Monday, April 4, 2022

This Is The Level of Foreign Influence That The Roberts Court Facilitated In Its "First Amendment" Decisions

 

Stengel: Russian Foreign Minister toying with Trump 

 

In case anyone forgets, that Putin's henchman, liar and probably spy, soemone who even George W. Bush called "a complete asshole," Sergey Lavarov, was welcomed into the oval office along with others who were certainly security risks by Putin's most successful weapon against the United States, the Republican President, Donald Trump.   The context of that coup by Putin working in concert with the Republican Party is best given in what Trump told Lavarov that day.

 “I just fired the head of the F.B.I. He was crazy, a real nut job, I faced great pressure because of Russia. That’s taken off.”

You don't need to feel sorry for the FBI director, James Comey, because he did as much as anyone to put Trump, the candidate of Comey's party, into the White House, which no one should ever forget when that sanctimonious asshole is mentioned.    Something he has yet to apologize for even as what a catastrophe he wrought in sandbagging Hillary Clinton became undeniable even to that big boy scout.

That Lavarov can be safely assumed to be a spy was probably not necessary because it is known Trump gave him highly classified information that was not even given to America's actual allies, risking the lives of our intelligence sources,  at that meeting:

President Trump revealed highly classified information to the Russian foreign minister and ambassador in a White House meeting last week, according to current and former U.S. officials, who said Trump’s disclosures jeopardized a critical source of intelligence on the Islamic State.

The information the president relayed had been provided by a U.S. partner through an intelligence-sharing arrangement considered so sensitive that details have been withheld from allies and tightly restricted even within the U.S. government, officials said.

The partner had not given the United States permission to share the material with Russia, and officials said Trump’s decision to do so endangers cooperation from an ally that has access to the inner workings of the Islamic State. After Trump’s meeting, senior White House officials took steps to contain the damage, placing calls to the CIA and the National Security Agency.

“This is code-word information,” said a U.S. official familiar with the matter, using terminology that refers to one of the highest classification levels used by American spy agencies. Trump “revealed more information to the Russian ambassador than we have shared with our own allies.”

To put this propaganda and intelligence compromise coup in current context, this was also mentioned at the tail-end of the reporting of that event:

“Trump emphasized the need to work together to end the conflict in Syria,” the summary said. The president also “raised Ukraine” and “emphasized his desire to build a better relationship between the United States and Russia.”

But while it is right to call out Comey, there was no one who did more to put Trump, Putin's puppet, there than the Court majority in the Citizens United decision which was issued despite warnings by many that to rule the way they did would open up the United States to dangerous political influence by foreign dark money as it did domestic billionaire money.   

The Roberts Court is probably the most dangerous Court in terms of national security we've ever had since Taney was trying to hamper Lincoln's conduct of the Civil War in Maryland.   The role that they played in opening up our politics to dirty money, even more than the Berger and Rehnquist Courts did, proves that the Court overturning clean-election laws passed in the wake of the Nixon crime spree was among the most dangerous things that Court has ever done.   And they did it by citing the sacralized and totally inadequate First Amendment, among others.   Their use of it proves that it can be that kind of danger as it is written.   It has to be amended to remove any of the amoral and absurd idea that there is ever a right to lie that is protected as "free speech."  

There is a direct line between those court decisions and our Country having been in the hands of Vladimir Putins' willing puppet who, if he wasn't worried about the rumored blackmail video would have certainly sold out the United States, Ukraine and Syria to get a Trump Hotel in Moscow.   And unlike the presidency, the Court is even more solidly in the control of the Republican-fascist majority that those decisions have enabled and empowered.

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