hobnobbing with criminals?

Donald Trump carried out a form of espionage right in front of our faces, on TV and in the public. He did it during his presidency by showing documents to various foreign officials, especially Russians starting in his first couple of months.

As Thom Hartmann relates in his Wednesday newsletter:   

 ‘If Trump shared American secrets with Putin, our intelligence agencies are not going to call a press conference to let us all know…In 2019 The Washington Post revealed that, throughout his presidency, Donald Trump was having secret phone conversations with Russia’s President Putin (over 20 have been identified so far, including one just days before the 2020 election)…The Washington Post reported last August that Trump had a habit of carrying top-secret information that could severely damage our national security, leaving it in hotel rooms in hostile nations. 

In his first months in office, Trump outed an Israeli spy to the Russian Ambassador in what he thought was going to be a “secret Oval Office meeting” (the Russians released the photo to the press), resulting in MOSAD having to “burn” (relocate, change identity of) that spy.,,That, in turn, prompted the CIA to worry that a longtime American spy buried deep in the Kremlin was similarly vulnerable to Trump handing him over to Putin…The CIA concluded that the risk Trump had burned or was about to burn our spy inside the Kremlin was so great that — at massive loss to US intelligence abilities that…they pulled our spy out of Russia in the first year of Trump’s presidency, 2017. 

in Helsinki on July 16, 2018, Trump and Putin talked in private for several hours and Trump ordered his translators’ notes destroyed…Three weeks after Trump’s July 16, 2018 meeting with Putin in Helsinki, Senator Rand Paul made a solo trip to Moscow to personally hand-deliver a document or package of documents from Trump to Putin. Its contents are still unknown, although Paul told the press it was a “personal” letter of some sort. 

From campaigning to destroy NATO to opposing aid to Ukraine to demolishing the free world’s confidence in America’s ability to keep top secret information confidential, Trump’s goal appears to be,… to “Make America Russia.” 

Despite evidence that is almost overwhelming, and despite the fact that Trump’s actions have put America’s soldiers and intelligence forces in a much more precarious situation, Iowa’s top extremist right wing Republican elected officials once again choose to put party ahead of the welfare of the country. 

From siouxlandproud we get this report on comments from Iowa’s senators Grassley and Ernst and Governor Kim Reynolds:

Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa

DOJ indicts former President / candidate Trump SAME DAY DOJ/FBI restricts access to unnecessarily redacted Biden allegations And they wonder why ppl think there r two standards for justice

SEN. CHUCK GRASSLEY ON TWITTER

Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa

The Left is more concerned with so-called “equity” than equal application of the law. Biden promised to unify, but instead he’s further politicized the justice system, sowing more doubt in American institutions. Iowans are fed up & want to restore confidence in our justice system

SEN. JONI ERNST ON TWITTER

Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds

The federal indictment of former President Trump represents a grave warning sign for the state of equal justice and public trust in government institutions in this country.

Just like the Biden CDC’s overreach during COVID will have long-lasting impacts on the American people’s trust in public health institutions, the Biden administration’s weaponization of the Justice Department will diminish Americans’ confidence in law enforcement institutions for decades to come.

This is a sad day for America, and it is difficult to see where we go from here—particularly as President Biden has also been accused of the same thing the DOJ is prosecuting former President Trump for. 2024 can’t come soon enough.”  

Not one word of concern about the damage that Trump’s apparent espionage may have done to our country. Not a word about putting our military in greater danger. Not one whit of concern about the burning of spies or the loss of their years of experience. 

Grassley has always been little but a party whore with a carefully cultivated – and wholly mistaken – image as a statesman. Ernst uses her military credentials as one of her major claims to electability. Yet where is her concern about the danger Trump’s action have put our military in? Certainly much less important than regurgitating party talking points.

Kim Reynolds continues in her quest to be recognized as Trump’s top stooge with her ridiculous misdirection to the covid pandemic (which Trump botched so badly that estimates claim as many as 700,000 deaths were due to Trump’s incompetence) then her turn to claim that Trump is a victim of a two-tiered justice system.

Most Americans see a two-tiered system, but not the way Reynolds does. We are right now witnessing yet another rich person get kid glove handling as we see day to day common Americans being manhandled by a system built to coddle the rich. Yep, we see the two-tiered system but certainly not the way Reynolds does.

As the various trials for Donald Trump play out in public view I fully expect that the vast majority of Americans will be sickened by how Trump violated, even mocked, our systems. Most Americans will also be sickened by Republican politicians turn a blind eye to Trump’s lawlessness and lie over and over about his innocence despite huge amounts of solid evidence. Payback at the polls may be brutal.

I surely would not want to be a Republican politician trying to sell a very skeptical public on Trump’s innocence before the 2024 election. Talk about selling a turd in a punchbowl. Expect the vast majority of Americans to be really pissed off if Trump is able to do the damage he has done to the country and get away without punishment. That will be proof positive that our justice system only works for the rich.

Who Reynolds really works for