Former WH lawyer: 'people are starting to realize this administration has been corrupt from day one

[babylonsister]

https://m.dailykos.com/stories/2018/4/3/1754088/-Former-WH-lawyer-people-are-starting-to-realize-this-administration-has-been-corrupt-from-day-one


Former WH lawyer: 'people are starting to realize this administration has been corrupt from day one'
Apr 03, 2018 12:40pm EDT by Walter Einenkel


Richard Painter is a former ethics lawyer for George W. Bush between 2005-2007. This is a dubious distinction but it does put him outside of the more godawful Bush era ethics decisions of torturing people. He’s been intensely critical of Donald Trump’s presidency, calling Trump’s actions traitorous. The Minnesota law professor also filed a lawsuit last year against Trump over the ethics of his business interests and refusal to sell off those interests once in office. Painter was brought onto MSNBC to duke it out with Scott Pruitt friend and apologist Hugh Hewitt. If you don’t know who Hewitt is you can read about the kind of asshole he is here. Suffice it to say, he’s a Trump supporter who is “good friends” with Scott Pruitt AND the lobbyist who rented Pruitt the Washington, D.C. condo for $50 a night. Asked about whether the recent spate of conservatives coming out to criticize the clearly corrupt EPA chief Scott Pruitt, Richard Painter had this to say:

I think we're finding Republican supporters of president Trump, one by one, starting to realize that this administration is corrupt and has been corrupt from day one. And our lawsuit is about foreign government money that has been going to the president in violation of the United States constitution. We have the incidents involving cabinet members getting favors and money from lobbyists. We just today had the president of the United States making statements that were false, probably knowingly false, about Amazon, driving the stock price if an investor lost money in that stock, the investor could sue him for securities fraud.

And those investors ought to be calling a lawyer. It's every day we have a new violation of either the constitution, the federal statutes or the ethics regulations. It's over and over again. And yes, I think people like Chris Christie are finally getting fed up. And the voters are getting fed up. I've been fed up with this president ever since he was a candidate, and it was very clear he was going to violate the law if he won the election; and that’s what we’ve had non-stop.

Hewitt defended this by saying that Pruitt wasn’t allowed to stay at his apartment in Washington, D.C. because of the “gift rule,” that Pruitt claims he hasn’t broken here. Painter began to get pissed at Hewitt’s grotesque obtuseness.

Find me a hotel renting for $50 in Washington, D.C. And tell me that's not a gift from a lobbyist. No decent ethics lawyer would sign off on that. If that had happened in the Bush administration, I would have shut it down. Fifty dollars a night to get a room in Washington, D.C. That is a violation of the gift rules. No ethics can cover that up. It's just flat-out wrong and you know it.

Hewitt pretended not to “know it,” including a bit of historic trivia that former House Speaker John Boehner used to rent a place out in D.C. from a lobbyist for 10 years! And while Hewitt may think that this makes everything all right in the case of Scott Pruitt, it just further affirms what people around here knew for decades—John Boehner was a corrupt piece of shit.

[Squinch]

1. Those who are "starting to realize" this are too stupid to be allowed to vote.

[BoneyardDem]

11. And it's those same people that have had to be hit with a barrage of info

verification, statements, leaked info, whistle blowers, news statements, lack of transparency, personal enrichments, poor cabinet choices, multiple law suits and finally listening to Trump's own words, almost on a daily basis for over a year and they are "starting to realize" OMG, next they'll be telling us that the Evangelicals realze he may not be ordained by God for this postion.

[dalton99a]

2. Corruption has always been the hallmark of Donald Trump and his crime family.

[Iliyah]

3. Give me a fucking break . . .

[babylonsister]

7. Not people on DU but

maybe people who voted for him and believed the swill he dished out.

[Raster]

4. starting to realize????

Hewitt is a GOP tool and a fool. Of course Hewitt and Pruitt* are friends, they both have the same greasy, self-serving air.

[GWC58]

9. Hewitt was also getting on Sessions about

states flouting Federal marijuana law. Fuck that asshole!

[usaf-vet]

18. In states where marijuana is legal opioid prescriptions fall.

When people are in pain all they initially want is pain relief. If that relief can come from a natural (legal) substance marijuana. Many folks would choose the alternative that would not require taking an addictive medication. Addiction then leads, in many cases, to illegal activities to acquire the opioids.

Locally in our region that has caused a rise in crime that is quickly getting out of hand straining our local police.

The obvious truth IMO is drug companies fight to keep marijuana illegal because they know it will impact their sales.


https://www.rawstory.com/2018/04/marijuana-legal-opioid-prescriptions-fall-studies-find/#.WsOSJVsHn6E.facebook
https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2016-09-15/study-opioid-use-decreases-in-states-that-legalize-medical-marijuana
https://drugabuse.com/legalizing-marijuana-decreases-fatal-opiate-overdoses/
https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2018/04/02/598787768/opioid-use-lower-in-states-that-eased-marijuana-laws

[malaise]

5. Duh!

You don't steal an election and turn into Mr Clean

[malthaussen]

6. Which "people" are these?

Since, oh, just about everybody I know knew it since before the election.

-- Mal

[babylonsister]

10. Maybe people

who are suddenly being screwed by the guy they trusted? Like farmers, for instance?

https://thinkprogress.org/china-targets-us-soybeans-tariffs-e2818e0f195c/

China responds to tariffs by targeting U.S. soybeans, hitting farmers where it hurts
"As the Chinese saying goes, it is only polite to reciprocate."

[bigbrother05]

8. The Speaker renting from a lobbyist has at least the appearance of conflict

If it was at a fair market price, that would be a mitigating factor but still stinks.

[gratuitous]

12. If Trump is to be removed from office

If Trump is to be removed from office, this epiphany has to occur to a lot of people. Yes, they're very late to the party. Yes, millions have suffered and continue to suffer because of this horrible administration. Yes, it's very tempting to scream, "Where the fuck have you been for the last year and a half, asshole?" But it's not very helpful.

It's against our nature as progressives to hammer on a point over and over again. We figure we get it the first time, and so should everyone else. They don't. That's why Fox and Sinclair and Trump keep returning to their tired old talking points like a dog to its vomit. They know their audience is liable to forget to hate gays, liberals, black people, brown people, and women if they aren't constantly reminded to do so.

We need to get over our reluctance to repeat ourselves. We need to hit these points over and over again. Some people are slowing starting to get it. Stay on message.

Let's encourage other dominoes to fall instead of yelling at the ones that finally tumble.

[Honeycombe8]

13. Painter doesn't say why he thinks that. ??? nt

[Sophia4]

14. Here:

I am quoting from the OP, the words of Painter:

"foreign government money that has been going to the president in violation of the United States constitution." Is that a violation of the emoluments clause?

"cabinet members getting favors and money from lobbyists"

"the president of the United States making statements that were false, probably knowingly false, about Amazon, . . . "

[ismnotwasm]

15. People pretended it not to know this apparently

Too focused on Hillary, just like they were directed to. Dumbasses. I sat and watched it in real time, numbingly horrified. Now I’m simply pissed off.

[calimary]

16. So am I.

I have a visceral nausea toward Hugh Hewitt. If I were running MSNBC, he’d be the first one I’d kick out the front door. His smug smirking and holier-than-thou/smarter-than-thou attitude almost literally turns my stomach. I saw that segment and only stayed with it as Richard a Painter started kicking him around harder and harder. He was GREAT. And the simpering smug Hewittt just sat there with that self-satisfied smirk that telegraphed nothing but disdain and a VERY large superior attitude. I’m surprised that “Smug” isn’t ol’ Hugh’s actual middle name.

[peggysue2]

17. LOL!!

Perfect description of Hewitt's attitude. That smug smirk of his says it all. Once he said something disparaging about Minnesota, Painter ripped him a new one.

Well deserved!

[calimary]

19. Painter should have ripped him a DOZEN new ones.

The weasel got off easy. He certainly deserved what Painter dished out, though - and more. MUCH more.

Maybe we should write in complaining about his presence on MSNBC.

I wrote a regular ol’ conventional letter about Greta Van Susteren getting a show on MSNBC. And look how long she lasted. I’m absolutely certain it wasn’t just me. I suspect there was a ton of negative viewer reaction to her badly mismatched presence on that network that the executive suites couldn’t handle it anymore.

Make your voice HEARD! If they think you don’t care, they won’t either!

[ProfessorGAC]

20. He May Have Had A Smug Look

But he got his ass handed to him.

[calimary]

21. Yeah. And it was a thing of beauty to watch.

He's a BIG ass, so it's a heavy lift. But Richard Painter managed it. I think Baby Huey is like a lot of those jerks in CON world. They're used to tossing out the put-downs and insults and DELIBERATE bastardizations of our party's name (it is The Democratic Party. NOT the "Democrat Party," dammit!) and watch us back down in sullen silence. Like all the gunners and NRA lovers have gotten so complacent because people tend to go to candlelight vigils after yet-another-in-a-continuing-series-of-mass-shootings and that's all that happens. So when a really serious, vigorous, muscular, righteous, and unrelenting opposition raises its head, they're flummoxed.

We're supposed to lie down, roll over, and die. And NOT fight back. And NOT make a big public stink about it. And NOT fill the streets with marchers and the halls of Congress and the statehouses with loud determined activists. We're supposed to be "nice." And mild-mannered, and not making any fuss. We're supposed to wilt. And whimper. And shut up. And go away. And know our "place" (under their jackbooted heels). No wonder they're so apoplectic about those fearless and brilliant - AND EFFECTIVE - Parkland Florida kids.

The bad guys are not accustomed to having opponents with backbone, brains, strategic skills, and sharp teeth.

[DFW]

22. I find the "starting" part to be deeply disturbing

That's like saying a guy who has smoked four packs of unfiltered cigarettes a day for forty years, and is wheezing and gasping with lung cancer and emphysema, is "starting" to realize that he should started cutting down before now.

Gee, ya think?

It's not like he has any business saying his diagnosis came as a shock to him, even if his uncle Zachary smoked five packs a day and lived to age 113. Send twenty thousand people blindfolded to cross the New Jersey Turnpike or the Santa Monica Freeway on foot at rush hour, and one or two of them will make it across uninjured, too. Most won't fare so well.

[Daxter]

23. More corrupt republicans

The republican party has for decades been the party of corruption and lies. Scott Pruitt should be in jail but probly will go unpunished.