A distraught Napoleon talked to coffee bushes on St Helena. Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia hung around the haberdashery department of Jolly’s in Bath. Uganda’s Idi Amin plotted bloody revenge from a Novotel in Jeddah. Only Alfred the Great made a successful comeback.
All of which brings us to Donald Trump, currently in exile at his luxury club in Bedminster, New Jersey. Whingeing amid the manicured greens and bunkers of his exclusive golf course, the defeated president recalls an ageing Bonnie Prince Charlie – a sort of “king over the water” with water features. Like deposed leaders throughout history, he obsesses about a return to power.
Yet as Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell moves to kill off a 9/11-style national commission to investigate the 6 January Capitol Hill insurrection, the pressing question is not whether Trump can maintain cult-like sway over Republicans, or even whether he will run again in 2024. The question that should most concern Americans who care about democracy is: why isn’t Trump in jail?
The fact he is not, and has not been charged with anything, is a genuine puzzle – some might say a scandal, even a conspiracy. Trump’s actual and potential criminal rap sheet long predates the Capitol siege. It includes alleged abuses of power, obstruction of justice, fraud, tax evasion, Russian money-laundering, election tampering, conflicts of interest, hush-money bribes, assassination – and a lot of lies.
Read more at:
Lock him up! Why is repeat offender Donald Trump still a free man? | Simon Tisdall | The Guardian
Showing posts with label Scandal. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Scandal. Show all posts
11/3/21
9/6/18
USA: White House in Turmoil: Pence and Pompeo Deny Writing Op-Ed Critical of the Trump Administration - by Eileen Sullivan
A day after a senior administration
official described President Trump as amoral, impetuous, petty and
ineffective in an anonymous essay, the denials from the upper echelon of
the administration started to roll in.
Read more: Pence and Pompeo Deny Writing Op-Ed Critical of the Trump Administration - The New York Times
The
mystery writer is not Vice President Mike Pence, a spokesman said
Thursday. “Our office is above such amateur acts,” the vice president’s
spokesman, Jarrod Agen, said in a morning Twitter post, referring to the Op-Ed published on Wednesday in The New York Times.
“It is not mine,” Mike Pompeo, the secretary of state, said.
“Patently
false,” said Dan Coats, the national intelligence director, responding
to rumors that he or his principal deputy wrote the piece. “We did not.”
Read more: Pence and Pompeo Deny Writing Op-Ed Critical of the Trump Administration - The New York Times
8/11/17
The Netherlands - the contaminated egg scandal: Fipronil in eggs: Dutch police arrest two suspects
 |
| The Netherlands Egg Contamination Scandal |
Dutch prosecutors said in a statement Thursday the men are directors of a company that allegedly used an unauthorized insecticide at poultry farms.
Investigators in the Netherlands and Belgium made the arrests during a string of coordinated raids linked to their probe into how fipronil, which can be harmful to humans, made it into the food chain.
"The Dutch investigation focused on the Dutch company that allegedly used fipronil, a Belgian supplier as well as a Dutch company that colluded with the Belgian supplier," the prosecutors said.
"They are suspected of putting public health in danger by supplying and using fipronil in pens containing egg-laying chickens."
Authorities in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany recalled millions of eggs at the start of the month after the discovery of fipronil in batches delivered to supermarkets. Dozens of poultry farms, mainly in the Netherlands but also in Belgium, have been closed down, while supermarkets have cleared tainted eggs from their shelves.
The French agriculture ministry confirmed on Friday that 250,000 contaminated eggs had been "on the market" in France between April and July. Five companies using egg products had been involved. A first batch of 196,000 eggs from Belgium had been placed on the market between April 16 and May 2 and a second lot from the Netherlands of 48,000 eggs had been sold through Leader Price shops between July 19 and 28.
Note EU-Digest: The European Commissioner charged with food safety has called for a meeting of ministers and national watchdogs to discuss the fallout of an eggs contamination scare that has led to finger pointing between several European Union members.
Tensions had risen between agricultural ministers in Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany after traces of moderately toxic insecticide fipronil were found in batches of eggs, linked by authorities to a Dutch supplier of cleaning products.
Read more: Fipronil in eggs: Dutch police arrest two suspects | News | DW | 10.08.2017
3/17/17
USA Wiretap Scandal: : White House apologizes to Britain GCHQ
The US has made a "formal apology" to Britain over accusations
that a UK spy agency worked with President Barack Obama to
wiretap Trump Tower before the election,
according to The Telegraph.
The White House press secretary, Sean Spicer, claimed in a briefing on Thursday that Obama partnered with the UK's Government Communications Headquarters for an operation spying on Trump Tower during the 2016 presidential campaign.
ScandalThe Telegraph reports that both Spicer and National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster apologized to Britain.
A White House official said: "Ambassador Kim Darroch and Sir Mark Lyall expressed their concerns to Sean Spicer and General McMaster. Mr. Spicer and General McMaster explained that Mr. Spicer was simply pointing to public reports, not endorsing any specific story."
McMaster apologized directly to Sir Mark Lyall Grant, Prime Minister Theresa May's security chief, according to The Sun.
Read more: White House apologizes to Britain GCHQ - Business Insider
The White House press secretary, Sean Spicer, claimed in a briefing on Thursday that Obama partnered with the UK's Government Communications Headquarters for an operation spying on Trump Tower during the 2016 presidential campaign.
ScandalThe Telegraph reports that both Spicer and National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster apologized to Britain.
A White House official said: "Ambassador Kim Darroch and Sir Mark Lyall expressed their concerns to Sean Spicer and General McMaster. Mr. Spicer and General McMaster explained that Mr. Spicer was simply pointing to public reports, not endorsing any specific story."
McMaster apologized directly to Sir Mark Lyall Grant, Prime Minister Theresa May's security chief, according to The Sun.
Read more: White House apologizes to Britain GCHQ - Business Insider
10/19/16
Denmark: - Danish anti-immigration party hit by EU cash scandal
Denmark's anti-immigration Danish People's Party (DPP) was
reeling Wednesday from a string of EU expenses scandals, including a
trip to Brussels when European institutions were closed.
Morten Messerschmidt, a European lawmaker and one of the country's most ardent eurosceptics, was kicked off the populist party's top leadership late Tuesday after the DPP agreed to pay back 500,000 kroner (67,000 euros, $74,000) of EU funds.
"It's sloppiness at a very high level," party leader Kristian Thulesen Dahl told public broadcaster DR.
The money had been used to cover expenses for two EU conferences that appeared to be indistinguishable from the party's regular summer meetings, as well as an educational trip to Brussels for campaign workers during a public holiday when EU institutions were closed.
Cash had also been spent on media training and an advertising campaign.
Messerschmidt told broadcaster TV 2 News that he "completely rejects that there has been a deliberate attempt to cheat."
The expenses scandal is a sharp blow to the outspoken politician, who helped the eurosceptic DPP become Denmark's largest party in the European Parliament election of 2014.
The liberal Politiken daily responded by publishing a list of DPP expense quotes, accusing the EU of wasting taxpayers' money.
"If Europeans knew the full extent of the shameless waste of money, I am convinced that there would be a revolution," Messerschmidt wrote in 2012.
The European parliament had previously asked the DPP to pay back 2.9 million kroner that it spent on political campaigning. The party repaid 1.6 million kroner in June, saying it did not administer the rest of the money.
Messerschmidt previously sat on the board of the Movement for a Europe of Liberties and Democracy, a now defunct conservative European alliance.
Last year, the DPP paid back 120,700 kroner to Brussels after using the m
Read more: Flash - Danish anti-immigration party hit by EU cash scandal - France 24
Morten Messerschmidt, a European lawmaker and one of the country's most ardent eurosceptics, was kicked off the populist party's top leadership late Tuesday after the DPP agreed to pay back 500,000 kroner (67,000 euros, $74,000) of EU funds.
"It's sloppiness at a very high level," party leader Kristian Thulesen Dahl told public broadcaster DR.
The money had been used to cover expenses for two EU conferences that appeared to be indistinguishable from the party's regular summer meetings, as well as an educational trip to Brussels for campaign workers during a public holiday when EU institutions were closed.
Cash had also been spent on media training and an advertising campaign.
Messerschmidt told broadcaster TV 2 News that he "completely rejects that there has been a deliberate attempt to cheat."
The expenses scandal is a sharp blow to the outspoken politician, who helped the eurosceptic DPP become Denmark's largest party in the European Parliament election of 2014.
The liberal Politiken daily responded by publishing a list of DPP expense quotes, accusing the EU of wasting taxpayers' money.
"If Europeans knew the full extent of the shameless waste of money, I am convinced that there would be a revolution," Messerschmidt wrote in 2012.
The European parliament had previously asked the DPP to pay back 2.9 million kroner that it spent on political campaigning. The party repaid 1.6 million kroner in June, saying it did not administer the rest of the money.
Messerschmidt previously sat on the board of the Movement for a Europe of Liberties and Democracy, a now defunct conservative European alliance.
Last year, the DPP paid back 120,700 kroner to Brussels after using the m
Read more: Flash - Danish anti-immigration party hit by EU cash scandal - France 24
9/3/16
Middle East: The U.S.-Syria Scandal: Supporting Sectarian War - by Gareth Porter
The main criticism of U.S. policy in Syria has long been that President Barack Obama should have used U.S. military force or more aggressive arms aid to strengthen the armed opposition to Assad.
The easy answer is that the whole idea that there was a viable non-extremist force to be strengthened is a myth – albeit one that certain political figures in London and Washington refuse to give up.
But the question that should have been debated is why the Obama administration acquiesced to its allies funding and supplying a group of unsavory sectarian armed groups to overthrow the Assad regime.
That U.S. acquiescence is largely responsible for a horrible bloodletting that has now killed as many as 400,000 Syrians.
Worse yet, there is still no way to end the war without the serious threat of sectarian retribution against the losers.
Read more: The U.S.-Syria Scandal: Supporting Sectarian War - The Globalist
The easy answer is that the whole idea that there was a viable non-extremist force to be strengthened is a myth – albeit one that certain political figures in London and Washington refuse to give up.
But the question that should have been debated is why the Obama administration acquiesced to its allies funding and supplying a group of unsavory sectarian armed groups to overthrow the Assad regime.
That U.S. acquiescence is largely responsible for a horrible bloodletting that has now killed as many as 400,000 Syrians.
Worse yet, there is still no way to end the war without the serious threat of sectarian retribution against the losers.
Read more: The U.S.-Syria Scandal: Supporting Sectarian War - The Globalist
1/6/15
Eurozone: The Real Eurozone Scandal - by Simon Wren-Lewis
Imagine that it was
revealed that 10% of the European Union budget (the money that goes to
the EU centre to fund the common agricultural policy and other EU wide
projects) had been found to be completely wasted as a result of actions
by EU policymakers.
By wasted I do not mean spent on things that maybe
it should not have been spent on (rich farmers, inefficient farmers,
infrastructure projects whose costs exceed benefits etc), but literally
money that went up in smoke. Imagine the scandal. Heads would roll, and
some might find themselves in jail.
10% of the EU budget is about 0.1% of EU
GDP. Yet sums at least ten times that figure are currently being wasted
in the Eurozone, as a result of actions by Eurozone policymakers. Here is the latest OECD assessment of output gaps across eleven Eurozone countries, for both 2013 (blue) and 2014.
A negative output gap means that output
could be the amount of the gap higher without raising inflation above
target. Of course Greece is a nightmare, and things in the other PIIGS
are really bad, but the output gap in the Netherlands is around 3%, in
France over 2% in 2014, and even in Germany the output gap exceeds 1%.
Estimating output gaps is an imprecise science, but gaps of at least
this size are consistent with inflation well below target (currently
0.3%). So output could be at least 1% higher across the Eurozone with no
ill effects. This is the equivalent of the entire EU budget going up in
smoke.
Read more: The Real Eurozone Scandal
1/9/13
Insurance Industry: AIG, greed, and legislative stupidity - by Jeb Golinkin
On Tuesday, Washington was abuzz with murmurs that AIG — the catastrophically managed insurer of untold amounts of Wall Street mortgage debt that required a $182 billion bailout in 2008 — may join a $25 billion lawsuit against the United States government (i.e. the taxpayer) over the terms of that bailout. Outrage — manufactured and genuine — ensued.
The Tea Party crowd will undoubtedly go insane if the AIG board does in fact join Hank Greenberg and Co.'s lawsuit against the government. But a group of congressional Democrats — including Wall Street's least favorite senator, Elizabeth Warren, the always animated Maxine Waters, and three run-of-the-mill House Democrats — were the first leaders to publicly react to the news of the potential lawsuit. It seems that the Democratic lawmakers are surprised that a firm that was so recently saved by the American taxpayer would even consider suing these same taxpayers. This confusion shows how little our leaders have learned about how corporations work.
Our leaders and citizens continue to believe the financial crisis was created by nothing more than immoral, greedy investment bankers. They are mistaken. Indeed, the financial crisis was not caused by a band of irrational, greedy fools, but rather by some of the smartest people in the United States acting exactly as we might have expected them to act had we taken a disinterested look at the incentives the legal and regulatory framework provided them.
That we have not come to terms with this unpleasant reality is underscored by Congress' typically hasty reaction to the crisis. Contrary to the claims of the lawmakers responsible for passing Dodd-Frank, no less an expert than Weil's Harvey Miller, probably the top bankruptcy lawyer in the United States, maintains that the law has not so much as made a dent in the systemic risk posed by financial institutions that were and remain too big to fail.
Of course, despite all of the huffing and puffing going on inside the beltway, DealBreaker's Matt Levine correctly points out that AIG will almost certainly not join the lawsuit. Aside from the fact that doing so would bring an immense amount of bad publicity to a company that is not exactly beloved by the public at large, the lawsuit appears to be a loser. The suit, the brainchild of former AIG CEO and "Master of the Universe" Hank Greenberg, failed before the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. Greenberg's latest attempt, which is before the Court of Federal Claims in Washington D.C., is unlikely to fare much better. The board, therefore, will probably elect not to join the lawsuit.
But what if the lawsuit did present a real chance of actual recovery for the shareholders? What then? Would it be acceptable for AIG's board to sue the very government that saved it from liquidation? The congressional Democrats who have chimed in so far certainly seem to think not. After ripping into the company and exclaiming that it should be taxed more in the future, Sen. Warren stated that "AIG should thank American taxpayers for their help, not bite the hand that fed them for helping them out in a crisis." Rep. Waters, the ranking Democratic member on the House Financial Services Committee, was even less circumspect, stating that she would "urge the board to drop its consideration of the lawsuit, thank the American public for the $182 billion rescue package that prevented the company's collapse and support the reforms in the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act that ensure that systemically important financial institutions can no longer hold our economy hostage." Finally, and most notably, three Congressional Democrats — Peter Welch, Michael Capuano, and Luis Gutierrez — sent AIG chair Robert S. Miller a letter in which they very thoughtfully state: "Don't do it. Don't even think about it."
Like any taxpayer, I am a bit irked with the possibility that after having bailed out AIG, the U.S. government might also have to defend a lawsuit against the company for not being generous enough.
Read more: AIG, greed, and legislative stupidity - The Week
The Tea Party crowd will undoubtedly go insane if the AIG board does in fact join Hank Greenberg and Co.'s lawsuit against the government. But a group of congressional Democrats — including Wall Street's least favorite senator, Elizabeth Warren, the always animated Maxine Waters, and three run-of-the-mill House Democrats — were the first leaders to publicly react to the news of the potential lawsuit. It seems that the Democratic lawmakers are surprised that a firm that was so recently saved by the American taxpayer would even consider suing these same taxpayers. This confusion shows how little our leaders have learned about how corporations work.
Our leaders and citizens continue to believe the financial crisis was created by nothing more than immoral, greedy investment bankers. They are mistaken. Indeed, the financial crisis was not caused by a band of irrational, greedy fools, but rather by some of the smartest people in the United States acting exactly as we might have expected them to act had we taken a disinterested look at the incentives the legal and regulatory framework provided them.
That we have not come to terms with this unpleasant reality is underscored by Congress' typically hasty reaction to the crisis. Contrary to the claims of the lawmakers responsible for passing Dodd-Frank, no less an expert than Weil's Harvey Miller, probably the top bankruptcy lawyer in the United States, maintains that the law has not so much as made a dent in the systemic risk posed by financial institutions that were and remain too big to fail.
Of course, despite all of the huffing and puffing going on inside the beltway, DealBreaker's Matt Levine correctly points out that AIG will almost certainly not join the lawsuit. Aside from the fact that doing so would bring an immense amount of bad publicity to a company that is not exactly beloved by the public at large, the lawsuit appears to be a loser. The suit, the brainchild of former AIG CEO and "Master of the Universe" Hank Greenberg, failed before the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. Greenberg's latest attempt, which is before the Court of Federal Claims in Washington D.C., is unlikely to fare much better. The board, therefore, will probably elect not to join the lawsuit.
But what if the lawsuit did present a real chance of actual recovery for the shareholders? What then? Would it be acceptable for AIG's board to sue the very government that saved it from liquidation? The congressional Democrats who have chimed in so far certainly seem to think not. After ripping into the company and exclaiming that it should be taxed more in the future, Sen. Warren stated that "AIG should thank American taxpayers for their help, not bite the hand that fed them for helping them out in a crisis." Rep. Waters, the ranking Democratic member on the House Financial Services Committee, was even less circumspect, stating that she would "urge the board to drop its consideration of the lawsuit, thank the American public for the $182 billion rescue package that prevented the company's collapse and support the reforms in the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act that ensure that systemically important financial institutions can no longer hold our economy hostage." Finally, and most notably, three Congressional Democrats — Peter Welch, Michael Capuano, and Luis Gutierrez — sent AIG chair Robert S. Miller a letter in which they very thoughtfully state: "Don't do it. Don't even think about it."
Like any taxpayer, I am a bit irked with the possibility that after having bailed out AIG, the U.S. government might also have to defend a lawsuit against the company for not being generous enough.
Read more: AIG, greed, and legislative stupidity - The Week
11/13/12
Shame and Scandal in the US Military: Why Is Love Pentagon an FBI Case?
While General David Petraeus's sexy email scandal has given us many things—a clearer picture of Petraeus's public relations machine, insight into the military-industrial-housewife complex, the understanding that 60-year-olds are no more responsible about sexy Internet use than are tweens—we still don't understand exactly where it came from. The best guess so far is that an unnamed shirtless FBI agent had a crush on a married Tampa socialite, and got the investigation going to impress her.
Think about what got the investigation started: Jill Kelley got between five and 10 harassing anonymous emails. They did not threaten violence. According to The Daily Beast's Michael Daly, they said things like, "Who do you think you are? … You parade around the base." Another email "claimed to have watched Ms. Kelley touching 'him' provocatively underneath a table," according to The Wall Street Journal. It's hard to imagine small town cops getting excited about those messages.
When Kelley told her friend who worked at the FBI about them, the agency wasn't all that excited, either. The cyber squad in the Tampa field office "was not even sure the case was worth pursuing," Daly reports. "What tipped it may have been Kelley’s friendship with the agent. The squad opened a case, though with no expectation it would turn into anything significant."
At Slate, Emily Bazelon writes that given her reporting on cyberbullying, she doubts cops would have opened a case. Broad stalking and harassment charges "shouldn't trigger an investigation based on so little evidence," she says. But once it got going, it grew easily, thanks to outdated laws and new technology. The New Yorker's Patrick Radden Keefe notes there's a delicious irony in Petraeus being brought down by the national security capabilities he boasted about as "diabolical."
The FBI doesn't need a warrant to access email that's more than 180 days old, because a 1986 law declares that "abandoned," The New Yorker explains. Once they figured out it was Paula Broadwell sending the emails, they were able to go into Broadwell's email account, The Daily Beast reports, and discovered Broadwell "really knew Petraeus." The FBI figured out the two were leaving messages for each other in the drafts folder of a shared account, and that they were having an affair. That's when the investigation "morph[ed]" into an investigation into whether classified information was leaked, The New Yorker says. But despite concluding no crime had been committed, Slate notes, the FBI notified the Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper, anyway. Clapper asked Petraeus to resign. And still, the investigation keeps going, with the FBI raiding Broadwell's house Monday night.
On Tuesday, it was revealed that Gen. John Allen was emailing with Kelley, too, though there's no accusation that classified information was leaked in that case, and even the "flirtatious" nature of the emails is disputed. And we still don't know if Agent Shirtless ever managed to impress Jill Kelley.
Read more: Why Is Love Pentagon an FBI Case? - National - The Atlantic Wire
Think about what got the investigation started: Jill Kelley got between five and 10 harassing anonymous emails. They did not threaten violence. According to The Daily Beast's Michael Daly, they said things like, "Who do you think you are? … You parade around the base." Another email "claimed to have watched Ms. Kelley touching 'him' provocatively underneath a table," according to The Wall Street Journal. It's hard to imagine small town cops getting excited about those messages.
When Kelley told her friend who worked at the FBI about them, the agency wasn't all that excited, either. The cyber squad in the Tampa field office "was not even sure the case was worth pursuing," Daly reports. "What tipped it may have been Kelley’s friendship with the agent. The squad opened a case, though with no expectation it would turn into anything significant."
At Slate, Emily Bazelon writes that given her reporting on cyberbullying, she doubts cops would have opened a case. Broad stalking and harassment charges "shouldn't trigger an investigation based on so little evidence," she says. But once it got going, it grew easily, thanks to outdated laws and new technology. The New Yorker's Patrick Radden Keefe notes there's a delicious irony in Petraeus being brought down by the national security capabilities he boasted about as "diabolical."
The FBI doesn't need a warrant to access email that's more than 180 days old, because a 1986 law declares that "abandoned," The New Yorker explains. Once they figured out it was Paula Broadwell sending the emails, they were able to go into Broadwell's email account, The Daily Beast reports, and discovered Broadwell "really knew Petraeus." The FBI figured out the two were leaving messages for each other in the drafts folder of a shared account, and that they were having an affair. That's when the investigation "morph[ed]" into an investigation into whether classified information was leaked, The New Yorker says. But despite concluding no crime had been committed, Slate notes, the FBI notified the Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper, anyway. Clapper asked Petraeus to resign. And still, the investigation keeps going, with the FBI raiding Broadwell's house Monday night.
On Tuesday, it was revealed that Gen. John Allen was emailing with Kelley, too, though there's no accusation that classified information was leaked in that case, and even the "flirtatious" nature of the emails is disputed. And we still don't know if Agent Shirtless ever managed to impress Jill Kelley.
Read more: Why Is Love Pentagon an FBI Case? - National - The Atlantic Wire
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