It Seems Donald J. Trump Is More of a Conspiracy Nut Than Even Alex Jones

New Lawyers to be Hired by Trump: Husband and Wife “Tag Team”

(Hold on tight – the road ahead is a mine field)

OOOPS ... now not so sure - UPDATED from Vox here highlights:

Jay Sekulow, Trump’s personal lawyer, gave The NY Times this statement:

“The president is disappointed that conflicts prevent Joe diGenova and Victoria Toensing from joining the president’s special counsel legal team...However, those conflicts do not prevent them from assisting the president in other legal matters. The president looks forward to working with them.”

Trump’s legal team is facing major upheaval as the Russia investigation heats up.

The president’s lead attorney, John Dowd, resigned Thursday after clashing with Trump about legal strategy. The president reportedly wanted to sit down for an interview with investigators, as they had requested, but Dowd believed it was too risky.

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Original post is below.

Wow it's hard to keep track or keep up with Trump and all these changes that he seeks as he "will hire only the best" that he promised - so who's next? Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh?

Introduction to this post is what I call “Here we go again” BS: There is a lot to read and cover, but the truth matters, not more rumors and myth based on opinion, simply the facts — enjoy.

In In May 2015, with the publication of a book called “Clinton Cash: The Untold Story of How and Why Foreign Governments and Businesses Helped Make Bill and Hillary Rich,” turned out to be an exposé of alleged Clinton Foundation corruption that was written by Peter Schweizer, former editor-at-large at Breitbart. One chapter in the book suggests that the Clinton family and Russia each may have benefited from a “pay-for-play” scheme while Hillary Clinton was secretary of state, involving the transfer of U.S. uranium reserves to the new Russian owners of an international mining operation in exchange for $145 million in donations to the Clinton Foundation – referred to as the “Uranium-One Deal.”

Summary: Book author Schweizer raised legitimate questions about the Clinton Foundation and its donations but, he simply goes too far when he says Clinton had “veto power and could have stopped the uranium deal” when in fact only the President has the authority to suspend or prohibit (not approve) such a covered transaction. 

Through a spokeswoman, Schweizer backpedaled and told the TIMES that he “meant the Clinton could have forced the issue to the president's desk.” However, at is not what he said when he appeared on Fox News Sunday, where he discussed the uranium deal and his book (which was released May 5, 2015).

Chris Wallace, host of Fox News Sunday: Made that point when he questioned Schweizer about his lack of evidence connecting the donations to the uranium deal. 

(Note: Fox News was among the media outlets that received an advance copy of the Schweizer book). Schweizer made his counter-argument and again without any evidence that “…investors bought Hillary Clinton’s silence by making contributions to the Clinton Foundation.” Schweizer speculated that investors were worried about Clinton's history of opposing the sale of “critical assets in the U.S.,” while citing her opposition as a senator to the 2006 sale of six U.S. ports to Dubai Ports World, a state-owned business in the United Arab Emirates.

Fox’s Chris Wallace: “Nine separate agencies and the Clinton campaign all pointed out there's no hard evidence, and you don't cite any in the book that Hillary Clinton took direct action or was involved in any way in approving as one of nine agencies the sale of the company?”

Schweizer: “Well, here's what's important to keep in mind: it was one of nine agencies, but any one of those agencies had veto power. So, she could have stopped the deal. So, what's interesting about this, of all those nine agencies, who was the most hawkish on these types of issues? Hillary Clinton. She had a reputation going back to the Dubai Ports deal.” 

Note: Schweizer and his publicist were emailed links about the comments and assertions to CRS report and the regulation that governs the CFIUS and their work.

Schweizer responded through the publicist saying (in fancy sidestepping): “By veto I mean halt the deal and advance their concerns to the President.”  He then noted that Clinton was the only committee member who had a family foundation that received donations from the investors in the uranium deal.

Schweizer is trafficking in pure and utter speculation even as he raises legitimate questions about the Clinton Foundation and its donations – all fair game, but, he goes too far when he says Clinton had “veto power and could have stopped the uranium deal.” 

That was a flat out a lie – and one huge whopper.

Further is this super update from this Shep Smith also at Fox:

While Fox News has doubled down on the “Clinton-Russian Pay-to-Play Uranium One” story on recent weeks, devoting hours of programming time to the Obama-era uranium deal in an effort to paint it as “the real Russian conspiracy,” one prominent face on the network has completely avoided covering it. Until today, that is. And let’s just say, he covered the story in a far different way than, say, Sean Hannity.

Now with Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee pushing AG Sessions to appoint a special counsel to investigate Hillary Clinton’s involvement in the deal, Fox News anchor Shepard Smith devoted a few minutes to breaking down the facts of the deal. In doing so, he made it clear that much of what’s been reported on his own network about the “scandalous” deal doesn’t hold water.

After giving a bit of a history lesson on mining company Uranium One and the 2010 deal involving a Russian agency obtaining controlling interest in the company, Smith zeroed in on the Schweizer book and his theory – and not facts.

Smith said flatly: “That Schweizer statement is inaccurate in a number of ways. Most importantly, Clinton State Department had no power to veto or approve that transaction. It could do neither.”

Smith then went on to explain how the approval process worked with this particular deal while pointing out that Clinton appeared to have very little, if any, involvement. Also, regarding the claims that $140 million was donated to the Clinton Foundation from investors involved in the deal, Smith pointed out that most of those donations cited were from a man who sold his stake in the company in 2007, three years before the deal.

Note: During the 2016 presidential campaign, Trump lodged the uranium accusation during a campaign rally saying that “Hillary Clinton gave up 20 percent of America’s uranium supply to Russia — to Russia.”

Note: According to Politifact, Trump said that and ranked the claim “mostly false” because there was no evidence of a quid pro quo, adding: “The State Department did approve the Uranium-One deal, but it didn’t act unilaterally. It was one of nine U.S. government agencies, plus independent federal and state nuclear regulators, as well as the Canadian government had to sign off on the deal.”

Separately, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) needed to approve, and did approve, the transfer of two uranium recovery licenses as part of the sale.

Key Facts that are stunning and should be a wakeup call for all Americans and especially the right-wingers who follow this crap without facts:

1. Only * CFIUS (The Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States) can approve a sale, but it cannot stop a sale. Only the president can do that (stop a sale), and then only if the committee recommends or “any member of CFIUS recommends suspension or prohibition of the transaction.”

2. According to guidelines issued by the Treasury Department in December 2008 (Note: Barack Obama was not president in December 2008) and then after the department adopted its final rule which was a month earlier and that would have been in November 2008 and under President George W. Bush).

That rule reads “Treasury Department, Dec. 8, 2008: Only the President has the authority to suspend or prohibit a covered transaction. Pursuant to section 6(c) of Executive Order 11858, CFIUS refers a covered transaction to the President if CFIUS or any member of CFIUS recommends suspension or prohibition of the transaction, or if CFIUS otherwise seeks a Presidential determination on the transaction.”

* The Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) is an inter-agency committee of the United States Government that reviews the national security implications of foreign investments in U.S. companies or operations.

CFIUS is chaired by the Treasury Secretary, and it also includes representatives from 16 departments and agencies, including DOD, STATE, COMMERCE, and personnel mostly from DHS.

CFIUS BTW, was established by President Ford’s EO Executive Order 11858 in 1975. President Reagan delegated the review process to the CFIUS with EO 12661 in 1988.

Further: Even the president cannot prohibit a transaction without “credible evidence that the foreign interest exercising control might take action that threatens to impair the national security.”

Also: Very little is known about the Uranium-One-Rosatom deal or even Clinton's role in it because the law for such matters and according to Treasury Department guidelines have:

“Strong confidentiality requirements by law information filed with CFIUS is subject to strong confidentiality requirements that prohibit disclosure to the public, and accordingly, CFIUS does not disclose whether parties to any transaction have filed notices with CFIUS, nor does CFIUS disclose the results of any review. When a transaction is referred to the President, however, the decision of the President is announced publicly.”

Last note: Jose Fernandez, former Assistant Sec of State with CFIUS stated that: “Mrs. Clinton never intervened with me on any CFIUS matter.”

My 2 cents: Also, it all ties into this latest critical update from Trump in the White House on this bogus issue again is the story from Media Matters here. 

As pictured above: Victoria Toensing, newest Trump lawyer is the wife of recently-hired Joseph diGenova. As the article headline states: “She has been trying to use the “Uranium-One” myth to get Mueller investigated and ultimately fired.” 

It is more and more apparent to me that Trump wants to rule America as a one-man nation that is apparent with each passing day crazy-ass idea coming from like these two recent hires and the idea he wants to eliminate the Chief of Staff position in favor of what he calls: “Four co-equal principals reporting directly to him instead of having one White House Chief of Staff.” 

So, when will the general public come to grips of what Trump has done and proposes to do to consolidate his power and thus the country at this finger tips as a business acquisition. 

Stay tuned, and thanks for stopping by. Hope you enjoyed this review.