Datasets:

---

innovation-hacking2

/

shitposting_dataset2

like 0

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin ." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies", ">\n\nAt least once amirite" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies", ">\n\nAt least once amirite", ">\n\nOne of the biggest morons ever..... is he gonna be held accountable? No, right? Hahah" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies", ">\n\nAt least once amirite", ">\n\nOne of the biggest morons ever..... is he gonna be held accountable? No, right? Hahah", ">\n\nAll of them, each a n d every one of the times. If that's not a guilty mindset, then idk what is." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies", ">\n\nAt least once amirite", ">\n\nOne of the biggest morons ever..... is he gonna be held accountable? No, right? Hahah", ">\n\nAll of them, each a n d every one of the times. If that's not a guilty mindset, then idk what is.", ">\n\nIt was always gonna come out. Serial sewer rat meadows was involved in so much skullduggery that any one of the shitty things he’s done was bound to be exposed." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies", ">\n\nAt least once amirite", ">\n\nOne of the biggest morons ever..... is he gonna be held accountable? No, right? Hahah", ">\n\nAll of them, each a n d every one of the times. If that's not a guilty mindset, then idk what is.", ">\n\nIt was always gonna come out. Serial sewer rat meadows was involved in so much skullduggery that any one of the shitty things he’s done was bound to be exposed.", ">\n\nSo when can we expect this motherf’r to be prosecuted?" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies", ">\n\nAt least once amirite", ">\n\nOne of the biggest morons ever..... is he gonna be held accountable? No, right? Hahah", ">\n\nAll of them, each a n d every one of the times. If that's not a guilty mindset, then idk what is.", ">\n\nIt was always gonna come out. Serial sewer rat meadows was involved in so much skullduggery that any one of the shitty things he’s done was bound to be exposed.", ">\n\nSo when can we expect this motherf’r to be prosecuted?", ">\n\nAt least six years, seven or more - just enough time for him to get rich serving his cronies. Probably." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies", ">\n\nAt least once amirite", ">\n\nOne of the biggest morons ever..... is he gonna be held accountable? No, right? Hahah", ">\n\nAll of them, each a n d every one of the times. If that's not a guilty mindset, then idk what is.", ">\n\nIt was always gonna come out. Serial sewer rat meadows was involved in so much skullduggery that any one of the shitty things he’s done was bound to be exposed.", ">\n\nSo when can we expect this motherf’r to be prosecuted?", ">\n\nAt least six years, seven or more - just enough time for him to get rich serving his cronies. Probably.", ">\n\nBurn after reading?" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies", ">\n\nAt least once amirite", ">\n\nOne of the biggest morons ever..... is he gonna be held accountable? No, right? Hahah", ">\n\nAll of them, each a n d every one of the times. If that's not a guilty mindset, then idk what is.", ">\n\nIt was always gonna come out. Serial sewer rat meadows was involved in so much skullduggery that any one of the shitty things he’s done was bound to be exposed.", ">\n\nSo when can we expect this motherf’r to be prosecuted?", ">\n\nAt least six years, seven or more - just enough time for him to get rich serving his cronies. Probably.", ">\n\nBurn after reading?", ">\n\nSwear to god, next guy who gets sketchy in the WH, I'm gunna be totally fine with doors getting kicked in during office hours. Livestream it too, I'll make food." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies", ">\n\nAt least once amirite", ">\n\nOne of the biggest morons ever..... is he gonna be held accountable? No, right? Hahah", ">\n\nAll of them, each a n d every one of the times. If that's not a guilty mindset, then idk what is.", ">\n\nIt was always gonna come out. Serial sewer rat meadows was involved in so much skullduggery that any one of the shitty things he’s done was bound to be exposed.", ">\n\nSo when can we expect this motherf’r to be prosecuted?", ">\n\nAt least six years, seven or more - just enough time for him to get rich serving his cronies. Probably.", ">\n\nBurn after reading?", ">\n\nSwear to god, next guy who gets sketchy in the WH, I'm gunna be totally fine with doors getting kicked in during office hours. Livestream it too, I'll make food.", ">\n\nMark didn't take the documents to his rustic mobile home in North Carolina? Coulda had a big bonfire... oh wait, he and the missus never lived there despite it being the address he used to run for office and vote." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies", ">\n\nAt least once amirite", ">\n\nOne of the biggest morons ever..... is he gonna be held accountable? No, right? Hahah", ">\n\nAll of them, each a n d every one of the times. If that's not a guilty mindset, then idk what is.", ">\n\nIt was always gonna come out. Serial sewer rat meadows was involved in so much skullduggery that any one of the shitty things he’s done was bound to be exposed.", ">\n\nSo when can we expect this motherf’r to be prosecuted?", ">\n\nAt least six years, seven or more - just enough time for him to get rich serving his cronies. Probably.", ">\n\nBurn after reading?", ">\n\nSwear to god, next guy who gets sketchy in the WH, I'm gunna be totally fine with doors getting kicked in during office hours. Livestream it too, I'll make food.", ">\n\nMark didn't take the documents to his rustic mobile home in North Carolina? Coulda had a big bonfire... oh wait, he and the missus never lived there despite it being the address he used to run for office and vote.", ">\n\nSparky Marky and the Danville Detention Bunch" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies", ">\n\nAt least once amirite", ">\n\nOne of the biggest morons ever..... is he gonna be held accountable? No, right? Hahah", ">\n\nAll of them, each a n d every one of the times. If that's not a guilty mindset, then idk what is.", ">\n\nIt was always gonna come out. Serial sewer rat meadows was involved in so much skullduggery that any one of the shitty things he’s done was bound to be exposed.", ">\n\nSo when can we expect this motherf’r to be prosecuted?", ">\n\nAt least six years, seven or more - just enough time for him to get rich serving his cronies. Probably.", ">\n\nBurn after reading?", ">\n\nSwear to god, next guy who gets sketchy in the WH, I'm gunna be totally fine with doors getting kicked in during office hours. Livestream it too, I'll make food.", ">\n\nMark didn't take the documents to his rustic mobile home in North Carolina? Coulda had a big bonfire... oh wait, he and the missus never lived there despite it being the address he used to run for office and vote.", ">\n\nSparky Marky and the Danville Detention Bunch", ">\n\nWhy aren't all the WH fireplaces plugged? It's justifiable as both a security measure and a fire hazard." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies", ">\n\nAt least once amirite", ">\n\nOne of the biggest morons ever..... is he gonna be held accountable? No, right? Hahah", ">\n\nAll of them, each a n d every one of the times. If that's not a guilty mindset, then idk what is.", ">\n\nIt was always gonna come out. Serial sewer rat meadows was involved in so much skullduggery that any one of the shitty things he’s done was bound to be exposed.", ">\n\nSo when can we expect this motherf’r to be prosecuted?", ">\n\nAt least six years, seven or more - just enough time for him to get rich serving his cronies. Probably.", ">\n\nBurn after reading?", ">\n\nSwear to god, next guy who gets sketchy in the WH, I'm gunna be totally fine with doors getting kicked in during office hours. Livestream it too, I'll make food.", ">\n\nMark didn't take the documents to his rustic mobile home in North Carolina? Coulda had a big bonfire... oh wait, he and the missus never lived there despite it being the address he used to run for office and vote.", ">\n\nSparky Marky and the Danville Detention Bunch", ">\n\nWhy aren't all the WH fireplaces plugged? It's justifiable as both a security measure and a fire hazard.", ">\n\nNot very sustainable, is it? Think about it, most of America prohibits the burning of logs." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies", ">\n\nAt least once amirite", ">\n\nOne of the biggest morons ever..... is he gonna be held accountable? No, right? Hahah", ">\n\nAll of them, each a n d every one of the times. If that's not a guilty mindset, then idk what is.", ">\n\nIt was always gonna come out. Serial sewer rat meadows was involved in so much skullduggery that any one of the shitty things he’s done was bound to be exposed.", ">\n\nSo when can we expect this motherf’r to be prosecuted?", ">\n\nAt least six years, seven or more - just enough time for him to get rich serving his cronies. Probably.", ">\n\nBurn after reading?", ">\n\nSwear to god, next guy who gets sketchy in the WH, I'm gunna be totally fine with doors getting kicked in during office hours. Livestream it too, I'll make food.", ">\n\nMark didn't take the documents to his rustic mobile home in North Carolina? Coulda had a big bonfire... oh wait, he and the missus never lived there despite it being the address he used to run for office and vote.", ">\n\nSparky Marky and the Danville Detention Bunch", ">\n\nWhy aren't all the WH fireplaces plugged? It's justifiable as both a security measure and a fire hazard.", ">\n\nNot very sustainable, is it? Think about it, most of America prohibits the burning of logs.", ">\n\nOf the many people from this dumpster fire who’ll be going to jail, the one most likely to openly sob while in prison, is Mark Meadows. And it just delights me to picture it." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies", ">\n\nAt least once amirite", ">\n\nOne of the biggest morons ever..... is he gonna be held accountable? No, right? Hahah", ">\n\nAll of them, each a n d every one of the times. If that's not a guilty mindset, then idk what is.", ">\n\nIt was always gonna come out. Serial sewer rat meadows was involved in so much skullduggery that any one of the shitty things he’s done was bound to be exposed.", ">\n\nSo when can we expect this motherf’r to be prosecuted?", ">\n\nAt least six years, seven or more - just enough time for him to get rich serving his cronies. Probably.", ">\n\nBurn after reading?", ">\n\nSwear to god, next guy who gets sketchy in the WH, I'm gunna be totally fine with doors getting kicked in during office hours. Livestream it too, I'll make food.", ">\n\nMark didn't take the documents to his rustic mobile home in North Carolina? Coulda had a big bonfire... oh wait, he and the missus never lived there despite it being the address he used to run for office and vote.", ">\n\nSparky Marky and the Danville Detention Bunch", ">\n\nWhy aren't all the WH fireplaces plugged? It's justifiable as both a security measure and a fire hazard.", ">\n\nNot very sustainable, is it? Think about it, most of America prohibits the burning of logs.", ">\n\nOf the many people from this dumpster fire who’ll be going to jail, the one most likely to openly sob while in prison, is Mark Meadows. And it just delights me to picture it.", ">\n\nNothing says innocent like burning documents" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies", ">\n\nAt least once amirite", ">\n\nOne of the biggest morons ever..... is he gonna be held accountable? No, right? Hahah", ">\n\nAll of them, each a n d every one of the times. If that's not a guilty mindset, then idk what is.", ">\n\nIt was always gonna come out. Serial sewer rat meadows was involved in so much skullduggery that any one of the shitty things he’s done was bound to be exposed.", ">\n\nSo when can we expect this motherf’r to be prosecuted?", ">\n\nAt least six years, seven or more - just enough time for him to get rich serving his cronies. Probably.", ">\n\nBurn after reading?", ">\n\nSwear to god, next guy who gets sketchy in the WH, I'm gunna be totally fine with doors getting kicked in during office hours. Livestream it too, I'll make food.", ">\n\nMark didn't take the documents to his rustic mobile home in North Carolina? Coulda had a big bonfire... oh wait, he and the missus never lived there despite it being the address he used to run for office and vote.", ">\n\nSparky Marky and the Danville Detention Bunch", ">\n\nWhy aren't all the WH fireplaces plugged? It's justifiable as both a security measure and a fire hazard.", ">\n\nNot very sustainable, is it? Think about it, most of America prohibits the burning of logs.", ">\n\nOf the many people from this dumpster fire who’ll be going to jail, the one most likely to openly sob while in prison, is Mark Meadows. And it just delights me to picture it.", ">\n\nNothing says innocent like burning documents", ">\n\nMy whole life is probably online yet these fools are burning paper documents? And it matters? The fuck?" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies", ">\n\nAt least once amirite", ">\n\nOne of the biggest morons ever..... is he gonna be held accountable? No, right? Hahah", ">\n\nAll of them, each a n d every one of the times. If that's not a guilty mindset, then idk what is.", ">\n\nIt was always gonna come out. Serial sewer rat meadows was involved in so much skullduggery that any one of the shitty things he’s done was bound to be exposed.", ">\n\nSo when can we expect this motherf’r to be prosecuted?", ">\n\nAt least six years, seven or more - just enough time for him to get rich serving his cronies. Probably.", ">\n\nBurn after reading?", ">\n\nSwear to god, next guy who gets sketchy in the WH, I'm gunna be totally fine with doors getting kicked in during office hours. Livestream it too, I'll make food.", ">\n\nMark didn't take the documents to his rustic mobile home in North Carolina? Coulda had a big bonfire... oh wait, he and the missus never lived there despite it being the address he used to run for office and vote.", ">\n\nSparky Marky and the Danville Detention Bunch", ">\n\nWhy aren't all the WH fireplaces plugged? It's justifiable as both a security measure and a fire hazard.", ">\n\nNot very sustainable, is it? Think about it, most of America prohibits the burning of logs.", ">\n\nOf the many people from this dumpster fire who’ll be going to jail, the one most likely to openly sob while in prison, is Mark Meadows. And it just delights me to picture it.", ">\n\nNothing says innocent like burning documents", ">\n\nMy whole life is probably online yet these fools are burning paper documents? And it matters? The fuck?", ">\n\nFace of evil" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies", ">\n\nAt least once amirite", ">\n\nOne of the biggest morons ever..... is he gonna be held accountable? No, right? Hahah", ">\n\nAll of them, each a n d every one of the times. If that's not a guilty mindset, then idk what is.", ">\n\nIt was always gonna come out. Serial sewer rat meadows was involved in so much skullduggery that any one of the shitty things he’s done was bound to be exposed.", ">\n\nSo when can we expect this motherf’r to be prosecuted?", ">\n\nAt least six years, seven or more - just enough time for him to get rich serving his cronies. Probably.", ">\n\nBurn after reading?", ">\n\nSwear to god, next guy who gets sketchy in the WH, I'm gunna be totally fine with doors getting kicked in during office hours. Livestream it too, I'll make food.", ">\n\nMark didn't take the documents to his rustic mobile home in North Carolina? Coulda had a big bonfire... oh wait, he and the missus never lived there despite it being the address he used to run for office and vote.", ">\n\nSparky Marky and the Danville Detention Bunch", ">\n\nWhy aren't all the WH fireplaces plugged? It's justifiable as both a security measure and a fire hazard.", ">\n\nNot very sustainable, is it? Think about it, most of America prohibits the burning of logs.", ">\n\nOf the many people from this dumpster fire who’ll be going to jail, the one most likely to openly sob while in prison, is Mark Meadows. And it just delights me to picture it.", ">\n\nNothing says innocent like burning documents", ">\n\nMy whole life is probably online yet these fools are burning paper documents? And it matters? The fuck?", ">\n\nFace of evil", ">\n\nGeez what was so bad that he set it on fire?" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies", ">\n\nAt least once amirite", ">\n\nOne of the biggest morons ever..... is he gonna be held accountable? No, right? Hahah", ">\n\nAll of them, each a n d every one of the times. If that's not a guilty mindset, then idk what is.", ">\n\nIt was always gonna come out. Serial sewer rat meadows was involved in so much skullduggery that any one of the shitty things he’s done was bound to be exposed.", ">\n\nSo when can we expect this motherf’r to be prosecuted?", ">\n\nAt least six years, seven or more - just enough time for him to get rich serving his cronies. Probably.", ">\n\nBurn after reading?", ">\n\nSwear to god, next guy who gets sketchy in the WH, I'm gunna be totally fine with doors getting kicked in during office hours. Livestream it too, I'll make food.", ">\n\nMark didn't take the documents to his rustic mobile home in North Carolina? Coulda had a big bonfire... oh wait, he and the missus never lived there despite it being the address he used to run for office and vote.", ">\n\nSparky Marky and the Danville Detention Bunch", ">\n\nWhy aren't all the WH fireplaces plugged? It's justifiable as both a security measure and a fire hazard.", ">\n\nNot very sustainable, is it? Think about it, most of America prohibits the burning of logs.", ">\n\nOf the many people from this dumpster fire who’ll be going to jail, the one most likely to openly sob while in prison, is Mark Meadows. And it just delights me to picture it.", ">\n\nNothing says innocent like burning documents", ">\n\nMy whole life is probably online yet these fools are burning paper documents? And it matters? The fuck?", ">\n\nFace of evil", ">\n\nGeez what was so bad that he set it on fire?", ">\n\nLike Trump, Meadows is a crook." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies", ">\n\nAt least once amirite", ">\n\nOne of the biggest morons ever..... is he gonna be held accountable? No, right? Hahah", ">\n\nAll of them, each a n d every one of the times. If that's not a guilty mindset, then idk what is.", ">\n\nIt was always gonna come out. Serial sewer rat meadows was involved in so much skullduggery that any one of the shitty things he’s done was bound to be exposed.", ">\n\nSo when can we expect this motherf’r to be prosecuted?", ">\n\nAt least six years, seven or more - just enough time for him to get rich serving his cronies. Probably.", ">\n\nBurn after reading?", ">\n\nSwear to god, next guy who gets sketchy in the WH, I'm gunna be totally fine with doors getting kicked in during office hours. Livestream it too, I'll make food.", ">\n\nMark didn't take the documents to his rustic mobile home in North Carolina? Coulda had a big bonfire... oh wait, he and the missus never lived there despite it being the address he used to run for office and vote.", ">\n\nSparky Marky and the Danville Detention Bunch", ">\n\nWhy aren't all the WH fireplaces plugged? It's justifiable as both a security measure and a fire hazard.", ">\n\nNot very sustainable, is it? Think about it, most of America prohibits the burning of logs.", ">\n\nOf the many people from this dumpster fire who’ll be going to jail, the one most likely to openly sob while in prison, is Mark Meadows. And it just delights me to picture it.", ">\n\nNothing says innocent like burning documents", ">\n\nMy whole life is probably online yet these fools are burning paper documents? And it matters? The fuck?", ">\n\nFace of evil", ">\n\nGeez what was so bad that he set it on fire?", ">\n\nLike Trump, Meadows is a crook.", ">\n\nTreason/overthrow plans is the only possibility." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies", ">\n\nAt least once amirite", ">\n\nOne of the biggest morons ever..... is he gonna be held accountable? No, right? Hahah", ">\n\nAll of them, each a n d every one of the times. If that's not a guilty mindset, then idk what is.", ">\n\nIt was always gonna come out. Serial sewer rat meadows was involved in so much skullduggery that any one of the shitty things he’s done was bound to be exposed.", ">\n\nSo when can we expect this motherf’r to be prosecuted?", ">\n\nAt least six years, seven or more - just enough time for him to get rich serving his cronies. Probably.", ">\n\nBurn after reading?", ">\n\nSwear to god, next guy who gets sketchy in the WH, I'm gunna be totally fine with doors getting kicked in during office hours. Livestream it too, I'll make food.", ">\n\nMark didn't take the documents to his rustic mobile home in North Carolina? Coulda had a big bonfire... oh wait, he and the missus never lived there despite it being the address he used to run for office and vote.", ">\n\nSparky Marky and the Danville Detention Bunch", ">\n\nWhy aren't all the WH fireplaces plugged? It's justifiable as both a security measure and a fire hazard.", ">\n\nNot very sustainable, is it? Think about it, most of America prohibits the burning of logs.", ">\n\nOf the many people from this dumpster fire who’ll be going to jail, the one most likely to openly sob while in prison, is Mark Meadows. And it just delights me to picture it.", ">\n\nNothing says innocent like burning documents", ">\n\nMy whole life is probably online yet these fools are burning paper documents? And it matters? The fuck?", ">\n\nFace of evil", ">\n\nGeez what was so bad that he set it on fire?", ">\n\nLike Trump, Meadows is a crook.", ">\n\nTreason/overthrow plans is the only possibility.", ">\n\n‪I'm from Germany and i'm recently working on a paper about social inequality in the U.S and would be happy if you participate in it :) takes about 3-4 minutes :) empirio.de/s/t=YdhXtYXk thank you very much" ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies", ">\n\nAt least once amirite", ">\n\nOne of the biggest morons ever..... is he gonna be held accountable? No, right? Hahah", ">\n\nAll of them, each a n d every one of the times. If that's not a guilty mindset, then idk what is.", ">\n\nIt was always gonna come out. Serial sewer rat meadows was involved in so much skullduggery that any one of the shitty things he’s done was bound to be exposed.", ">\n\nSo when can we expect this motherf’r to be prosecuted?", ">\n\nAt least six years, seven or more - just enough time for him to get rich serving his cronies. Probably.", ">\n\nBurn after reading?", ">\n\nSwear to god, next guy who gets sketchy in the WH, I'm gunna be totally fine with doors getting kicked in during office hours. Livestream it too, I'll make food.", ">\n\nMark didn't take the documents to his rustic mobile home in North Carolina? Coulda had a big bonfire... oh wait, he and the missus never lived there despite it being the address he used to run for office and vote.", ">\n\nSparky Marky and the Danville Detention Bunch", ">\n\nWhy aren't all the WH fireplaces plugged? It's justifiable as both a security measure and a fire hazard.", ">\n\nNot very sustainable, is it? Think about it, most of America prohibits the burning of logs.", ">\n\nOf the many people from this dumpster fire who’ll be going to jail, the one most likely to openly sob while in prison, is Mark Meadows. And it just delights me to picture it.", ">\n\nNothing says innocent like burning documents", ">\n\nMy whole life is probably online yet these fools are burning paper documents? And it matters? The fuck?", ">\n\nFace of evil", ">\n\nGeez what was so bad that he set it on fire?", ">\n\nLike Trump, Meadows is a crook.", ">\n\nTreason/overthrow plans is the only possibility.", ">\n\n‪I'm from Germany and i'm recently working on a paper about social inequality in the U.S and would be happy if you participate in it :) takes about 3-4 minutes :) empirio.de/s/t=YdhXtYXk thank you very much", ">\n\nHe was trying to keep warm." ]

[ "Well, in the history of politics, no one burns stuff that makes you look good.", ">\n\nRepublican leadership likes a guy like this. Meadows was demonstrating some real rat fuck behavior, and that goes along way with this current iteration of the GOP.", ">\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics? The last 6-7 years, the GOP has really leaned into the overt cruelty, corruption, lies, etc. and their voters fucking love it.\nNobody ever gets held accountable and as long as their voters like it, they’ll just get more and more bold. I don’t know how to even fight against this mentality.", ">\n\n\nSerious question - how do we even get this shit out of American politics?\n\nYou get a voting system in place that allows people to express their displeasure without having to completely sacrifice their other principles.\nA conservative is still going to vote Republican, not because they think burning documents is best practise, but because they value conservatism. There are no other avenues for them to vote for conservative values in a first-past-the-post system.\nFirst-past-the-post doesn't give a shit about your political opinion, beyond \"these 2 choices\". The People cannot exercise their duty when it's the same two unpunished parties over and over.\nInstead, it will turn the people against each other as the political system becomes calcified into nothing more than an ongoing series of football matches played by the same two teams for eternity.\nThe political class really has the public right where they want them - fighting amongst themselves instead of channelling that energy into demanding and rewarding better governance.", ">\n\nSpoiler… they don’t value conservatism. \nNo conservatives are fucking conservative. \nThey are dumb as fuck. The people leading their party don’t practice religion like they pretend they do, they all have abortions etc. They just get people all excited about this shit even though it doesn’t actually mean shit to them.", ">\n\nThat's missing the point really, and falling into the mode that better suits politicians than it does the citizenry. \nI wouldn't necessarily take what the Republican party does as what all conservatives really, 100% want. It's just the closest to it.\nGet a system that provides more options, ranging from centrist all the way through the MAGA nutjobs and then see who they vote for before making a judgement.\nIf the US is like every other country in the world (and I have seen no reason to think otherwise), there's probably a large central mass of voters who, while on different sides of the political spectrum, probably agree on more things than is evident.\nBut the current political system doesn't accurately portray that. And the media certainly didn't fucking help either.", ">\n\nNeither party will ever let that happen.", ">\n\nThis should be an indicator of how deep the problem goes - it shouldn't be up to the parties. They should be responding to the demands of the people.\nThe FPTP issue is compounded by the US not having mandatory voting. This means parties don't need to consider everyone - a winning strategy can simply be \"be as different to the other team as possible, and create wedge issues that we can throw to our supporters to make them mad enough to vote for us\". They don't have to cater to anyone other than their bases.\nPeople are hung up on the issues that political parties want them to be hung up on. Wedge issues are valid, but in the scheme of things aren't as important as making sure elections are reflective of the actual will of the people.", ">\n\nA perfect example of this is the republicans current fixation: trans issues. Only between 0.5%-1.5% of the US population identify as transgender and yet if you listened to Republicans, you would think this number is considerably higher.", ">\n\nI find it interesting how closely the trump White House was working hand-in-hand with its congressional saboteurs, the House Freedom Caucus, to stage a coup.\nMark Meadows is one the Freedom Caucus' co-founders, Scott Perry is its current Chairman.\nMick Mulvaney, who is yet another co-founder of the Freedom Caucus, and also trump's former Chief of Staff, once said, \"Trump wants to turn Washington upside down – that was his first message and his winning message. We want the exact same thing.\"\nWatch this caucus closely, they are an ongoing threat to democracy, even if trump never returns to the White House. Meanwhile, one of the caucus' other co-founders, Ron DeSantis, has a good chance of picking up where trump and his saboteurs left off.", ">\n\nThey're essentially also the Pro Putin Caucus if you consider how a majority of them have voted against Ukraine aid/other bills having to do with war - and the general parroting of Kremlin talking points.", ">\n\nYes, they are also the pro Putin caucus, or known by their other nick name, the Treason Caucus. Just recently, two members, Boebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky during his congressional address. Many other members did not even attend the speech.", ">\n\n\nBoebert and Gaetz, made a point to disrespect Zelensky\n\nAnd Russian media noticed and praised them for it.", ">\n\nNoticed? It was probably their plan", ">\n\nApparently it was over a dozen times the witness saw him burning documents.", ">\n\nI believe she said that he made copies though too.", ">\n\nDo you have a source for that?", ">\n\nI thought I had read a quote in another thread but I think this must be what I saw (Cassidy Hutchinson speaking): “However, I don’t know if they were the first or original copies of anything,” she continued. “It’s entirely possible that he had put things in his fireplace that he also would have put into a burn bag that there were duplicates of or that there was an electronic copy of.”\nSo no, not definitive that he had other copies, but it's possible.\nsource", ">\n\nIt does seem possible that there were copies. Thanks!", ">\n\nI mean if someone typed up something in the 1950s and you burned it, that's it, gone forever. But I find it hard to believe these people were typing out all their secret shit on analog typewriters, they were printing out emails and electronic reports and PDFs. Surely there's got to be copies somewhere.", ">\n\nThey do illegal things because they know they won't be held accountable.", ">\n\nAnd even if we suddenly hold them accountable, we've shown how slow we are to act. If someone wants to really make a run for the coup they will a good idea what their window is... and it's super wide.", ">\n\nIm just so happy don't have to worry about these types of shenanigans from Joe biden", ">\n\nHaven’t you seen the impeach Biden flags? Whatever he did, I shudder to think about. If they won’t say what it is, it must be an unspeakable evil.", ">\n\nThese folks all need to be in jail. For a long, long time.", ">\n\nYou misspelled forever.", ">\n\nNah, it needs to be longer than that", ">\n\nAnd they need a GoT nun to follow them around and intone SHAME every two minutes or so.", ">\n\nYou think that Meadows has come to the realization that he's going to be trump's fall guy? Better start talking.", ">\n\nIt seems like he drank the Koolaid, I bet they'd have to make him talk.", ">\n\nThat's a thought that plagues me. Think of all of the shit that has come out on this administration. Now think of the fact that everything we know is just what's left after they tried very hard to cover the worst of it up.", ">\n\nThere's a legacy for the Trump Admin to add to all the future history books: The administration that was responsible for all of The White House fireplaces being bricked in.", ">\n\nSome day he'll give Michelle Obama a piece of candy and all will be forgiven.", ">\n\nDestruction of evidence should result in an automatic guilty verdict.", ">\n\nNot to be AH, but how can anyone prove that the tinder wasn't doodles of dicks.\nI'm waiting for real evidence that can be introduced into a court. Without that, we have the theory, just not the evidence. Giuliani showed how that works in court.", ">\n\nThere's an archival procedure.", ">\n\nBy the testimony that I read, Meadows apparently took the meeting notes, then destroyed them prior to archival. If someone else took the notes, they are possibly recoverable. I still would see this as an unwinnable, he said - she said.", ">\n\nWhen the party of law and order prove they’re not.", ">\n\nWhat does Mark Meadows have to say about this? Has he issued a statement? Maybe he’s only Arsonist-ish to quote a newly-elected Republican.", ">\n\nHe drafted a statement, then hurriedly shoved it in his arson hole while avoiding all eye contact.", ">\n\nSomething about him avoiding eye-contact and staring at his phone during the attack makes me think that this guy is the sort who will cut a deal to save himself. I’m not saying that it’s cowardice. It’s cowardly behavior but its his lack of values for anything beyond self-interest that will compel him to cut a deal. What reason does he have to do otherwise?", ">\n\nConservative Americans actually support this behavior in the 21st Century but in the 'good old days' this wouldn't fly. \nThey think that treating politics like a reality show will make America as \"great\" as it was in the 50s.", ">\n\nWow, you liberals will do anything to distract from the fact that Obama wore a tan suit and profited from his presidency by writing a book when he was no longer president.\n/s cause i'm a wimp.", ">\n\nNice job leaving out mention of the Dijon mustard superscandal, you filthy commie.\n(/s, me too)", ">\n\nHe didn't even mention the shameful bicycle helmet.", ">\n\n“Actually, it was really cold that day & the heat was broken, so we burned a bunch of completely innocuous papers to keep warm.”", ">\n\nDon't they have shredders?", ">\n\nTrump tore stuff up and shredded stuff, but destroying presidential documents is literally a crime so the White house Historian spent a lot of time taping the torn up and shredded papers back together again. \nYou can't tape back burnt documents.", ">\n\nIt was illegal to do, and immoral, and the only rational reason to do this, is to cover the tracks and evidence of some LARGER crime that can be tracked to those burnt documents.\nI think future generations deserve to know what our 45th President did with America’s history. Taxpayers paid for Trump and Meadows to sleep and eat in luxury and to act as our Elected Representative and they decided to burn the documents we paid them to save and keep in the archives.", ">\n\nAll documents, communications, etc. in the WH (and elsewhere in the government) belong to the American people. It is illegal to destroy, take, keep or otherwise hide materials from the archives and various relevant agencies. \nHow is it so many folks have broken the law in this area? \nAnd how is it that charges have not been issued? Is it a matter of gathering evidence? Is there a massive RICO investigation going on to tie everyone to the same crimes and prosecute the lot?\nI am a pretty conservative dude (generally) and this is outrageous. It is inexcusable. \nBreaking the law by the highest officials in the land must be punished. There has been a shift over the past several decades to allow the powerful to simply get by; most famously when we all watched a president commit perjury. Doesn’t matter what it was about, he lied and got away with it. \nBefore that was Nixon - he should have been torn to shreds in the courts. I can appreciate why Ford did what he did but long term I think it was a mistake. \nBefore Watergate it was Nixon actively sabotaging peace negotiations so he could defeat LBJ. \nAnd before that it was LBJ assaulting staffers and sexually assaulting female staffers. Oh, and prosecuting a war he knew we wouldn’t win but he didn’t want to lose face or be embarrassed. The man who named his own penis “Jumbo” and used it to intimidate and bully senators, congressman, secret service and just a out anyone else sent thousands of Americans to die for vanity. \nMore recently it was the lies that got us into Iraq. Everyone walked away. Except those amongst us who can’t walk away and bear the scars of that war. Which was not fought for oil (fighting for resources is at least defensible), it wasn’t fought because Iraq attacked the US. It was fought because we didn’t like Saddam and figured that if we kicked the door in the whole rotten thing would collapse. And it did. On our heads. And suddenly we found ourselves mired in building a nation that didn’t want to be built. At least not in the way we wanted. \nThen came assassinations of all manner of folks including American citizens. While I don’t particularly disagree with it, I think it made sense, the legality was… shaky. \nThen came a known charlatan and oh buddy were the gates just thrown wide open. And not enough people cared. Some senior folks tried to stay involved, temper the worst tantrums and incomprehensible decisions. But that only masked the problem for a while. It was a band aid on what has turned out to be a suppurating wound. \nPopulism has brought us to this inflection point. Primaries whose very nature favor fringe candidates, social media that serves as a conduit to spread misinformation and disinformation, the blind engagement with and envelopment by the strangest fictions (I won’t call them conspiracy theories… a “theory” denotes some sort of logical work and process). Identity politics that divides us into ever smaller, distinct and irreconcilable camps. This is where we are. \nThe sky is falling and half of us look up and see it happening. The other half refuse to look up, to even accept that we can look up at all or that the sky could be falling to begin with. We have got to figure this out. There is too much at stake. Societal fragmentation and collapse or ugly, violent things none of us should wish for. Yet here we are. Sigh.", ">\n\nSince we can never really know and this man basically held the second most important office in the country, the only proper course of action is to assume that the worst most outrageous and treasonous things were written on those pieces of paper and charge him concurrently.", ">\n\nWater boarding is still in vogue according to the GOP. Let’s try that /s", ">\n\nCounting the days until this idiot winds up in jail for Trump. Donnie douchebag will drop him like a hot potato once the arrests begin .", ">\n\nI’m confused…. Are these people hand writing these “papers” are there not multiple digital copies and sources? MS word auto saves…. Your telling me these boomers are smart enough to have ONE copy and not a trace of it anywhere?", ">\n\nHe’s a traitor", ">\n\nAnd let’s be honest, Mark Meadows wont do well in prison. He should be begging for a plea deal right now.", ">\n\nMaybe we should send Mark Meadows to Guantanamo. I mean after all they seem to think their methods are necessary when extracting information from terrorists and these people are nothing if not terrorists.", ">\n\nThat’d be solid. Example made", ">\n\nNot to mention Marky Mark was registered to vote in THREE different states last election.", ">\n\nThe transcript from Putin and trumps conversation is ash is what Im hearing here.", ">\n\nwell gee that sounds like you mean sam", ">\n\nEvery time I hear about the Trump team burning documents I'm reminded of this scene from The West Wing.\nOnly it's much less entertaining to hear about stupid people doing stupid things than it was to watch these otherwise smart people being stupid.", ">\n\n\"Sir, I know you told me not to wake you up unless the building is on fire...\"\nOne of my favorite opens of that whole show, going the long way around just for that joke.", ">\n\nAmong the reasons I'd obviously be bad at a coup is that it wouldn't occur to me to write it all down in the first place.", ">\n\nDick Cheney has new tweed the chat", ">\n\nI wonder if he scrubbed any servers", ">\n\n“It was chilly…nothing to see here..”", ">\n\nThe white house fireplace has seen some shit over the years I'm sure.", ">\n\nThis is both an admission of a guilty state of mind and the destruction of evidence. Also note that he did not use the “supplied “burn bag , that would not be secure enough . He had to see them destroyed with his own eyes . Ever wonder why he has been so silent ? He is holding a lot back and none of it is good.", ">\n\nMark Meadows likely realized that the documents were incriminating as \"Stop the Steal\" was discussed. \nBut was he protecting himself or Trump?", ">\n\nAny chance he took a digital record and the FBI found those burned docs on phone?\nNo way he burns those papers without having an out planned. Even he can't be stupid enough to know a crime being planned right in front of him and not have an out. More to this than meets the eye.", ">\n\nJust download the printer buffers in his office! You know they weren't smart enough to wipe those.", ">\n\nCan someone explain why burning documents would even be effective when they exist somewhere on a hard drive in PDF or whatever format? They aren’t using typewriters I assume.", ">\n\nPaystubs from Putin.", ">\n\nKushners deals with Saudis.", ">\n\nIs there evidence? Shady AF, but I don't see how anything can be done to hold anyone accountable unless either Meadows or Perry flips.", ">\n\nWhen DIDN'T he, is a better question.", ">\n\nWow, everything that occurred during trump's administration is worth at least 2 Watergate incidents now.", ">\n\nI'm pretty sure that Meadows did a little mental math and decided the penalties for violating the Presedential Records Act weren't as bad as what he'd get if he didn't burn those records.", ">\n\nEverything I learn about Meadows makes me believe that he was the epicenter of the Jan 6 coup attempt. If some of the rioters had gotten ahold of Pence then I am quite sure he would've let that play out. And remember that at one point as Pence and his family left his office that the rioters were only 40' away. His whole family could've been murdered and Meadows was fine with that.", ">\n\nI'm sure there are plenty of people who would love to get their hands on those documents!", ">\n\nWhy is this traitor not in jail?", ">\n\nJmo, because I am thinking he flipped? its possible?", ">\n\nOnce is too many.", ">\n\nDoesn’t mean much unless somebody can testify to what those documents were. His top aide doesn’t even know.", ">\n\nBut Mark Meadows knows. And odds of him going to prison for Trump are diminishing by the day. And Scott Perry is definitely not going to jail for him.", ">\n\nHe was just sending up the signal fire to say he'd seen the Pope's balls.", ">\n\nLock. Him. Up.", ">\n\nThose are probably the documents Meadows were concerned that could REALLY get Trump in trouble. You know, aside from all the other evidence.", ">\n\nPut these fuckers in prison already!", ">\n\nLock him up!", ">\n\ni wager that this is the russian collusion stuff. i dont think trump would have won without russian influencers targeting our idiots on social media", ">\n\nWell compensated idiots, as I have read.", ">\n\nWe believe what she says still?", ">\n\nSo we've established that Meadows is smarter than Trump.", ">\n\nAnd yet remains free and uncharged…", ">\n\nIf we can figure out what kind of stuff he burned, can people just sue for stuff related to that information, demand it through discovery, and get automatic wins when the judge finds out those documents were deliberately destroyed?", ">\n\nHopefully an assistant or leaker would have copies", ">\n\nAt least once amirite", ">\n\nOne of the biggest morons ever..... is he gonna be held accountable? No, right? Hahah", ">\n\nAll of them, each a n d every one of the times. If that's not a guilty mindset, then idk what is.", ">\n\nIt was always gonna come out. Serial sewer rat meadows was involved in so much skullduggery that any one of the shitty things he’s done was bound to be exposed.", ">\n\nSo when can we expect this motherf’r to be prosecuted?", ">\n\nAt least six years, seven or more - just enough time for him to get rich serving his cronies. Probably.", ">\n\nBurn after reading?", ">\n\nSwear to god, next guy who gets sketchy in the WH, I'm gunna be totally fine with doors getting kicked in during office hours. Livestream it too, I'll make food.", ">\n\nMark didn't take the documents to his rustic mobile home in North Carolina? Coulda had a big bonfire... oh wait, he and the missus never lived there despite it being the address he used to run for office and vote.", ">\n\nSparky Marky and the Danville Detention Bunch", ">\n\nWhy aren't all the WH fireplaces plugged? It's justifiable as both a security measure and a fire hazard.", ">\n\nNot very sustainable, is it? Think about it, most of America prohibits the burning of logs.", ">\n\nOf the many people from this dumpster fire who’ll be going to jail, the one most likely to openly sob while in prison, is Mark Meadows. And it just delights me to picture it.", ">\n\nNothing says innocent like burning documents", ">\n\nMy whole life is probably online yet these fools are burning paper documents? And it matters? The fuck?", ">\n\nFace of evil", ">\n\nGeez what was so bad that he set it on fire?", ">\n\nLike Trump, Meadows is a crook.", ">\n\nTreason/overthrow plans is the only possibility.", ">\n\n‪I'm from Germany and i'm recently working on a paper about social inequality in the U.S and would be happy if you participate in it :) takes about 3-4 minutes :) empirio.de/s/t=YdhXtYXk thank you very much", ">\n\nHe was trying to keep warm.", ">\n\nLock him up!" ]

[]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones." ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones" ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off" ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off", ">\n\nEar \"poop\" . Good lord that's cringey" ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off", ">\n\nEar \"poop\" . Good lord that's cringey", ">\n\nBut not inaccurate, metaphorically. I wear hearingaids, used to wear the in the canal kind and was forever clearing earwax out of the things and occasionally getting ear infections I believe caused by the wearing. If you ever need ear help go straight to the behind the ear type, much better machines, and if you are worried that people will stop and stare, nope, generally they are too far up their own business to notice." ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off", ">\n\nEar \"poop\" . Good lord that's cringey", ">\n\nBut not inaccurate, metaphorically. I wear hearingaids, used to wear the in the canal kind and was forever clearing earwax out of the things and occasionally getting ear infections I believe caused by the wearing. If you ever need ear help go straight to the behind the ear type, much better machines, and if you are worried that people will stop and stare, nope, generally they are too far up their own business to notice.", ">\n\nDo you not clean them? I clean my earbuds pretty often and they look fine. Also, due to anxiety, I don’t like having both ears buds in so I can still listen to my surroundings. It’s a lot more comfortable to do that with earbuds than headphones. I know a lot more people who’ve never washed their headphones than people that don’t clean their earbuds." ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off", ">\n\nEar \"poop\" . Good lord that's cringey", ">\n\nBut not inaccurate, metaphorically. I wear hearingaids, used to wear the in the canal kind and was forever clearing earwax out of the things and occasionally getting ear infections I believe caused by the wearing. If you ever need ear help go straight to the behind the ear type, much better machines, and if you are worried that people will stop and stare, nope, generally they are too far up their own business to notice.", ">\n\nDo you not clean them? I clean my earbuds pretty often and they look fine. Also, due to anxiety, I don’t like having both ears buds in so I can still listen to my surroundings. It’s a lot more comfortable to do that with earbuds than headphones. I know a lot more people who’ve never washed their headphones than people that don’t clean their earbuds.", ">\n\nI was in the same boat with anxiety and wearing one earbud. I recently got a pair with a \"talk through\" feature, and it changed everything. Now I can get stereo music, and hear my surroundings." ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off", ">\n\nEar \"poop\" . Good lord that's cringey", ">\n\nBut not inaccurate, metaphorically. I wear hearingaids, used to wear the in the canal kind and was forever clearing earwax out of the things and occasionally getting ear infections I believe caused by the wearing. If you ever need ear help go straight to the behind the ear type, much better machines, and if you are worried that people will stop and stare, nope, generally they are too far up their own business to notice.", ">\n\nDo you not clean them? I clean my earbuds pretty often and they look fine. Also, due to anxiety, I don’t like having both ears buds in so I can still listen to my surroundings. It’s a lot more comfortable to do that with earbuds than headphones. I know a lot more people who’ve never washed their headphones than people that don’t clean their earbuds.", ">\n\nI was in the same boat with anxiety and wearing one earbud. I recently got a pair with a \"talk through\" feature, and it changed everything. Now I can get stereo music, and hear my surroundings.", ">\n\nLove my headphones. Soft, comfortable and they keep my ears warm. Ear pods just pop out and you have to spend time finding them and putting them back in. Personal preference probably." ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off", ">\n\nEar \"poop\" . Good lord that's cringey", ">\n\nBut not inaccurate, metaphorically. I wear hearingaids, used to wear the in the canal kind and was forever clearing earwax out of the things and occasionally getting ear infections I believe caused by the wearing. If you ever need ear help go straight to the behind the ear type, much better machines, and if you are worried that people will stop and stare, nope, generally they are too far up their own business to notice.", ">\n\nDo you not clean them? I clean my earbuds pretty often and they look fine. Also, due to anxiety, I don’t like having both ears buds in so I can still listen to my surroundings. It’s a lot more comfortable to do that with earbuds than headphones. I know a lot more people who’ve never washed their headphones than people that don’t clean their earbuds.", ">\n\nI was in the same boat with anxiety and wearing one earbud. I recently got a pair with a \"talk through\" feature, and it changed everything. Now I can get stereo music, and hear my surroundings.", ">\n\nLove my headphones. Soft, comfortable and they keep my ears warm. Ear pods just pop out and you have to spend time finding them and putting them back in. Personal preference probably.", ">\n\nI wear glasses…headphones push my ear against the arm and it starts hurting pretty soon" ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off", ">\n\nEar \"poop\" . Good lord that's cringey", ">\n\nBut not inaccurate, metaphorically. I wear hearingaids, used to wear the in the canal kind and was forever clearing earwax out of the things and occasionally getting ear infections I believe caused by the wearing. If you ever need ear help go straight to the behind the ear type, much better machines, and if you are worried that people will stop and stare, nope, generally they are too far up their own business to notice.", ">\n\nDo you not clean them? I clean my earbuds pretty often and they look fine. Also, due to anxiety, I don’t like having both ears buds in so I can still listen to my surroundings. It’s a lot more comfortable to do that with earbuds than headphones. I know a lot more people who’ve never washed their headphones than people that don’t clean their earbuds.", ">\n\nI was in the same boat with anxiety and wearing one earbud. I recently got a pair with a \"talk through\" feature, and it changed everything. Now I can get stereo music, and hear my surroundings.", ">\n\nLove my headphones. Soft, comfortable and they keep my ears warm. Ear pods just pop out and you have to spend time finding them and putting them back in. Personal preference probably.", ">\n\nI wear glasses…headphones push my ear against the arm and it starts hurting pretty soon", ">\n\nThis really depends on your frames and the headphones. I have thin frames that work with just about any pair of headphones. But I also hate most ear covering ones as I have big ass ears." ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off", ">\n\nEar \"poop\" . Good lord that's cringey", ">\n\nBut not inaccurate, metaphorically. I wear hearingaids, used to wear the in the canal kind and was forever clearing earwax out of the things and occasionally getting ear infections I believe caused by the wearing. If you ever need ear help go straight to the behind the ear type, much better machines, and if you are worried that people will stop and stare, nope, generally they are too far up their own business to notice.", ">\n\nDo you not clean them? I clean my earbuds pretty often and they look fine. Also, due to anxiety, I don’t like having both ears buds in so I can still listen to my surroundings. It’s a lot more comfortable to do that with earbuds than headphones. I know a lot more people who’ve never washed their headphones than people that don’t clean their earbuds.", ">\n\nI was in the same boat with anxiety and wearing one earbud. I recently got a pair with a \"talk through\" feature, and it changed everything. Now I can get stereo music, and hear my surroundings.", ">\n\nLove my headphones. Soft, comfortable and they keep my ears warm. Ear pods just pop out and you have to spend time finding them and putting them back in. Personal preference probably.", ">\n\nI wear glasses…headphones push my ear against the arm and it starts hurting pretty soon", ">\n\nThis really depends on your frames and the headphones. I have thin frames that work with just about any pair of headphones. But I also hate most ear covering ones as I have big ass ears.", ">\n\nI hate both, but I prefer ear buds most of the time.\nWearing headphones for too long makes my ears hurt and I can feel a bit disoriented for some reason. I'm not sure how, but I get car sick, so maybe that relates somehow. \nAnything that goes in my ear falls out constantly. I clean them regularly, but the little net that covers the hole (like a speaker) always seems to come out after a few cleaning attempts. The mic on them always seems to break as well. I go through them way too quickly. I do think you have a point, but I'm still going to use them." ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off", ">\n\nEar \"poop\" . Good lord that's cringey", ">\n\nBut not inaccurate, metaphorically. I wear hearingaids, used to wear the in the canal kind and was forever clearing earwax out of the things and occasionally getting ear infections I believe caused by the wearing. If you ever need ear help go straight to the behind the ear type, much better machines, and if you are worried that people will stop and stare, nope, generally they are too far up their own business to notice.", ">\n\nDo you not clean them? I clean my earbuds pretty often and they look fine. Also, due to anxiety, I don’t like having both ears buds in so I can still listen to my surroundings. It’s a lot more comfortable to do that with earbuds than headphones. I know a lot more people who’ve never washed their headphones than people that don’t clean their earbuds.", ">\n\nI was in the same boat with anxiety and wearing one earbud. I recently got a pair with a \"talk through\" feature, and it changed everything. Now I can get stereo music, and hear my surroundings.", ">\n\nLove my headphones. Soft, comfortable and they keep my ears warm. Ear pods just pop out and you have to spend time finding them and putting them back in. Personal preference probably.", ">\n\nI wear glasses…headphones push my ear against the arm and it starts hurting pretty soon", ">\n\nThis really depends on your frames and the headphones. I have thin frames that work with just about any pair of headphones. But I also hate most ear covering ones as I have big ass ears.", ">\n\nI hate both, but I prefer ear buds most of the time.\nWearing headphones for too long makes my ears hurt and I can feel a bit disoriented for some reason. I'm not sure how, but I get car sick, so maybe that relates somehow. \nAnything that goes in my ear falls out constantly. I clean them regularly, but the little net that covers the hole (like a speaker) always seems to come out after a few cleaning attempts. The mic on them always seems to break as well. I go through them way too quickly. I do think you have a point, but I'm still going to use them.", ">\n\nA good pair I use let's you just buy new cables (including mic on the cable) the brand is KZ the actual speaker part of the earbuds just pop off so that you can replace the cable instead of the whole unit. Might be good for you since you wouldn't have to spend as much replacing them" ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off", ">\n\nEar \"poop\" . Good lord that's cringey", ">\n\nBut not inaccurate, metaphorically. I wear hearingaids, used to wear the in the canal kind and was forever clearing earwax out of the things and occasionally getting ear infections I believe caused by the wearing. If you ever need ear help go straight to the behind the ear type, much better machines, and if you are worried that people will stop and stare, nope, generally they are too far up their own business to notice.", ">\n\nDo you not clean them? I clean my earbuds pretty often and they look fine. Also, due to anxiety, I don’t like having both ears buds in so I can still listen to my surroundings. It’s a lot more comfortable to do that with earbuds than headphones. I know a lot more people who’ve never washed their headphones than people that don’t clean their earbuds.", ">\n\nI was in the same boat with anxiety and wearing one earbud. I recently got a pair with a \"talk through\" feature, and it changed everything. Now I can get stereo music, and hear my surroundings.", ">\n\nLove my headphones. Soft, comfortable and they keep my ears warm. Ear pods just pop out and you have to spend time finding them and putting them back in. Personal preference probably.", ">\n\nI wear glasses…headphones push my ear against the arm and it starts hurting pretty soon", ">\n\nThis really depends on your frames and the headphones. I have thin frames that work with just about any pair of headphones. But I also hate most ear covering ones as I have big ass ears.", ">\n\nI hate both, but I prefer ear buds most of the time.\nWearing headphones for too long makes my ears hurt and I can feel a bit disoriented for some reason. I'm not sure how, but I get car sick, so maybe that relates somehow. \nAnything that goes in my ear falls out constantly. I clean them regularly, but the little net that covers the hole (like a speaker) always seems to come out after a few cleaning attempts. The mic on them always seems to break as well. I go through them way too quickly. I do think you have a point, but I'm still going to use them.", ">\n\nA good pair I use let's you just buy new cables (including mic on the cable) the brand is KZ the actual speaker part of the earbuds just pop off so that you can replace the cable instead of the whole unit. Might be good for you since you wouldn't have to spend as much replacing them", ">\n\n\nMost people carry some sort of bag with them every day to most places.\n\nNo?" ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off", ">\n\nEar \"poop\" . Good lord that's cringey", ">\n\nBut not inaccurate, metaphorically. I wear hearingaids, used to wear the in the canal kind and was forever clearing earwax out of the things and occasionally getting ear infections I believe caused by the wearing. If you ever need ear help go straight to the behind the ear type, much better machines, and if you are worried that people will stop and stare, nope, generally they are too far up their own business to notice.", ">\n\nDo you not clean them? I clean my earbuds pretty often and they look fine. Also, due to anxiety, I don’t like having both ears buds in so I can still listen to my surroundings. It’s a lot more comfortable to do that with earbuds than headphones. I know a lot more people who’ve never washed their headphones than people that don’t clean their earbuds.", ">\n\nI was in the same boat with anxiety and wearing one earbud. I recently got a pair with a \"talk through\" feature, and it changed everything. Now I can get stereo music, and hear my surroundings.", ">\n\nLove my headphones. Soft, comfortable and they keep my ears warm. Ear pods just pop out and you have to spend time finding them and putting them back in. Personal preference probably.", ">\n\nI wear glasses…headphones push my ear against the arm and it starts hurting pretty soon", ">\n\nThis really depends on your frames and the headphones. I have thin frames that work with just about any pair of headphones. But I also hate most ear covering ones as I have big ass ears.", ">\n\nI hate both, but I prefer ear buds most of the time.\nWearing headphones for too long makes my ears hurt and I can feel a bit disoriented for some reason. I'm not sure how, but I get car sick, so maybe that relates somehow. \nAnything that goes in my ear falls out constantly. I clean them regularly, but the little net that covers the hole (like a speaker) always seems to come out after a few cleaning attempts. The mic on them always seems to break as well. I go through them way too quickly. I do think you have a point, but I'm still going to use them.", ">\n\nA good pair I use let's you just buy new cables (including mic on the cable) the brand is KZ the actual speaker part of the earbuds just pop off so that you can replace the cable instead of the whole unit. Might be good for you since you wouldn't have to spend as much replacing them", ">\n\n\nMost people carry some sort of bag with them every day to most places.\n\nNo?", ">\n\nright? most...women? maybe? i'm not even sure most women are out there carrying purses anymore" ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off", ">\n\nEar \"poop\" . Good lord that's cringey", ">\n\nBut not inaccurate, metaphorically. I wear hearingaids, used to wear the in the canal kind and was forever clearing earwax out of the things and occasionally getting ear infections I believe caused by the wearing. If you ever need ear help go straight to the behind the ear type, much better machines, and if you are worried that people will stop and stare, nope, generally they are too far up their own business to notice.", ">\n\nDo you not clean them? I clean my earbuds pretty often and they look fine. Also, due to anxiety, I don’t like having both ears buds in so I can still listen to my surroundings. It’s a lot more comfortable to do that with earbuds than headphones. I know a lot more people who’ve never washed their headphones than people that don’t clean their earbuds.", ">\n\nI was in the same boat with anxiety and wearing one earbud. I recently got a pair with a \"talk through\" feature, and it changed everything. Now I can get stereo music, and hear my surroundings.", ">\n\nLove my headphones. Soft, comfortable and they keep my ears warm. Ear pods just pop out and you have to spend time finding them and putting them back in. Personal preference probably.", ">\n\nI wear glasses…headphones push my ear against the arm and it starts hurting pretty soon", ">\n\nThis really depends on your frames and the headphones. I have thin frames that work with just about any pair of headphones. But I also hate most ear covering ones as I have big ass ears.", ">\n\nI hate both, but I prefer ear buds most of the time.\nWearing headphones for too long makes my ears hurt and I can feel a bit disoriented for some reason. I'm not sure how, but I get car sick, so maybe that relates somehow. \nAnything that goes in my ear falls out constantly. I clean them regularly, but the little net that covers the hole (like a speaker) always seems to come out after a few cleaning attempts. The mic on them always seems to break as well. I go through them way too quickly. I do think you have a point, but I'm still going to use them.", ">\n\nA good pair I use let's you just buy new cables (including mic on the cable) the brand is KZ the actual speaker part of the earbuds just pop off so that you can replace the cable instead of the whole unit. Might be good for you since you wouldn't have to spend as much replacing them", ">\n\n\nMost people carry some sort of bag with them every day to most places.\n\nNo?", ">\n\nright? most...women? maybe? i'm not even sure most women are out there carrying purses anymore", ">\n\nI should be carrying a bag with me, but..." ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off", ">\n\nEar \"poop\" . Good lord that's cringey", ">\n\nBut not inaccurate, metaphorically. I wear hearingaids, used to wear the in the canal kind and was forever clearing earwax out of the things and occasionally getting ear infections I believe caused by the wearing. If you ever need ear help go straight to the behind the ear type, much better machines, and if you are worried that people will stop and stare, nope, generally they are too far up their own business to notice.", ">\n\nDo you not clean them? I clean my earbuds pretty often and they look fine. Also, due to anxiety, I don’t like having both ears buds in so I can still listen to my surroundings. It’s a lot more comfortable to do that with earbuds than headphones. I know a lot more people who’ve never washed their headphones than people that don’t clean their earbuds.", ">\n\nI was in the same boat with anxiety and wearing one earbud. I recently got a pair with a \"talk through\" feature, and it changed everything. Now I can get stereo music, and hear my surroundings.", ">\n\nLove my headphones. Soft, comfortable and they keep my ears warm. Ear pods just pop out and you have to spend time finding them and putting them back in. Personal preference probably.", ">\n\nI wear glasses…headphones push my ear against the arm and it starts hurting pretty soon", ">\n\nThis really depends on your frames and the headphones. I have thin frames that work with just about any pair of headphones. But I also hate most ear covering ones as I have big ass ears.", ">\n\nI hate both, but I prefer ear buds most of the time.\nWearing headphones for too long makes my ears hurt and I can feel a bit disoriented for some reason. I'm not sure how, but I get car sick, so maybe that relates somehow. \nAnything that goes in my ear falls out constantly. I clean them regularly, but the little net that covers the hole (like a speaker) always seems to come out after a few cleaning attempts. The mic on them always seems to break as well. I go through them way too quickly. I do think you have a point, but I'm still going to use them.", ">\n\nA good pair I use let's you just buy new cables (including mic on the cable) the brand is KZ the actual speaker part of the earbuds just pop off so that you can replace the cable instead of the whole unit. Might be good for you since you wouldn't have to spend as much replacing them", ">\n\n\nMost people carry some sort of bag with them every day to most places.\n\nNo?", ">\n\nright? most...women? maybe? i'm not even sure most women are out there carrying purses anymore", ">\n\nI should be carrying a bag with me, but...", ">\n\nThere’s a Best Buy ad for ear buds right below this lol" ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off", ">\n\nEar \"poop\" . Good lord that's cringey", ">\n\nBut not inaccurate, metaphorically. I wear hearingaids, used to wear the in the canal kind and was forever clearing earwax out of the things and occasionally getting ear infections I believe caused by the wearing. If you ever need ear help go straight to the behind the ear type, much better machines, and if you are worried that people will stop and stare, nope, generally they are too far up their own business to notice.", ">\n\nDo you not clean them? I clean my earbuds pretty often and they look fine. Also, due to anxiety, I don’t like having both ears buds in so I can still listen to my surroundings. It’s a lot more comfortable to do that with earbuds than headphones. I know a lot more people who’ve never washed their headphones than people that don’t clean their earbuds.", ">\n\nI was in the same boat with anxiety and wearing one earbud. I recently got a pair with a \"talk through\" feature, and it changed everything. Now I can get stereo music, and hear my surroundings.", ">\n\nLove my headphones. Soft, comfortable and they keep my ears warm. Ear pods just pop out and you have to spend time finding them and putting them back in. Personal preference probably.", ">\n\nI wear glasses…headphones push my ear against the arm and it starts hurting pretty soon", ">\n\nThis really depends on your frames and the headphones. I have thin frames that work with just about any pair of headphones. But I also hate most ear covering ones as I have big ass ears.", ">\n\nI hate both, but I prefer ear buds most of the time.\nWearing headphones for too long makes my ears hurt and I can feel a bit disoriented for some reason. I'm not sure how, but I get car sick, so maybe that relates somehow. \nAnything that goes in my ear falls out constantly. I clean them regularly, but the little net that covers the hole (like a speaker) always seems to come out after a few cleaning attempts. The mic on them always seems to break as well. I go through them way too quickly. I do think you have a point, but I'm still going to use them.", ">\n\nA good pair I use let's you just buy new cables (including mic on the cable) the brand is KZ the actual speaker part of the earbuds just pop off so that you can replace the cable instead of the whole unit. Might be good for you since you wouldn't have to spend as much replacing them", ">\n\n\nMost people carry some sort of bag with them every day to most places.\n\nNo?", ">\n\nright? most...women? maybe? i'm not even sure most women are out there carrying purses anymore", ">\n\nI should be carrying a bag with me, but...", ">\n\nThere’s a Best Buy ad for ear buds right below this lol", ">\n\nHeadphones make my head ache and they look clubber-ish?" ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off", ">\n\nEar \"poop\" . Good lord that's cringey", ">\n\nBut not inaccurate, metaphorically. I wear hearingaids, used to wear the in the canal kind and was forever clearing earwax out of the things and occasionally getting ear infections I believe caused by the wearing. If you ever need ear help go straight to the behind the ear type, much better machines, and if you are worried that people will stop and stare, nope, generally they are too far up their own business to notice.", ">\n\nDo you not clean them? I clean my earbuds pretty often and they look fine. Also, due to anxiety, I don’t like having both ears buds in so I can still listen to my surroundings. It’s a lot more comfortable to do that with earbuds than headphones. I know a lot more people who’ve never washed their headphones than people that don’t clean their earbuds.", ">\n\nI was in the same boat with anxiety and wearing one earbud. I recently got a pair with a \"talk through\" feature, and it changed everything. Now I can get stereo music, and hear my surroundings.", ">\n\nLove my headphones. Soft, comfortable and they keep my ears warm. Ear pods just pop out and you have to spend time finding them and putting them back in. Personal preference probably.", ">\n\nI wear glasses…headphones push my ear against the arm and it starts hurting pretty soon", ">\n\nThis really depends on your frames and the headphones. I have thin frames that work with just about any pair of headphones. But I also hate most ear covering ones as I have big ass ears.", ">\n\nI hate both, but I prefer ear buds most of the time.\nWearing headphones for too long makes my ears hurt and I can feel a bit disoriented for some reason. I'm not sure how, but I get car sick, so maybe that relates somehow. \nAnything that goes in my ear falls out constantly. I clean them regularly, but the little net that covers the hole (like a speaker) always seems to come out after a few cleaning attempts. The mic on them always seems to break as well. I go through them way too quickly. I do think you have a point, but I'm still going to use them.", ">\n\nA good pair I use let's you just buy new cables (including mic on the cable) the brand is KZ the actual speaker part of the earbuds just pop off so that you can replace the cable instead of the whole unit. Might be good for you since you wouldn't have to spend as much replacing them", ">\n\n\nMost people carry some sort of bag with them every day to most places.\n\nNo?", ">\n\nright? most...women? maybe? i'm not even sure most women are out there carrying purses anymore", ">\n\nI should be carrying a bag with me, but...", ">\n\nThere’s a Best Buy ad for ear buds right below this lol", ">\n\nHeadphones make my head ache and they look clubber-ish?", ">\n\nI clean my ear buds weekly, and clean my ears like twice a day 🤔😂" ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off", ">\n\nEar \"poop\" . Good lord that's cringey", ">\n\nBut not inaccurate, metaphorically. I wear hearingaids, used to wear the in the canal kind and was forever clearing earwax out of the things and occasionally getting ear infections I believe caused by the wearing. If you ever need ear help go straight to the behind the ear type, much better machines, and if you are worried that people will stop and stare, nope, generally they are too far up their own business to notice.", ">\n\nDo you not clean them? I clean my earbuds pretty often and they look fine. Also, due to anxiety, I don’t like having both ears buds in so I can still listen to my surroundings. It’s a lot more comfortable to do that with earbuds than headphones. I know a lot more people who’ve never washed their headphones than people that don’t clean their earbuds.", ">\n\nI was in the same boat with anxiety and wearing one earbud. I recently got a pair with a \"talk through\" feature, and it changed everything. Now I can get stereo music, and hear my surroundings.", ">\n\nLove my headphones. Soft, comfortable and they keep my ears warm. Ear pods just pop out and you have to spend time finding them and putting them back in. Personal preference probably.", ">\n\nI wear glasses…headphones push my ear against the arm and it starts hurting pretty soon", ">\n\nThis really depends on your frames and the headphones. I have thin frames that work with just about any pair of headphones. But I also hate most ear covering ones as I have big ass ears.", ">\n\nI hate both, but I prefer ear buds most of the time.\nWearing headphones for too long makes my ears hurt and I can feel a bit disoriented for some reason. I'm not sure how, but I get car sick, so maybe that relates somehow. \nAnything that goes in my ear falls out constantly. I clean them regularly, but the little net that covers the hole (like a speaker) always seems to come out after a few cleaning attempts. The mic on them always seems to break as well. I go through them way too quickly. I do think you have a point, but I'm still going to use them.", ">\n\nA good pair I use let's you just buy new cables (including mic on the cable) the brand is KZ the actual speaker part of the earbuds just pop off so that you can replace the cable instead of the whole unit. Might be good for you since you wouldn't have to spend as much replacing them", ">\n\n\nMost people carry some sort of bag with them every day to most places.\n\nNo?", ">\n\nright? most...women? maybe? i'm not even sure most women are out there carrying purses anymore", ">\n\nI should be carrying a bag with me, but...", ">\n\nThere’s a Best Buy ad for ear buds right below this lol", ">\n\nHeadphones make my head ache and they look clubber-ish?", ">\n\nI clean my ear buds weekly, and clean my ears like twice a day 🤔😂", ">\n\nDo you ever clean your ears?" ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off", ">\n\nEar \"poop\" . Good lord that's cringey", ">\n\nBut not inaccurate, metaphorically. I wear hearingaids, used to wear the in the canal kind and was forever clearing earwax out of the things and occasionally getting ear infections I believe caused by the wearing. If you ever need ear help go straight to the behind the ear type, much better machines, and if you are worried that people will stop and stare, nope, generally they are too far up their own business to notice.", ">\n\nDo you not clean them? I clean my earbuds pretty often and they look fine. Also, due to anxiety, I don’t like having both ears buds in so I can still listen to my surroundings. It’s a lot more comfortable to do that with earbuds than headphones. I know a lot more people who’ve never washed their headphones than people that don’t clean their earbuds.", ">\n\nI was in the same boat with anxiety and wearing one earbud. I recently got a pair with a \"talk through\" feature, and it changed everything. Now I can get stereo music, and hear my surroundings.", ">\n\nLove my headphones. Soft, comfortable and they keep my ears warm. Ear pods just pop out and you have to spend time finding them and putting them back in. Personal preference probably.", ">\n\nI wear glasses…headphones push my ear against the arm and it starts hurting pretty soon", ">\n\nThis really depends on your frames and the headphones. I have thin frames that work with just about any pair of headphones. But I also hate most ear covering ones as I have big ass ears.", ">\n\nI hate both, but I prefer ear buds most of the time.\nWearing headphones for too long makes my ears hurt and I can feel a bit disoriented for some reason. I'm not sure how, but I get car sick, so maybe that relates somehow. \nAnything that goes in my ear falls out constantly. I clean them regularly, but the little net that covers the hole (like a speaker) always seems to come out after a few cleaning attempts. The mic on them always seems to break as well. I go through them way too quickly. I do think you have a point, but I'm still going to use them.", ">\n\nA good pair I use let's you just buy new cables (including mic on the cable) the brand is KZ the actual speaker part of the earbuds just pop off so that you can replace the cable instead of the whole unit. Might be good for you since you wouldn't have to spend as much replacing them", ">\n\n\nMost people carry some sort of bag with them every day to most places.\n\nNo?", ">\n\nright? most...women? maybe? i'm not even sure most women are out there carrying purses anymore", ">\n\nI should be carrying a bag with me, but...", ">\n\nThere’s a Best Buy ad for ear buds right below this lol", ">\n\nHeadphones make my head ache and they look clubber-ish?", ">\n\nI clean my ear buds weekly, and clean my ears like twice a day 🤔😂", ">\n\nDo you ever clean your ears?", ">\n\nI totally love headphones over ear buds but headphones simply aren't as convenient to carry around." ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off", ">\n\nEar \"poop\" . Good lord that's cringey", ">\n\nBut not inaccurate, metaphorically. I wear hearingaids, used to wear the in the canal kind and was forever clearing earwax out of the things and occasionally getting ear infections I believe caused by the wearing. If you ever need ear help go straight to the behind the ear type, much better machines, and if you are worried that people will stop and stare, nope, generally they are too far up their own business to notice.", ">\n\nDo you not clean them? I clean my earbuds pretty often and they look fine. Also, due to anxiety, I don’t like having both ears buds in so I can still listen to my surroundings. It’s a lot more comfortable to do that with earbuds than headphones. I know a lot more people who’ve never washed their headphones than people that don’t clean their earbuds.", ">\n\nI was in the same boat with anxiety and wearing one earbud. I recently got a pair with a \"talk through\" feature, and it changed everything. Now I can get stereo music, and hear my surroundings.", ">\n\nLove my headphones. Soft, comfortable and they keep my ears warm. Ear pods just pop out and you have to spend time finding them and putting them back in. Personal preference probably.", ">\n\nI wear glasses…headphones push my ear against the arm and it starts hurting pretty soon", ">\n\nThis really depends on your frames and the headphones. I have thin frames that work with just about any pair of headphones. But I also hate most ear covering ones as I have big ass ears.", ">\n\nI hate both, but I prefer ear buds most of the time.\nWearing headphones for too long makes my ears hurt and I can feel a bit disoriented for some reason. I'm not sure how, but I get car sick, so maybe that relates somehow. \nAnything that goes in my ear falls out constantly. I clean them regularly, but the little net that covers the hole (like a speaker) always seems to come out after a few cleaning attempts. The mic on them always seems to break as well. I go through them way too quickly. I do think you have a point, but I'm still going to use them.", ">\n\nA good pair I use let's you just buy new cables (including mic on the cable) the brand is KZ the actual speaker part of the earbuds just pop off so that you can replace the cable instead of the whole unit. Might be good for you since you wouldn't have to spend as much replacing them", ">\n\n\nMost people carry some sort of bag with them every day to most places.\n\nNo?", ">\n\nright? most...women? maybe? i'm not even sure most women are out there carrying purses anymore", ">\n\nI should be carrying a bag with me, but...", ">\n\nThere’s a Best Buy ad for ear buds right below this lol", ">\n\nHeadphones make my head ache and they look clubber-ish?", ">\n\nI clean my ear buds weekly, and clean my ears like twice a day 🤔😂", ">\n\nDo you ever clean your ears?", ">\n\nI totally love headphones over ear buds but headphones simply aren't as convenient to carry around.", ">\n\nClean ur ears once a week and u won’t have Tht problem" ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off", ">\n\nEar \"poop\" . Good lord that's cringey", ">\n\nBut not inaccurate, metaphorically. I wear hearingaids, used to wear the in the canal kind and was forever clearing earwax out of the things and occasionally getting ear infections I believe caused by the wearing. If you ever need ear help go straight to the behind the ear type, much better machines, and if you are worried that people will stop and stare, nope, generally they are too far up their own business to notice.", ">\n\nDo you not clean them? I clean my earbuds pretty often and they look fine. Also, due to anxiety, I don’t like having both ears buds in so I can still listen to my surroundings. It’s a lot more comfortable to do that with earbuds than headphones. I know a lot more people who’ve never washed their headphones than people that don’t clean their earbuds.", ">\n\nI was in the same boat with anxiety and wearing one earbud. I recently got a pair with a \"talk through\" feature, and it changed everything. Now I can get stereo music, and hear my surroundings.", ">\n\nLove my headphones. Soft, comfortable and they keep my ears warm. Ear pods just pop out and you have to spend time finding them and putting them back in. Personal preference probably.", ">\n\nI wear glasses…headphones push my ear against the arm and it starts hurting pretty soon", ">\n\nThis really depends on your frames and the headphones. I have thin frames that work with just about any pair of headphones. But I also hate most ear covering ones as I have big ass ears.", ">\n\nI hate both, but I prefer ear buds most of the time.\nWearing headphones for too long makes my ears hurt and I can feel a bit disoriented for some reason. I'm not sure how, but I get car sick, so maybe that relates somehow. \nAnything that goes in my ear falls out constantly. I clean them regularly, but the little net that covers the hole (like a speaker) always seems to come out after a few cleaning attempts. The mic on them always seems to break as well. I go through them way too quickly. I do think you have a point, but I'm still going to use them.", ">\n\nA good pair I use let's you just buy new cables (including mic on the cable) the brand is KZ the actual speaker part of the earbuds just pop off so that you can replace the cable instead of the whole unit. Might be good for you since you wouldn't have to spend as much replacing them", ">\n\n\nMost people carry some sort of bag with them every day to most places.\n\nNo?", ">\n\nright? most...women? maybe? i'm not even sure most women are out there carrying purses anymore", ">\n\nI should be carrying a bag with me, but...", ">\n\nThere’s a Best Buy ad for ear buds right below this lol", ">\n\nHeadphones make my head ache and they look clubber-ish?", ">\n\nI clean my ear buds weekly, and clean my ears like twice a day 🤔😂", ">\n\nDo you ever clean your ears?", ">\n\nI totally love headphones over ear buds but headphones simply aren't as convenient to carry around.", ">\n\nClean ur ears once a week and u won’t have Tht problem", ">\n\nI sort of agree with this. I personally clean them regularly but I know people who have the grossest ear buds I have ever seen and make me feel sick every time I see them. So ya if you want the convenience of having them please for the sake of humanity, clean them!" ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off", ">\n\nEar \"poop\" . Good lord that's cringey", ">\n\nBut not inaccurate, metaphorically. I wear hearingaids, used to wear the in the canal kind and was forever clearing earwax out of the things and occasionally getting ear infections I believe caused by the wearing. If you ever need ear help go straight to the behind the ear type, much better machines, and if you are worried that people will stop and stare, nope, generally they are too far up their own business to notice.", ">\n\nDo you not clean them? I clean my earbuds pretty often and they look fine. Also, due to anxiety, I don’t like having both ears buds in so I can still listen to my surroundings. It’s a lot more comfortable to do that with earbuds than headphones. I know a lot more people who’ve never washed their headphones than people that don’t clean their earbuds.", ">\n\nI was in the same boat with anxiety and wearing one earbud. I recently got a pair with a \"talk through\" feature, and it changed everything. Now I can get stereo music, and hear my surroundings.", ">\n\nLove my headphones. Soft, comfortable and they keep my ears warm. Ear pods just pop out and you have to spend time finding them and putting them back in. Personal preference probably.", ">\n\nI wear glasses…headphones push my ear against the arm and it starts hurting pretty soon", ">\n\nThis really depends on your frames and the headphones. I have thin frames that work with just about any pair of headphones. But I also hate most ear covering ones as I have big ass ears.", ">\n\nI hate both, but I prefer ear buds most of the time.\nWearing headphones for too long makes my ears hurt and I can feel a bit disoriented for some reason. I'm not sure how, but I get car sick, so maybe that relates somehow. \nAnything that goes in my ear falls out constantly. I clean them regularly, but the little net that covers the hole (like a speaker) always seems to come out after a few cleaning attempts. The mic on them always seems to break as well. I go through them way too quickly. I do think you have a point, but I'm still going to use them.", ">\n\nA good pair I use let's you just buy new cables (including mic on the cable) the brand is KZ the actual speaker part of the earbuds just pop off so that you can replace the cable instead of the whole unit. Might be good for you since you wouldn't have to spend as much replacing them", ">\n\n\nMost people carry some sort of bag with them every day to most places.\n\nNo?", ">\n\nright? most...women? maybe? i'm not even sure most women are out there carrying purses anymore", ">\n\nI should be carrying a bag with me, but...", ">\n\nThere’s a Best Buy ad for ear buds right below this lol", ">\n\nHeadphones make my head ache and they look clubber-ish?", ">\n\nI clean my ear buds weekly, and clean my ears like twice a day 🤔😂", ">\n\nDo you ever clean your ears?", ">\n\nI totally love headphones over ear buds but headphones simply aren't as convenient to carry around.", ">\n\nClean ur ears once a week and u won’t have Tht problem", ">\n\nI sort of agree with this. I personally clean them regularly but I know people who have the grossest ear buds I have ever seen and make me feel sick every time I see them. So ya if you want the convenience of having them please for the sake of humanity, clean them!", ">\n\nI like them better for sports though" ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off", ">\n\nEar \"poop\" . Good lord that's cringey", ">\n\nBut not inaccurate, metaphorically. I wear hearingaids, used to wear the in the canal kind and was forever clearing earwax out of the things and occasionally getting ear infections I believe caused by the wearing. If you ever need ear help go straight to the behind the ear type, much better machines, and if you are worried that people will stop and stare, nope, generally they are too far up their own business to notice.", ">\n\nDo you not clean them? I clean my earbuds pretty often and they look fine. Also, due to anxiety, I don’t like having both ears buds in so I can still listen to my surroundings. It’s a lot more comfortable to do that with earbuds than headphones. I know a lot more people who’ve never washed their headphones than people that don’t clean their earbuds.", ">\n\nI was in the same boat with anxiety and wearing one earbud. I recently got a pair with a \"talk through\" feature, and it changed everything. Now I can get stereo music, and hear my surroundings.", ">\n\nLove my headphones. Soft, comfortable and they keep my ears warm. Ear pods just pop out and you have to spend time finding them and putting them back in. Personal preference probably.", ">\n\nI wear glasses…headphones push my ear against the arm and it starts hurting pretty soon", ">\n\nThis really depends on your frames and the headphones. I have thin frames that work with just about any pair of headphones. But I also hate most ear covering ones as I have big ass ears.", ">\n\nI hate both, but I prefer ear buds most of the time.\nWearing headphones for too long makes my ears hurt and I can feel a bit disoriented for some reason. I'm not sure how, but I get car sick, so maybe that relates somehow. \nAnything that goes in my ear falls out constantly. I clean them regularly, but the little net that covers the hole (like a speaker) always seems to come out after a few cleaning attempts. The mic on them always seems to break as well. I go through them way too quickly. I do think you have a point, but I'm still going to use them.", ">\n\nA good pair I use let's you just buy new cables (including mic on the cable) the brand is KZ the actual speaker part of the earbuds just pop off so that you can replace the cable instead of the whole unit. Might be good for you since you wouldn't have to spend as much replacing them", ">\n\n\nMost people carry some sort of bag with them every day to most places.\n\nNo?", ">\n\nright? most...women? maybe? i'm not even sure most women are out there carrying purses anymore", ">\n\nI should be carrying a bag with me, but...", ">\n\nThere’s a Best Buy ad for ear buds right below this lol", ">\n\nHeadphones make my head ache and they look clubber-ish?", ">\n\nI clean my ear buds weekly, and clean my ears like twice a day 🤔😂", ">\n\nDo you ever clean your ears?", ">\n\nI totally love headphones over ear buds but headphones simply aren't as convenient to carry around.", ">\n\nClean ur ears once a week and u won’t have Tht problem", ">\n\nI sort of agree with this. I personally clean them regularly but I know people who have the grossest ear buds I have ever seen and make me feel sick every time I see them. So ya if you want the convenience of having them please for the sake of humanity, clean them!", ">\n\nI like them better for sports though", ">\n\nMe over here with nuraphones. :P" ]

[ "the headphones’ ear pieces can be washed\n\nSo can ear phones.", ">\n\nThe little net thing is very deep inside the silicone with my ones", ">\n\nYou can usually pop the silicone off", ">\n\nEar \"poop\" . Good lord that's cringey", ">\n\nBut not inaccurate, metaphorically. I wear hearingaids, used to wear the in the canal kind and was forever clearing earwax out of the things and occasionally getting ear infections I believe caused by the wearing. If you ever need ear help go straight to the behind the ear type, much better machines, and if you are worried that people will stop and stare, nope, generally they are too far up their own business to notice.", ">\n\nDo you not clean them? I clean my earbuds pretty often and they look fine. Also, due to anxiety, I don’t like having both ears buds in so I can still listen to my surroundings. It’s a lot more comfortable to do that with earbuds than headphones. I know a lot more people who’ve never washed their headphones than people that don’t clean their earbuds.", ">\n\nI was in the same boat with anxiety and wearing one earbud. I recently got a pair with a \"talk through\" feature, and it changed everything. Now I can get stereo music, and hear my surroundings.", ">\n\nLove my headphones. Soft, comfortable and they keep my ears warm. Ear pods just pop out and you have to spend time finding them and putting them back in. Personal preference probably.", ">\n\nI wear glasses…headphones push my ear against the arm and it starts hurting pretty soon", ">\n\nThis really depends on your frames and the headphones. I have thin frames that work with just about any pair of headphones. But I also hate most ear covering ones as I have big ass ears.", ">\n\nI hate both, but I prefer ear buds most of the time.\nWearing headphones for too long makes my ears hurt and I can feel a bit disoriented for some reason. I'm not sure how, but I get car sick, so maybe that relates somehow. \nAnything that goes in my ear falls out constantly. I clean them regularly, but the little net that covers the hole (like a speaker) always seems to come out after a few cleaning attempts. The mic on them always seems to break as well. I go through them way too quickly. I do think you have a point, but I'm still going to use them.", ">\n\nA good pair I use let's you just buy new cables (including mic on the cable) the brand is KZ the actual speaker part of the earbuds just pop off so that you can replace the cable instead of the whole unit. Might be good for you since you wouldn't have to spend as much replacing them", ">\n\n\nMost people carry some sort of bag with them every day to most places.\n\nNo?", ">\n\nright? most...women? maybe? i'm not even sure most women are out there carrying purses anymore", ">\n\nI should be carrying a bag with me, but...", ">\n\nThere’s a Best Buy ad for ear buds right below this lol", ">\n\nHeadphones make my head ache and they look clubber-ish?", ">\n\nI clean my ear buds weekly, and clean my ears like twice a day 🤔😂", ">\n\nDo you ever clean your ears?", ">\n\nI totally love headphones over ear buds but headphones simply aren't as convenient to carry around.", ">\n\nClean ur ears once a week and u won’t have Tht problem", ">\n\nI sort of agree with this. I personally clean them regularly but I know people who have the grossest ear buds I have ever seen and make me feel sick every time I see them. So ya if you want the convenience of having them please for the sake of humanity, clean them!", ">\n\nI like them better for sports though", ">\n\nMe over here with nuraphones. :P", ">\n\nI didn’t know what that was so I looked it up… I’m so jealous bro. ✋😭" ]