sheriff and Fox News regular David A. Clarke.  The event was organized by Maria Butina.

December 17, 2015 - Putin is quoted as saying (about Trump), "He’s a really brilliant and talented person, without any doubt,” according to a translation by Interfax. "It’s not our job to judge his qualities, that’s a job for American voters, but he’s the absolute leader in the presidential race.”

February 25, 2016  - Russia Insider reports Theofanis Philippou, law partner of the President of Cyprus (Nicos Anastasiades) is under investigation in Cyprus and in New York for allegedly concealing assets, cashflows, and money-laundering, and for lying to a Cyprus court and to the Cyprus Ministry of Interior, for the benefit of Leonid Lebedev. Philippou is a key witness in a $2 billion claim in the New York Supreme Court against TNK-BP partners Blavatnik and Vekselberg. Leonid Lebedev is the claimant, where his court filing says he is a Russian citizen. In Cyprus, Lebedev appears in government records as having been granted Cyprus citizenship in the spring of 2011 by the state Ministerial Council. He qualified, according to the Council record, with €11.5 million in assets on the island.

March 2016 - Investigators believe that the G.R.U., or a hacking group known as Fancy Bear or A.P.T. 28, was the second group to break into the D.N.C., but it played a bigger role in releasing committee emails.

March 21, 2016 - Trump names Carter Page one of his foreign policy advisors. Page, now Managing Partner of Global Energy Capital, is known for brokering energy deals in Russia and has been an advisor to (and investor in) Gazprom, the Russian state-controlled natural gas company.

April 16, 2016 - Trump promotes Paul Manafort to campaign chair and chief strategist. During his time working as a consultant for Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, Manafort persuaded the Ukrainian government to change its grain policies in a way that benefited a U.S. agribusiness giant, and to consider deals with Exxon and Chevron for oil exploration. Manafort and Roger Stone (both now working for Trump) were former business partners at Black, Manafort, Stone and Kelly, a Washington lobbyist group that lobbied on behalf of foreign dictators like Mohamed Siad Barre of Somalia, dictator Ferdinand Marcos of the Philippines, dictator Mobutu Sese Seko of Zaire, and Jonas Savimbi of Angola. They also represented Bethlehem Steel and The American Tobacco Institute as well as helping get Senators Phil Gramm, Jesse Helms, Charles McCurdy Mathias Jr., Arlen Specter, Paula Hawkins and David F. Durenberger get elected.

April 21, 2016 - Trump announces first major foreign policy address for April 27 to be hosted by the Center for the National Interest (CNI) to be held at the National Press Club.

April 26, 2016 - Trump campaign (Manafort) moves the location of the event to the Mayflower Hotel.

April 27, 2016 - Trump hosts a cocktail party before the event in a VIP room at the Mayflower. Attendees were Trump, Trump Jr, CNI event coordinator Heilbrunn, Kushner, Sessions, Lewandowski, Manafort, ambassadors to Russia, Singapore, Italy and Philippines, and Bud McFarlane. It is believed this was the event which included a negotiated sale of 19.5% of Rosneft - 0.5% to Trump, and Russian help in the election in exchange for lifting sanctions against Russia.

May 22, 2016 - Alexander Torshin attends NRA national convention and shares a dinner table with Donald Trump.

June 14, 2016 - Russian government hackers penetrate the computer network of the DNC and gain access to the entire database of opposition research on Donald Trump.

June 15, 2016 - American cyber-technology firm Crowdstrike releases a detailed statement about Russian hacking of the DNC. Trump’s team issues a statement: “We believe it was the DNC that did the ‘hacking’ as a way to distract from the many issues facing their deeply flawed candidate and failed party leader.” A hacker calling himself Guccifer 2.0 says he’s given the hacked emails to WikiLeaks, and also publishes them himself, complete with telltale Russian-language formatting errors.

July 2016 - The later-released Steele Dossier says an offer of a stake in the Russian oil company, Rosneft was made in exchange for lifting of US sanctions on Russia.  The dossier claims the offer was made by Igor Sechin in July, 2016 when Carter Page was in Moscow giving a speech at the Higher Economic School and just prior to the Republican National Convention. The claim was sourced to "a trusted compatriot and close associate" of Sechin, according to the dossier's author, former British spy Christopher Steele. On that same Page trip, U.S. intelligence agencies received reports that Page met with another top Putin aide while in Moscow — Igor Diveykin. A former Russian security official, Diveykin was serving as deputy chief for internal policy and is believed by U.S. officials to have responsibility for intelligence collected by Russian agencies about the U.S. election.

July 4, 2016  - Bloomberg News reports Mikhail Fridman (owner of Russia-based Alfa Bank) and three Russian billionaires are considering expanding their investment portfolio into US healthcare. Flush with almost $14 billion from the sale in 2013 of TNK-BP to state-owned Rosneft PJSC, Fridman and his partners.

July 18, 2016 - Working behind the scenes on a Republican convention platform plank, the Trump campaign guts the GOP's longstanding support for Ukrainians' popular resistance to Russia's 2014 intervention. Reportedly the change in the GOP plank was a result of conversations between Manafort and Konstantin Kilimnik.  JD Gordon, the Trump campaign's national-security policy representative, said that at the RNC he and others "advocated for the GOP platform to include language against arming Ukrainians against pro-Russian rebels" because "this was in line with Trump's views, expressed at a March national security meeting at the unfinished Trump hotel" in Washington, DC.  Gordon reportedly told CNN that "this was the language Donald Trump himself wanted and advocated for back in March [2016]” On March 2, 2017, USA Today reported that Gordon and another former Trump campaign adviser, Carter Page, met with Russia's ambassador to the US, Sergey Kislyak, at the RNC.

July 22, 2016 - WikiLeaks publishes the first in a series of hacked emails taken from the DNC.It releases a statement on Twitter reading, "Today, Friday 22 July 2016 at 10:30am EDT, WikiLeaks releases 19,252 emails and 8,034 attachments from the top of the US Democratic National Committee -- part one of our new Hillary Leaks series," the introduction says."The leaks come from the accounts of seven key figures in the DNC," including Communications Director Luis Miranda (10,770 emails), National Finance Director Jordon Kaplan (3,797 emails), Finance Chief of Staff Scott Comer and others. The newly released emails cover the period from January 2015 through May 25, 2016.

July 24, 2016 - Debbie Wasserman Schultz resigns from her position as DNC Chair amid email revelations that party officials were trying to undermine the candidacy of Sen. Bernie Sanders.Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook tells ABC News' "This Week" that their researchers (Crowdstrike) believe the Russians are responsible for the attack.

July 25, 2016 - The FBI announces it's investigating the hack.The DNC apologizes to Sen. Sanders.Trump: "The new joke in town is that Russia leaked the disastrous DNC e-mails, which should never have been written (stupid), because Putin likes me."

July 27, 2016 - In a news conference, Trump tells reporters that if Russia is behind the DNC hack that they most likely accessed her deleted emails from her tenure as secretary of state."By the way, if they hacked, they probably have her 33,000 emails. I hope they do," Trump said. "They probably have her 33,000 emails that she lost and deleted.” He then says, directly facing toward the cameras: "Russia, if you're listening, I hope you're able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing." At the same press conference Trump insisted, "I never met Putin. I've never spoken to him."

July 28, 2016 - Donald Trump, in an interview on"Fox & Friends," clarifies that "of course" he was being "sarcastic" with his comments about Russia hacking into Clinton's deleted emails. August 6, 2016NPR confirms the Trump campaign's involvement in the Republican platform change on Ukraine.

August 14, 2016 - A New York Times investigation conducted with the help of Ukrainian National Anti-Corruption Bureau shows that Donald Trump’s campaign chairman Paul Manafort received $12.7 million in cash from the former president of Ukraine, Victor Yanukovych.

August 19, 2016 - The investigation causes Manafort to step down from his post. Steve Bannon replaces Manafort as Chief Strategist and Kellyanne Conway replaces Manafort as Trump’s campaign manager.

August 30, 2016 - Harry Reid (R-Nev) writes to FBI Director James B. Comey asking him to initiate an investigation into Page’s Moscow visit stating the FBI should investigate his meetings as part of a larger look into whether the Trump campaign was conspiring with the Russian government to tamper with the U.S. presidential election.

September 8, 2016 - Jeff Sessions (R-Ala) meets with Sergei Kislyak, Russian Ambassador (Kislyak would also meet with Michael Flynn in December) in his Senate offices. Sessions was one of Trump's top foreign policy advisors at the time. Sessions would later be asked during his confirmation hearings for Attorney General whether he had any contact with Russian officials during the campaign and he responded "No" both orally and in writing. The Attorney General would normally oversee an investigation at the DoJ and FBI.  After being confirmed, Sessions would later admit to the meeting and recuse himself from the investigation.

September 13, 2016 - UN ambassador Vitaly Churkin lodges a formal complaint with the United Nations over a top U.N. official's condemnations of Donald Trump and some European politicians. Eight days before, Zeid went after Trump in a speech in The Hague, Netherlands, lumping the billionaire businessman with several populist leaders in Europe. "All seek in varying degrees to recover a past, halcyon and so pure in form, where sunlit fields are settled by peoples united by ethnicity or religion," Zeid said, calling it a sentiment they share with the Islamic State. "This is not only strange — it's scary," senior policy adviser Jake Sullivan said. "A major-party candidate for the presidency of the United States is being protected by the Kremlin. Wow."

September 23, 2016 - Yahoo news reports that although Trump first mentioned Carter Page’s name when asked to identify his “foreign policy team” during an interview with the Washington Post editorial team, his precise role in the campaign remains unclear; Trump spokeswoman Hope Hicks last month called him an “informal foreign adviser” who “does not speak for Mr. Trump or the campaign.” When Trump campaign spokesman Jason Miller was asked about Page he responded Page “has no role” and added: “We are not aware of any of his activities, past or present.” Miller did not respond when asked why Trump had previously described Page as one of his advisers.

September 26, 2016 - Carter Page announces he is taking a leave of absence from his work with the Trump campaign due to the controversy over Rosneft. At the first presidential debate, Trump states “I don’t think anybody knows it was Russia that broke into the DNC. [Clinton’s] saying Russia, Russia, Russia, but I don’t—maybe it was. I mean, it could be Russia, but it could also be China. It could also be lots of other people. It also could be somebody sitting on their bed that weighs 400 pounds, OK?”

Oct 1, 2016 - Six days before Wikileaks releases the first batch of DNC emails, Trump's informal advisor, Roger Stone, tweets "Wednesday @HillaryClinton is done #Wikileaks"

October 6, 2016 - DC Leaks publishes some hacked DNC emails.

October 7, 2016‪ - Beginning on Oct. 7, WikiLeaks publishes the first in a series of 50,000 emails belonging to Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta.

The Department of Homeland Security and the Office of the Director of the National Intelligence issue a joint statement concluding: “The U.S. Intelligence Community (USIC) is confident that the Russian Government directed the recent compromises of e-mails from US persons and institutions, including from US political organizations. The recent disclosures of alleged hacked e-mails on sites like DCLeaks.com and WikiLeaks and by the Guccifer 2.0 online persona are consistent with the methods and motivations of Russian-directed efforts. These thefts and disclosures are intended to interfere with the US election process.”

October 9, 2016 - Trump questions whether Russia is behind the hacks and suggests "maybe there is no hacking."“I notice any time anything wrong happens, they like to say ‘The Russians!’ She doesn't know if it's the Russians doing the hacking," Trump said of his rival Hillary Clinton. "Maybe there is no hacking. But they always blame Russia and the reason they blame Russia is because they think they are trying to tarnish me with Russia.”

October 20, 2016 - Trump: [Clinton] has no idea whether it is Russia, China or anybody else.Clinton: I am not quoting myself.Trump: You have no idea.Clinton: I am quoting seventeen, seventeen [US intelligence agencies.] Do you doubt…Trump: Our country has no idea.

October 30, 2016 - FBI Director James Comey announces an investigation and possible link between Clinton email server and emails from Anthony Weiner.Trump holds campaign rally in Las Vegas. That same day Russian billionaire Dmitry Rybolovlev flies in to Las Vegas.

October 31, 2016 - Slate.com reports that in July of 2016 a computer server owned by the Russia-based Alfa Bank "repeatedly looked up the contact information for a computer server being used by the Trump Organization”.  Later it would be reported that 99% of all activity to Trump’s server in Trump Tower were Alfa Bank and Spectrum Health.  Spectrum Health is owned by the DeVos family.  Alfa Bank is owned by Mikhail Fridman, a Russian billionaire.  

November 3, 2016 - Trump flies into Concord, NC for a campaign rally. That same day, Dmitry Rybolovlev flies in to Concord, NC (a single strip airport) from New York.

November 6, 2016 - FBI Director Jamey Comey affirms the FBI’s July decision not to charge Clinton after review of Weiner emails.

November 7, 2016 - WikiLeaks releases second batch of thousands of DNC emails.

November 8, 2016 - Donald Trump wins the US presidential election. Russian diplomat Sergei Krivov found unconscious at the Russian consulate in NY and died at the scene.  Krivov was released earlier in the year from a Russian prison after serving three years for demonstrating against election fraud in 2012. After initial reports said Krivov had fallen to his death from the roof of the consulate, the story was changed to say he had died of a heart attack.

November 10, 2016 - Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov states that Russian government officials conferred with members of Donald Trump’s campaign team in an interview with the Interfax news agency.

November 12, 2016 - Maria Butina hosts a birthday party in Washington DC. The event is attended by Trump staffers. At the event, Butina claims she had been part of the Trump campaign’s communications with Russia.

November 17, 2016 - House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-California, tells reporters she believes there should be a federal investigation into the hacking and that her team's own investigations alongside the DNC and other Democratic groups had led them to believe it was the Russians. Trump names Lt Gen Michael Flynn National Security Advisor.

December 2016 - National security adviser Michael Flynn privately discussed U.S. sanctions against Russia with that country’s ambassador to the US, Sergey Kislyak.  Trump advisor Jared Kushner participated in the meeting.  This was contrary to public assertions by Trump officials.

December 5/6, 2016 - Sergei Mikhailov, a senior officer of the Federal Security Service, or F.S.B. (formerly the K.G.B.) in their cyber security department was attending a routine staff meeting when several armed police officers burst in, threw a hood over his head, and dragged him from the room. That is the last anyone has seen of him. Following that day, the Russian State charged him with treason. Later, Russian media broke the story that another high ranking intelligence official Ruslan Stoyanov), at Kaspersky Labs, a leading private sector cybersecurity firm, had been detained along with two officers of Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB), since identified as Sergei Mikhailov and Dmitry Dokuchayev.There was sketchy information as to whether or not the official had also been imprisoned and charged. Kaspersky Labs, maker of anti-virus software, has long been rumored to be associated with the Russian government.  It is not known whether any of these three individuals may have been working for the US as spies. The day the Rosneft deal is believed to have been closed. Bud McFarlane and Kislyak both visit Trump Tower.

December 7, 2016 - Russia makes surprising announcement it has sold 19.5% of Rosneft, the state-controlled oil company. Reports on the investors are hazy, but include Glencore and Qatar with the remaining investment coming in the form of secured loans from Gazprombank, VTB and Bank Intesa (Italy, Moscow). Although Rosneft is valued at $59 Billion, total investment by Glencore and Qatar is $3B Euros and additional funding may have occurred of up to $2.5Billion by Russian and Cayman Island banks and a series of shell companies.The deal defies expectations that no investor would dare buy a share in the Russian asset, given Western sanctions against the government. December 9, 2016President Obama’s counter-terrorism adviser Lisa Monaco announces that the intelligence community’s review of the Russian hacking incident will be completed before the inauguration and presented to Congress. Washington Post and NYTimes report the CIA says the hack was done to help Trump get elected.  The Republican National Committee was also hacked but information wasn’t shared. Trump's transition team says of the intelligence community: "These are the same people that said Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. The election ended a long time ago in one of the biggest Electoral College victories in history. It’s now time to move on and 'Make America Great Again.'"

December 10, 2016 - The Blackstone Group, for which Stephen Schwarzman serves as co-founder and CEO, acquired Intertrust, a Dutch trust firm, in 2012. Intertrust has a series of assets located in the Cayman Islands, including Walkers Management Services (WMS). Walkers shares an address with and registered a Limited Liability Partnership called QHG Cayman Limited on December 16, only nine days after the Rosneft deal took place and just before the assets were moved to QHG Shares Pte. Ltd.

December 11, 2016 - RNC Chairman, and Trump's incoming White House Chief of Staff, Reince Priebus and Trump deny the RNC was hacked and separately deny that Russia was trying to interfere in the election, counter to the DHS and DNI's October statement. Trump tells "Fox News Sunday" that the reports of Russia's hacking are "ridiculous" and “Nobody really knows, and hacking is very interesting. Once they hack, if you don’t catch them in the act you’re not going to catch them.” Trump also argues that U.S. intelligence has "no idea" if Russia or China are behind the hackings. Breach remediation firm Crowdstrike points out that it did in fact catch the hackers “in the act,” monitoring their activities inside the DNC network for weeks. Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) calls for a select committee to investigate the Russian hacking, saying "it’s clear the Russians interfered."

December 12, 2016 - Republican lawmakers announce that congressional committees will also investigate the allegations made by the CIA.

December 13, 2016 - Trump names Rex Tillerson his nominee for Secretary of State.

December 14, 2016 - Rep. Devin Nunes, R-California, who chairs the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, releases a statement, calling it "unacceptable" that intelligence community directors declined the House Intelligence Committee's request to be briefed on the hacking. "The Committee is vigorously looking into reports of cyber-attacks during the election campaign, and in particular we want to clarify press reports that the CIA has a new assessment that it has not shared with us," Nunes added in the statement. "The Committee is deeply concerned that intransigence in sharing intelligence with Congress can enable the manipulation of intelligence for political purposes."

December 16, 2016 - In a press conference, Obama says that the hacks were initiated by the “highest levels of the Russian government.” Obama suggests he will retaliate but doesn’t specify how.

December 19, 2016 - Russian Ambassador to Turkey Andrei Karlov is assassinated by a police officer at a photo exhibit in Ankara. Petr Polshikov, a senior figure in the Latin American Dept of Foreign Ministry is shot dead in his Moscow apartment that same day.

December 26, 2016 - Oleg Erovinkin, a former general in the KGB and its successor the FSB (believed to be the primary source of the Steele Dossier), was found dead in the back of his car in Moscow on Boxing Day in mysterious circumstances.

December 28, 2016 - On reports of impending sanctions,Trump tells reporters, "I think we ought to get on with our lives.”

December 29, 2016 - Obama announces sanctions against Russian officials, including expulsion of 35 Russian diplomats and the closing of Russian compounds in Maryland and New York on suspicion they were used for intelligence gathering. Russian entities and people specifically called out:1. Main Intelligence Directorate (a.k.a. GRU)2. Federal Security Service (a.k.a FSB)3. Special Technology Center (a.k.a. STLC)4. Zorsecurity (a.k.a. Esage Lab)5. "Professional Assoc of Designers of Data Processing Systems" (a.k.a. ANO PO KSI) Individuals1. Igor Valentinovich Korobov2. Sergey Aleksandrovich Gizunov3. Igor Olegovich Kostyukov4. Vladimir Stepanovich Alexseyev Trump: "It's time for our country to move on to bigger and better things. Nevertheless, in the interest of our country and its great people, I will meet with leaders of the intelligence community next week in order to be updated on the facts of this situation."The Russian government vows retaliation.

December 30, 2016 - Putin makes the surprise announcement that he won’t kick U.S. diplomats out of Russia."We will not create problems for U.S. diplomats," Putin says in a statement. "We will not expel anybody.”Trump: "Great move on delay (by V. Putin) - I always knew he was very smart!"

December 31, 2016 - Trump: “I know a lot about hacking. And hacking is a very hard thing to prove. So it could be somebody else. And I also know things that other people don’t know, and so they cannot be sure of the situation.”

January 5, 2017 - Trump: "So how and why are they so sure about hacking if they never even requested an examination of the computer servers? What is going on?”  NBC News reports that the FBI said they had already captured the necessary forensic data via “upstream” intelligence, a term that refers to capturing data in transit.

January 6, 2017 - Classified documents are presented to President Obama and President-elect Trump by four of the senior-most US intelligence chiefs -- Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, FBI Director James Comey, CIA Director John Brennan, and NSA Director Admiral Mike Rogers. These documents include allegations that Russian operatives claim to have compromising personal and financial information about Mr. Trump.

January 9, 2017 - Russian Consul in Greece, Andrei Malanin is found dead in his apartment with no evidence of a break-in.

January 10, 2017 - The Daily Beast (1/11/17) reports a leaked dossier says that Diveykin (the report identifies him as “Devykin”) had warned Page at their meeting in July about the Kremlin preparing an ugly “kompromat” or compromising materials on Trump that involved the golden shower video.

January 11, 2017 - Trump: “Intelligence agencies should never have allowed this fake news to ‘leak’ into the public,” Trump wrote on Twitter. “One last shot at me. Are we living in Nazi Germany?”Trump admits to Russia hacking but denies the attacks were meant to boost him.

January 17, 2017 - In a WSJ interview Trump suggested he would be open to lifting sanctions on Russia.

January 19, 2017 - The New York Times reports that American law enforcement and intelligence agencies are investigating “intercepted communications” that potentially show ties between longtime Donald Trump ally Roger Stone and Russian officials.

January 20, 2017 - Inauguration DayMaria Butina attends the invitation-only Freedom Ball with business partner Paul Erickson. Together they are partners in Bridges LLC out of South Dakota. The business’ purpose is unknown.

January 22, 2017 - Rex Tillerson's nomination for Secretary of State receives the endorsement of the Senate Panel.

January 23, 2017 - Trump announces James Comey will remain FBI Director.

January 24, 2017 - Acting attorney general (Sally Yates) informed White House Chief Counsel Donald Mcghan, that she believed Michael Flynn had misled senior administration officials about the nature of his communications with the Russian ambassador to the United States, and warned that the national security adviser was potentially vulnerable to Russian blackmail, current and former U.S. officials said.

January 27, 2017 - Russian Ambassador to India, Alexander Kadakin dies after “a brief illness”.

January 30, 2017 - Deutsche Bank is fined $425 million by the US government for assisting in a $10 billion Russian money laundering scheme between 2011 and 2015. The scheme involved mirror trading with money directed toward New York and London. Over the past few years, Trump has received over $364 million in loans from Deutsche Bank for four separate properties.

January 31, 2017 - According to The Moscow Times, a report in Novaya Gazeta claims Mikhailov (currently charged with treason) implicated Vladimir Fomenko and his server rental company King Servers. In September 2016, ThreatConnect (a US cyber investigations agency) accused King Servers of involvement in the hacking of the Arizona and Illinois voting systems. And according to The New York Times, Fomenko claims he was unaware that this had happened until ThreatConnect released its findings.

February 1, 2017 - Rex Tillerson is sworn in as Secretary of State.

February 2, 2017 - The U.S. Treasury Department eases economic sanctions on Russia, allowing some cyber-security transactions with the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB).

February 3, 2017 - Congress repeals Dodd-Frank anti-corruption law. As a result, oil companies like Exxon Mobil will no longer be required to publicly state the taxes and other fees they pay to foreign governments (like Russia). The Hill reports that Trump invited Stephen Schwarzmann, CEO of Blackstone Group aboard Air Force One for his flight down to Mar-A-Lago. Schwarzmann is also a financial advisor to Trump and serves on the Advisory Board for the Qatar Foundation for Education, Science and Community Development.  

February 13, 2017 - Michael Flynn resigns from National Security Advisor role. Trump attends Stephen Schwarzman's 70th birthday party with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe along with daughter Ivanka, Jared Kushner, Wilbur Ross and Steve Mnuchin.

February 14, 2017 - James Comey meets with Trump, Jeff Sessions and Mike Pence for a briefing.  After the meeting, Comey would document his conversation with Trump in the form of a memo, as reported on May 16.  According to the memo, after the briefing, Trump asked Sessions and Pence to leave so he could talk to Comey alone.   Trump then suggested Comey end the Flynn investigation when he said “I hope you can see your way clear to letting this go, to letting Flynn go.  He is a good guy. I hope you can let this go.”  It was part of a paper trail Mr. Comey created documenting what he perceived as the president’s improper efforts to influence a continuing investigation.  

February 19, 2017 - NY Times reports a backchannel deal to lift sanctions on Russia was hand-delivered to Michael Flynn's office the day he resigned. The proposal, a peace plan for Ukraine and Russia, remains, along with those pushing it: Michael D. Cohen, the president’s personal lawyer, who delivered the document; Felix H. Sater, a business associate who helped Mr. Trump scout deals in Russia; and a Ukrainian lawmaker, Andrii Artemenko, trying to rise in a political opposition movement shaped in part by Mr. Trump’s former campaign manager Paul D. Manafort. Michael Cohen is Trump's chief personal lawyer and was named in the Steele Dossier as having "an ongoing secret liaison relationship between the Trump’s campaign and Russian leadership,” and that he met secretly with Kremlin officials in Prague in August 2016. Sater is a longtime Trump associate who helped Trump scout deals in Russia and worked out of Trump Tower. He has been in prison twice, once for embezzlement and once for stabbing a man in the face with a broken margarita glass. He has also been a US government informant. Manafort, as discussed earlier, has deep ties with the former Ukrainian President Yanukovych and was also named in the Steele Dossier as working directly with the Russian government during the Trump campaign.

February 20, 2017 - The Washington Post reports that Vitaly Churkin, the Russian ambassador to the United Nations, died suddenly in New York today. He is believed to have suffered from cardiac arrest while at the Russian Mission on East 67th Street, a law enforcement official said. On September 13, 2016, Churkin publicly defended Donald Trump when a top UN official criticized Trump's action during his campaign.

February 21, 2017 - The NY Times reports prosecutors in Ukraine are investigating whether Andrii V Artemenko, a member of Parliament, committed treason by working with two associates of President Trump’s to promote a plan for settling Ukraine’s conflicts with Russia.  In a court filing, prosecutors accused Artemenko of conspiring with Russia to commit “subversive acts against Ukraine,” in particular by advancing a proposal that could “legitimize the temporary occupation” of the Crimean peninsula.

March 2, 2017 - Andrii Artemenko, who helped broker a peace plan with Michael Cohen and Felix Sater, announces on Facebook that Alex Oronov, Russian millionaire, has died. Oronov was a business partner of Michael Cohen and his brother and reportedly the one to arrange the meeting. Michael Cohen’s brother is married to Oronov’s daughter.

March 5, 2017 - Famagusta Gazette reports that Wilbur Ross has stepped down as Vice Chairman of the Bank of Cyprus.

March 9, 2017 - The Trump administration orders 46 US attorneys to tender their resignation immediately, including Preet Bahrara, US attorney in Manhattan.  Two US Attorneys survived the firing, Dana Boente, the top prosecutor for the Eastern District of Virginia and acting deputy Attorney General, and Rod Rosenstein, the top prosecutor in Baltimore, whom Mr. Trump has nominated to be deputy attorney general.  At the time of his dismissal, Bahrara was overseeing an investigation into stock trades made by the president’s health secretary, Tom Price, according to a person familiar with the office.

March 19, 2017 - FBI Director James Comey and NSA head Mike Rogers confirm there is an ongoing investigation into the ties between Trump, his staff and the Russian government.White House confirms that Rex Tillerson will forgo a NATO meeting to travel to Russia to visit with Russian leaders.

March 21, 2017 - AP reports Paul Manafort secretly worked for Russian billionaire Oleg Deripaska as far back as 2005, to benefit the interests of Putin.  Manafort was paid $10 million/year from 2006 until at least 2009.

March 22, 2017 - In a press conference on the White House lawn, Devin Nunes, Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, admits to briefing the President on confidential information provided by the FBI and NSA regarding the investigation into Russia.  Nunes has not yet disclosed, even to the Intelligence Committee, the details of the conversation.

March 23, 2017 - Denis Voronenkov, was shot in the head and killed in Kiev.  Voronenkov had testified to Ukrainian investigators as part of their probe into the activities of the nation's former Russia-friendly president, Viktor Yanukovych, who was ousted by popular protests in February 2014 and fled to Russia.

March 24, 2017 - Rep Adam Schiff (D-Ranking Member, Intelligence Committee) reports that Chairman Devin Nunes has cancelled all open sessions of the Intelligence Committee.

April 6, 2017 - Devin Nunes recuses himself from the Russia investigation.

April 12, 2017 - Rex Tillerson meets with Vladimir Putin in Moscow both in an open session regarding a US airstrike on a Syrian air base as well as privately.  No press were allowed at the private meeting.

May 9, 2017 - James Comey, Director of the FBI and lead on the investigation of ties between Trump, his staff and Russia is fired by President Trump at the recommendation of Jeff Sessions (Attorney General) and Rod Rosenstein (newly appointed Deputy Attorney General).  In written statements, the reason for the firing was given as concerns over Comey’s handling of the Clinton email investigation.  Publicly, the Asst Press Secretary and Trump would both state the firing was due to concerns over the handling of the Russia investigation with hopes that the investigation would go away, leading to obstruction of justice concerns.

May 10, 2017 - Trump meets with Sergey Kislyak and Sergei Lavrov at the White House.  Although Russian media was invited to attend, no US media would be invited to the meeting.  Russian media would later release photos from the meeting without the consent of the White House.

May 12, 2017 - Trump (via Twitter): "James Comey better hope that there are no ‘tapes’ of our conversations before he starts leaking to the press!”

May 15, 2017 - CNN reports Trump may have revealed classified information regarding ISIS to Lavrov and Kislyak in the meeting on May 10.  Rex Tillerson and Gen McMaster would both state that Trump did not reveal anything sensitive.  While General McMaster did not deny that White House officials had reached out to intelligence agencies after Mr. Trump’s revelations to contain any potential damage, he said he could not explain why. “I would say maybe for an overabundance of caution,” he said. “I’m not sure.”

May 16, 2017 - Trump (via Twitter) admits to sharing classifed information:  As President I wanted to share with Russia (at an openly scheduled W.H. meeting) which I have the absolute right to do, facts pertaining to terrorism and airline flight safety. Humanitarian reasons, plus I want Russia to greatly step up their fight against ISIS & terrorism. Multiple sources release the February 14 memo written by James Comey following his meeting with Trump where Trump requested he end the investigation into Flynn.  Those same sources suggested Come wrote memos following each of his conversations with Trump.

May 17, 2017 - Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein appoints former FBI Director Bob Mueller to be a special counsel overseeing the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election. Trump names David Clarke, Milwaukee County Sheriff and Fox News regular, Assistant Secretary in the US Department of Homeland Security.  Clarke is currently in the midst of a prison-death scandal where a mentally ill inmate in his jail died of “profound dehydration”.

[1765liberty]

*cough*

There are roughly 58 countries in the world that offer universal healthcare to their citizens. Our closest try to that is now close to getting repealed and replaced with a plan where 1 out of every 13 Americans who have insurance under ACA will LOSE their insurance. A plan where credits will be given based on age, not based on need - a little like handing food stamps to a skinny person, not a poor person. A plan where your preemie could exceed his "lifetime limit" on coverage before he leaves the hospital the first time (American Academy of Pediatrics). A plan where your daughter could get raped, not be able to get an abortion, and then be turned down for health insurance because of a "pre-existing condition". A plan that does NOT apply to the people who will be voting it into law. And, unbelievably, a plan that will hurt Trump voters the most - the 11 states with the highest percentage of people with pre-existing conditions (1/3 of their entire under-65 population) ALL voted Trump in 2016. He just keeps on sticking it to you (and me) and you're oblivious to it.

[1765liberty]

STFU

You elected a man who has never held political office, never served in the military, has never run a publicly owned company and has never written a piece of legislation to be President and Commander in Chief. A man who you consider a "success" and a "leader" who has been married three times, declared bankruptcy four times, and who now owns trademarks for an escort service. You sat by quietly while he nominated a Secretary of State with no diplomatic experience, a Secretary of Education who has never educated, an EPA director who doesn't believe in climate change, a Secretary of Energy who is not a scientist, and a Secretary of Housing and Urban Development who is against fair housing. You sit by quietly while he attempts to stop all immigration, refuses to admit refugees, sells off public land to corporations, and removes consumer protections of personal privacy and access to healthcare, and protection from health hazards. You sit by quietly while people he has hired to work on his staff lie under oath, boldly lie to the American people on camera about events that never happened, and while, these people are being publicly unveiled as being agents of foreign governments and potentially committing treason. You sit by quietly while he boldly lies to the American people, even about meaningless things, and calls any media that does not agree with him "fake", while honorable people who have served both Democratic and Republican administrations warn he is a kleptocrat, an oligarch, an authoritarian, an idiot, unethical and potentially colluding with a foreign power. You sit by quietly while he refuses to divest his businesses, refuses to share his financial status while he spends 1/3 of his time spending taxpayer money to fund trips to his own properties and provide security to him, his estranged wife, and his fully grown children (while they manage his business) and makes decisions on behalf of the country that further his personal wealth. You sit by quietly as the representatives within your party openly break the law, change hundred year-old rules, are complicit in covering up your President's potentially illegal actions, block any effort at debate or compromise, and even fail to create legislation that was promised to you during the election despite controlling all three branches of government. This has all happened in the last six months. This is on you. We are doing everything we can to stop these idiots from destroying our country for the next, and potentially EVERY generation to come. I'm not whining, I'm mad. Put on your big boy/girl pants, own up to your mistake and help or get out of the way.

[1765liberty]

Update for Trump voters. 1. He said he wouldn’t bomb Syria. You bought it. Then he bombed Syria. 2. He said he'd build a wall along the border with Mexico. You bought it. Now his secretary of homeland security says "It’s unlikely that we will build a wall." 3. He said he’d clean the Washington swamp. You bought it. Then he brought into his administration more billionaires, CEOs, and Wall Street moguls than in any administration in history, to make laws that will enrich their businesses. 4. He said he’d repeal Obamacare and replace it with something “wonderful.” You bought it. Then he didn’t. 5. He said he’d use his business experience to whip the White House into shape. You bought it. Then he created the most chaotic, dysfunctional, back-stabbing White House in modern history, in which no one is in charge. 6. He said he’d release his tax returns, eventually. You bought it. He hasn’t, and says he never will. 7. He said he’d divest himself from his financial empire, to avoid any conflicts of interest. You bought it. He remains heavily involved in his businesses, makes money off of foreign dignitaries staying at his Washington hotel, gets China to give the Trump brand trademark and copyright rights, manipulates the stock market on a daily basis, and has more conflicts of interest than can even be counted. 8. He said Clinton was in the pockets of Goldman Sachs, and would do whatever they said. You bought it. Then he put half a dozen Goldman Sachs executives in positions of power in his administration. 9. He said he’d surround himself with all the best and smartest people. You bought it. Then he put Betsy DeVos, opponent of public education, in charge of education; Jeff Sessions, opponent of the Voting Rights Act, in charge of voting rights; Ben Carson, opponent of the Fair Housing Act, in charge of fair housing; Scott Pruitt, climate change denier, in charge of the Environmental Protection Agency; and Russian quisling Rex Tillerson as Secretary of State. 10. He said he’d faithfully execute the law. You bought it. Then he said his predecessor, Barack Obama, spied on him, without any evidence of Obama ever doing so, in order to divert attention from the FBI's investigation into collusion between his campaign and Russian operatives to win the election. 11. He said he knew more about strategy and terrorism than the generals did. You bought it. Then he promptly gave the green light to a disastrous raid in Yemen- even though all his generals said it would be a terrible idea. This raid resulted in the deaths of a Navy SEAL, an 8-year old American girl, and numerous civilians. The actual target of the raid escaped, and no useful intel was gained. 12. He called Barack Obama “the vacationer-in-Chief” and accused him of playing more rounds of golf than Tiger Woods. He promised to never be the kind of president who took cushy vacations on the taxpayer’s dime, not when there was so much important work to be done. You bought it. He has by now spent more taxpayer money on vacations than Obama did in the first 3 years of his presidency. Not to mention all the money taxpayers are spending protecting his family, including his two sons who travel all over the world on Trump business. 13. He called CNN, the Washington Post and the New York Times “fake news” and said they were his enemy. You bought it. Now he gets his information from Fox News, Breitbart, Gateway Pundit, and InfoWars. More to come. - Robert Reich

[1765liberty]

The Noose Tightens

Another day, another Seth Abrahamson MEGA tweet. 

Note: most of this is corroborated by my own timeline, culled from MSM.  He manages to put all the puzzle pieces together and explain some of the background detail of what may be going on as we speak.

"Between 6/20/16 and 12/13/16, former MI6 agent STEELE compiled an intel dossier establishing TRUMP and allies had committed treason. STEELE first worked for anti-Trump GOP operatives, but most of his research was done for free due to his concern for the intel on TRUMP. Between 6/1 and 11/18, parts of the dossier were variously held by anti-Trump GOPers, the MI6, FBI friends of Steele, and David Corn. During this time--largely pre-election--there is no evidence that any of the dossier's sources had been identified or in any way harmed. Between 11/18 and 12/9 MCCAIN acquired the dossier. The Guardian reports MCCAIN didn't share it--to avoid looking vengeful toward TRUMP. On 12/9, MCCAIN gave the dossier to COMEY. Presumably, COMEY thereafter shared it with other agents at the FBI. The NEW YORK FIELD OFFICE of the FBI is known to have illegally leaked confidential information to TRUMP advisers GIULIANI and PRINCE. GIULIANI and PRINCE--a TRUMP "shadow adviser" and brother to DEVOS--have admitted to having active FBI sources. Former TRUMP National Security Adviser Michael FLYNN was just found to have active (and paid) FBI sources also. Within seventeen days of the FBI having possession of Steele's dossier, the chief source behind the dossier had been murdered by PUTIN. On 12/26, the top aide and most trusted advisor of SECHIN, head of Russia's oil/gas company, was found murdered in the back of his car. The deceased man, former FSB agent Oleg EROVINKIN, was the trusted "go-between between SECHIN and PUTIN," also both former FSB agents. The dossier accused SECHIN of offering TRUMP, via PAGE, money from Russia's oil company ROSNEFT in exchange for lifting U.S. sanctions. The theory PUTIN helped elect TRUMP and offered money via SECHIN for lifting sanctions (allowing a ROSNEFT pipeline) is "#Russiagate." The death of SECHIN aide/STEELE source EROVINKIN was reported as a heart attack before an autopsy had occurred. By 12/29, outlets reporting EROVINKIN died in the back of his car via heart attack were withdrawing the claim. While news of the death wouldn't break widely until late January, it's reasonable to assume Steele had heard about it by early January. The reason for this is that former FSB and ROSNEFT man EROVINKIN was--as later became public--the chief source for the STEELE dossier. As there was no reason for STEELE to think on 12/26 the FSB had his dossier, there was no reason for him to think EROVINKIN was killed. The BUZZFEED publication also would've confirmed for STEELE that EROVINKIN had indeed been identified and thereafter murdered by PUTIN. On 1/12, STEELE and his family abandoned their home in Surrey with no indication of whether they'd ever return. By 1/12, British media had established Steele's strong reputation in the IC as former Russia-desk head for MI6. Meanwhile, U.S. media did little research on STEELE--and indulged claims by TRUMP that STEELE was a "failed spy" peddling "fake news." By 1/27, it had been leaked that EROVINKIN, a "go-between for PUTIN and SECHIN," was a primary dossier source. The news of EROVINKIN being linked to the dossier within a matter of days increased the credibility of the dossier for law enforcement. On 2/11 CBS said "it's gaining credibility among law enforcement--even for people who discounted it initially." On 2/27 reports placed Steele in Cambridge after 7 weeks without a sighting, though he remained away from home. On 3/1 it was revealed the FBI had enough confidence in the dossier that it offered to pay STEELE to expand it. On 3/2, SENATE DEMS contacted STEELE via friends and offered to help him testify before their Intel Committee. On 3/7, STEELE emerged from hiding and told the press, "I won't be making any further statements at this time." A reasonable speculation is that STEELE's emergence from hiding was prompted at least in part by U.S. assurances he'd be foregrounded. The more attention U.S. officials gave STEELE, and the more legitimacy their statements lent to his work, the safer he was from PUTIN. On 3/17 it was confirmed that a STEELE source, MILLIAN, met with former MANAFORT boss (DERIPASKA) in June 2016. DERIPASKA, a close ally of PUTIN, had paid MANAFORT $10 million annually from 2006 to 2009 to shill for Russia. MANAFORT, whose current tie to DERIPASKA/PUTIN is unknown, has now been found to have laundered his Russia pay. The MILLIAN/DERIPASKA meet further confirmed the dossier originated from sources in a position to know the movements of TRUMP advisers. On 3/20, the HOUSE INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE met publicly with COMEY. The Dems cited STEELE's dossier repeatedly. Within 72 hours the Dems had indicated they intended to ask STEELE to testify. Citing his dossier was likely intended to keep him safe. The likely Dem theory: if the dossier's content is not just public but made public by Congress, PUTIN gains nothing in killing STEELE. On 3/23, Rep. Himes (D-CT) of the HOUSE INTEL COMMITTEE told CBS, "We’ll want to talk to Christopher Steele." Himes' statement confirmed the House as well as the Senate was interested in STEELE and had a new level of confidence he would testify. In the past (e.g. after the 2004 election) minority parties in Congressional committees have scheduled informal meetings for witnesses. So even when the GOP refuses to let STEELE formally testify, HOUSE AND SENATE DEMS can (and say they will) schedule informal testimony. The benefit of informal testimony is that Dems can televise the testimony so long as STEELE agrees to discuss no classified U.S. intel. So there's every reason to believe that (a) STEELE has strong sources, (b) PUTIN won't kill him, and (c) he will soon testify publicly. For all the lies told by TRUMP and ALLIES about both STEELE and his dossier, in fact virtually none of it has been disproven to date. E.g., PAGE has confessed to ROSNEFT meets; the ROSNEFT sale was as described; COHEN was a courier as described. In sum, the IC and Democrats increasingly think the STEELE dossier and #Russiagate theory are accurate. If so, TRUMP will be impeached.(NOTES) Dossier claims about TRUMP's 2013 Moscow trip are still being investigated, but we know TRUMP lied about it.”

[1765liberty]

This may be the reason Stone, Manafort and Page suddenly agreed to testify to the Intelligence Committee.

[1765liberty]

YOU NEED TO READ THIS

If you do nothing else today:

Posted yesterday by Seth Abramson (HuffPost) on Twitter in a series of 51 tweets.  This story about Trump & Russia could be the one to bring down the Trump White House and folks like Sessions, Kushner, Manafort, Page, and others:

"The plot to sell America's foreign policy for foreign oil and steal an election in the bargain began at the Mayflower Hotel...  

Per @NYMag, Paul Manafort took over the Trump campaign on April 16, just 72 hours before Trump mathematically eliminated his competition. The timing was intentional: Manafort, hired in March, was slated to become the campaign's key player as soon as Trump became the nominee. On April 21, 48 hours after clinching, Trump announced the first major foreign policy address of his life. It was scheduled for April 27. The speech, arranged by Jared Kushner in mid-March, was to be hosted by the Center for the National Interest, a conservative think tank. The Center is widely known to have "ties to the Russian regime of President Vladimir Putin," per Politico. The speech was slated to be at the National Press Club, an august venue with a long history of staging secure events with large crowds. Less than 24 hours before the speech, it was cancelled. The Trump campaign (i.e., Manafort) declared the venue was too small and unsafe. So Manafort moved the event to the Mayflower Hotel: a smaller, less secure site. The decision confirmed the campaign's excuses were lies. The two things the Mayflower had that the NPC didn't were (a) 581 private rooms for private meetings, and (b) restricted, VIP-only areas. The latter was important because Manafort wanted Trump to hold an intimate, 24-person cocktail hour in the Mayflower's VIP Senate Room. Among the 24 at the event: Trump, CNI event coordinator Heilbrunn, Jeff Sessions, Kushner, Lewandowski, Manafort, and four ambassadors. Another VIP at the event was Iran-Contra figure Bud McFarlane, one of America's chief advocates for a bargain with Russia on oil access. The four ambassadors were the only four ambassadors in the world (out of 195 total) that the Putin-linked CNI had invited to the event. The biggest oil deal in Russia's history occurred in December of 2016. It involved the coordination of entities from three countries. Individuals from those three countries—RUSSIA, ITALY, and SINGAPORE—negotiated the sale of 19.5% of Russia's state oil company, Rosneft. The #Russiagate scandal involves claims Trump was given 0.5% of Rosneft and aid in getting elected in exchange for lifting US sanctions. The Rosneft deal closed Dec. 5-7. During that time, McFarlane visited Trump Tower. It's believed Russian ambassador/spy Kislyak did too. WSJ wrote in April 2016 that Trump met separately with the ambassadors at the Mayflower and was effusive. Quote: “Trump met at a VIP reception with Russia’s ambassador to the U.S., Sergey Kislyak. He warmly greeted Kislyak and 3 other ambassadors." The ambassadors at the Mayflower: RUSSIA! ITALY! SINGAPORE! And the Philippines--which is routinely cited as a Rosneft expansion target. So Trump warmly, privately chatted with the 3 Rosneft-deal nations at a cocktail hour right before his first big foreign-policy event. In his speech, Trump called for a Russian detente: "We desire to live peacefully and in friendship with Russia...we are not bound... to be adversaries. We should seek common ground based on shared interests...an easing of tensions and improved relations with Russia... is possible..[I hope to] make a deal under my administration that’s great for America but also good for Russia." Richard Burt, CNI and Russian Alfa Bank adviser, crafted the speech. He was also Putin's pipeline lobbyist. The only Kislyak meeting Sessions never disclosed to Congress, even after accusations of perjury, was the meeting at the Mayflower. But per the organizer of the Mayflower Hotel event, Jacob Heilbrunn of the CNI, a third Sessions-Kislyak meeting definitely occurred. Heilbrunn on the VIP event: "At a reception in the Senate Room of the Mayflower, a number of politicians and Trump advisers, such as...... Senator Jeff Sessions and ambassadors [from Russia and the other nations] congregated before the event." The VIP event wasn't just a receiving line as Trump claimed. It was a "cocktail meet-and-greet"--a full event. That Sessions would feel the need to hide his contact with Kislyak at the Mayflower event after accusations of perjury raises red flags. The White House saying it has “no recollection” of any of the VIPs at Trump's biggest-ever foreign policy event is also a red flag. When Kislyak was asked if he’d met Trump or members of his team during the campaign he replied, "What do you consider a campaign?" Kislyak went on to fail to disclose his meeting with Trump at the Mayflower, citing only a meeting at the RNC. We know Manafort and Kislyak would have known each other, as Manafort indirectly worked for Putin for years. We know Manafort set up the Mayflower event and was available for meetings at it--as was Kushner, who later met secretly with Kislyak. Congress must investigate any Mayflower meetings between Sessions, Manafort, Kushner, Kislyak and the Italian/Singaporean ambassadors. We know the White House lied about Mayflower. We know Sessions has. We know Kislyak has. And we know the Rosneft players were present. We know there was ample time/space for "sidelines" meetings. And we know Walid Phares was also there, and Trump Jr., and Stephen Miller. So other than the RNC and suspicious Trump Tower meetings in December, the Mayflower Speech should get the _most_ attention in Congress.  (Abramson also includes links and credits to other sources in his tweets, which I've edited out here.)

Editor’s Note: A 0.5% stake in Rosneft would be valued at roughly $300 million.  If sanctions are lifted on Russia, and the Arctic pipeline goes through (a deal expected to be worth $500 billion), Trump's share would be worth billions.

[1765liberty]

Russia=NRA=Trump

Surprise, surprise. The NRA may be involved in the Trump-Russia relationship too! Guns and Russia and Trump! What a great combination. Keep an eye on these players, ladies and gentlemen:

In May of 2013, Alexander Torshin travels to the NRA convention and meets with then-NRA President David Keene. Torshin was a Senator in Putin's political party.

Fall of 2013 David Keene travels to Russia for a gun conference hosted by "The Right to Bear Arms", a group founded by Maria Butina. She chaired the event, Torshin attended, and Keene spoke. In March, 2014 Dmitry Rogozin, head of the Russian defense industry, is one of several Russians individually sanctioned by the US/Obama for Russia's invasion of the Ukraine.

April 2014, Butina attends NRA convention in Indianapolis. Butina was invited to speak at the exclusive Ring of Freedom dinner with “the patrons who donated” more than $1 million to the NRA.

July 2014, Obama issues additional sanctions against Russia regarding firearms exports and NRA writes a scathing protest letter.

In 2015, Torshin becomes deputy head of Russia's Central Bank. His aide at the bank is Maria Butina and his boss is Sergey Aleksachenko (who used to be Carter Page's boss at Merrill Lynch Moscow).

December 11, 2015 David Keene flies to Moscow to attend the “Right to Bear Arms” gun event. He meets with Alexander Torshin and Dmitry Rogozin. Also attending: NRA First VP Pete Brownell; NRA funders Dr. Arnold Goldschlager and his daughter Hilary Goldschalger; Outdoor Life channel head Jim Liberatore and Milwaukee County Sheriff and Fox News regular David A. Clarke. The event was organized by Butina.

May 2016, Torshin attends another NRA annual meeting and shares a dinner table with Donald Trump Jr. The NRA would formally endorse Trump at this convention.

November 10, 2016 Butina hosts a birthday party in Washington. Many Trump staffers are in attendance. Butina supposedly bragged she was involved in the conversations between Trump and Russian officials.

On January 2, 2017, David Keene published an op-ed in the Washington Times in which he completely reverses his position on Vladimir Putin. Up until that point, the NRA had publicly been critical of Putin.

January, 20 2017 Butina attends the invite-only Freedom Ball on Inauguration day.

February 3, 2017 A Russian delegation consisting of 16 representatives of the state Duma, the Central Bank, academia and NGOs – attended the annual National prayer Breakfast in Washington, which was made by the President of the United States Donald trump. The primary representative of the delegation was Maria Butina.

February 24, 2017, NRA CEO Wayne LaPierre appears at CPAC and suggests executing U.S. intelligence officials who uncover details about the Trump team’s ties to Russia.

The NRA spent $30.3 million on the Trump campaign.