It’s been about a week’s wait to post more than a series of tweets on this latest work by Richard Engel who co-wrote recently:
The businessman, who donated $273,000 in 2016, wanted a face-to-face meeting with a Russian official.
— by Richard Engel, Kate Benyon-Tinker, Charlotte Gardiner and Kennett Werner / Sep.28.2018
Kukes is one of several Americans with deep ties to Russia who donated to Trump in 2016. Leonard Blavatnik, a Ukrainian-born billionaire, donated $1 million to the inauguration through his company Access Industries, a sprawling firm with interests in natural resources, chemicals, and media.
New York businessman Andrew Intrater donated $250,000 to the inauguration. His company, Columbus Nova, manages assets on behalf of the Russian-owned mining and telecoms conglomerate Renova Group. A previous SEC filing described Columbus Nova as the U.S.-based affiliate of the Renova Group and a recently archived version of its own website specified that Columbus Nova was “the U.S. investment vehicle for the Renova Group."
Those gifts are now being investigated by special counsel Robert Mueller as part of his probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election, several people familiar with the investigation told NBC News.
A key excerpt:
Moran, the ex-CIA officer, described the donations as part of an “operation” to influence the election and the future administration.
“The end goal,”
she suggested,
“was not only to get Trump elected but to get Trump elected and continue to be able to exert influence, if not control, through access...They’ve bought a ticket into the West Wing.”
— “they’ve bought a ticket to the West Wing..”
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Here is the first of a five part series:
— September 30th, 2018
Simon Kukes, a Russian-born, Houston-based donor to Trump, spent months trying to arrange meetings with a high-level Russian state official back in Moscow throughout the 2016 campaign.
note: If the video doesn’t play at first, try again in a moment after the video reappears; third try usually works, maybe try refreshing the page, or view video @ link above or here
Here are the next four segments of the report (no embed code was available):
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Here is an earlier six part series from Richard Engel (7/14/2017):
With a six part series on Environmental Goals (8/5/2017):
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Most of this series of reports, both earlier and on this latest work from Richard Engel has been covered here @ Daily Kos from just about every angle. David Corn has done a lot of research and writing on most all of this mess and calls it “an ever growing mosaic" of corruption. It is. But we haven’t got to the end of it yet. Not by a long shot
* * *
One last observation / opinion by me; just to push back a bit on the idea from those cautioning against - ‘wasting time attacking the GOP' ..
Dems being on defense is where the GOP/Trump want Dems, Just like any attack organization. Republicans set the debate, and distract away from their own political malfeasance.
..As furiously the GOP are covering-up their deceit, abuse of power, and political shenanigans, the more it needs exposure — imo — Not because we shouldn’t be constantly pressing forward with our own progressive Dems agenda, with major effort geared on organizing, registering folks, and GOTV, but because in order to help do that, the lies fabricated by the GOP propaganda Wurlitzer / Fox and Friends.. mischaracterizing every piece of our platform must be debunked and redirected toward the wrong-doers — the GOP
The “Socialist" or “evil socialism”/Communism" fear-mongering as one example out of a long list of “conservative” smears ; “Death Panels” ; “ Job-killing, burdensome regulations" .. blah .. blah .. blah..
.. The GOP has a lot to answer for. We should make them. Not by arguing what the Fox Propagandist, or Trump, or republican politicians throw out there, but instead, by going straight at the GOP, putting them in the spot-light; on defense; answering for their sins against this country, and all people around the world we live in
— We aim our platform straight at them, not in defense of it, but forcing them to answer for theirs.
grrr.. this NARAL video tweet directly above is really worth watching. Unfortunately IE11 with Windows 10 isn’t rendering the tweet, so the video doesn’t show. Google Chrome browser works, and so does Microsoft Edge browser. So if anyone has the same non-rendering result and can’t see the NARAL video, try either of those two browsers instead of IE11