"I would say that 99 of us believe the Russians did this," Graham said.

[kpete]

(CNN)Two of the Senate's most prominent hardliners on Russia are framing the Washington consensus of Russian aggression as free from any disagreement whatsoever -- except from President-elect Donald Trump.

Republicans Lindsey Graham and John McCain, on a trip to Estonia, a Baltic nation threatened by a belligerent Russia, told CNN's Jim Sciutto in an exclusive interview that the matter was settled and that Trump was simply wrong to question the bipartisan agreement.

"There are 100 United States senators. Amy Klobuchar is on this trip with us. She's a Democrat from Minnesota. I would say that 99 of us believe the Russians did this and we're going to do something about it," said Graham, who is planning a hearing with McCain on Russia's interference with US elections. "We're going to put sanctions together that hit Putin as an individual and his inner circle for interfering in our election, and they're doing it all over the world -- not just in the United States."

McCain, Graham and Kloubuchar are also headed to Latvia, Lithuania, Ukraine, Georgia and Montenegro to meet with officials about the Russian threat. The intelligence community has formally blamed the Kremlin for interfering in the most recent presidential election, using sophisticated hacking schemes and cyber intrusions to expose the emails of Democratic Party officials.




http://www.cnn.com/2016/12/27/politics/lindsey-graham-donald-trump-russia/index.html

[Achilleaze]

1. The illegitimate Republican regime of Comrade Casino (R)

also requires sanctions, starting with impeachment, and public paddling.

[volstork]

6. Might want to rethink the paddling

....he's likely to enjoy that part.

[Xipe Totec]

15. Orange is the new Red. nt

[JHB]

21. Kremlin Don (R)

[spanone]

2. remember, don knows more than the generals.....

[progressoid]

3. So what are they going to do about it?

[DFW]

4. As Putin might put it:

НИЧЕГО !!

("nee-cheh-VAW&quot

i.e. nothing

[LaydeeBug]

5. but some right here like to pretend we need to 'hone our meesage'. nt

[volstork]

7. Who would've thought Graham

would be the one to grow a spine?!

[MADem]

20. Oddly enough, he's been the main one to pipe up on this matter. nt

[volstork]

23. I know!

I find it quite surprising.

[BigDemVoter]

8. NEVER, NEVER in my life would I have thought I would be 'grateful' to John McCain and/or

that fool, "Miss Scarlett", aka Lyndsey Graham. . . .

I am so worried that all of this horse shit will be normalized, and THEN McCain and Graham will seem NORMAL by contrast, and THEY are not normal either!

[Botany]

9. If Trump knew about and worked with the Russians then that is treason

And i think both Trump and McConnell knew about the election rigging and Russian hacking.

Trump publicly called for Russia to hack the DNC and HRC’s campaign.

Donald Trump Calls on Russia to Find Hillary Clinton’s Missing Emails


DORAL, Fla. — Donald J. Trump said on Wednesday that he hoped Russian intelligence services had successfully hacked Hillary Clinton’s email, and encouraged them to publish whatever they may have stolen, essentially urging a foreign adversary to conduct cyberespionage against a former secretary of state.

“Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing,” Mr. Trump said during a news conference here in an apparent reference to Mrs. Clinton’s deleted emails. “I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.”


http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/28/us/politics/donald-trump-russia-clinton-emails.html?_r=0 happened in July 2016

McConnell was told that we had to increase security around our elections because of Russian actions and he blocked it.

Secret CIA assessment says Russia was trying to help Trump win White House

Though U.S. intelligence agencies were skeptical that hackers would be able to manipulate the election results in a systematic way, the White House feared that Russia would attempt to do so, sowing doubt about the fundamental mechanisms of democracy and potentially forcing a more dangerous confrontation between Washington and Moscow.

In a secure room in the Capitol used for briefings involving classified information, administration officials broadly laid out the evidence U.S. spy agencies had collected, showing Russia’s role in cyber-intrusions in at least two states and in hacking the emails of the Democratic organizations and individuals.


snip

The Democratic leaders in the room unanimously agreed on the need to take the threat seriously. Republicans, however, were divided, with at least two GOP lawmakers reluctant to accede to the White House requests.

According to several officials, McConnell raised doubts about the underlying intelligence and made clear to the administration that he would consider any effort by the White House to challenge the Russians publicly an act of partisan politics.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/obama-orders-review-of-russian-hacking-during-presidential-campaign/2016/12/09/31d6b300-be2a-11e6-94ac-3d324840106c_story.html?utm_term=.62bd935992b9

[bdamomma]

10. this comment should have put him in jail for espionage

“Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing,” Mr. Trump said during a news conference here in an apparent reference to Mrs. Clinton’s deleted emails. “I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.”



what a filthy man he is.

That comment he made is evidence just like his stupid tweets.

[Botany]

14. In 2000 Jeb Bush, Harris, & DBT kept from 50 to 90,000 blacks from voting in Florida ...

.... in 2004 Kewn Blackwell, Karl Rove, Michael Connell, and smartech kept over 250,000
blacks from voting in OH, and in 2016 millions of blacks were kept from voting and or having
their vote counted all across America.

Trump even has taunted us about that too.

https://thinkprogress.org/donald-trump-thanks-african-americans-for-not-voting-2d35fbf00753#.ubx78aum7

During a “thank you” rally Thursday night in Hershey, Pennsylvania, President-elect Donald Trump thanked various groups of people for his expected Electoral College victory over Hillary Clinton. Among them were African Americans, but Trump acknowledged them for a reason you might not expect — he specifically thanked those who didn’t turn out to vote at all.

Trump won just eight percent of the black vote, after a campaign in which his main message to African Americans fell along the lines of “your lives are terrible so why not try something different.”

And at Thursday’s rally, Trump emphasized that his last-ditch efforts to persuade black voters to stay home worked.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/12512667605

The real story is not about all the rural white people who came out to vote for Trump but the millions of African
Americans who couldn't vote or have their vote counted. Voter suppression, the Russians, Comey, and "magic"
voting machines and you have a coup. The models that HRC @ >90% chance of winning were not wrong.

[Blue_Roses]

13. I just wonder how deep this thing goes

I knew on election night that there was something weird going on. I even said so to my daughter. To see PA, then MI and WI go red, I knew. And with such a slim margin in all 3 states. But, enough that there wasn't a mandatory recall.

Never in my life did I ever think we would have a foreign country involved like this in our election.

[Botany]

18. It wan't just the Russians but the program called "cross check" gave Trump the #s he needed to "win"

the E.C.. The Russain hacking helped to hamstring HRC enough so they could keep it
close enough to steal it.

[Blue_Roses]

19. How does "cross check" work?

Found this:
http://m.democracynow.org/stories/14752

[AmericanActivist]

22. Yes, in "election" 2016 there were many negative factors that

all converged to benefit tRump. Cross check eliminated the votes of over 1 million Americans who were eligible to vote, they were robbed of their Constitutional Right to vote way before Nov 8th. The swing states needed for tRump were all "won" by exactly 1% which isn't likely. Plus Clinton had a lead in FL that was mathematically insurmountable without foul play.

[AmericanActivist]

25. I think you're right they both knew. Perhaps a few others too but definitely

tRump & Mitch.

[mopinko]

11. i think the impeachment margin is tighter than some here think.

enough of the old dogs get stirred up about russia, and it's off to the races, imho.
plus the fact that he is gonna gore a whole lot of oxen. i wouldnt sleep well if i were him.

[TheFrenchRazor]

12. we need prevention more than punishment, but even that would be too late. nt

[LaydeeBug]

16. kick, because I was told I was nuts. nt

[tom_kelly]

17. Don't trust these Republicans

Something smells funny to me. Remember how low these Republican MF's will go. Maybe these two will be creating a smoke screen of Republican "revolt" on this issue to make us think they've become a bit sane. Meanwhile, SS and Medicare, among other programs, are "trimmed" in the background. I don't trust them because they're Republicans and they are slimy.

[mountain grammy]

24. I hear that

But this still gives me hope

[Sanity Claws]

26. Who are the 99?

Is he referring to 99 out of 100 senators? If so, impeachment chances look good. Does he mean 99 out of the combined Senate and House? Does he mean 99%?
Whatever it is, he probably has a much better feel for what is really going on in DC than almost anyone.