David Cay Johnston: Donald Trump Is a Clear and Present Danger

[babylonsister]

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2017/05/17/donald-trump-is-a-clear-and-present-danger

Donald Trump Is a Clear and Present Danger
As the White House’s lies and worse keep piling up, the clean-up and cover-up is a mess in its own right.
David Cay Johnston
05.17.17 1:00 AM ET

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Flynn’s conduct was egregious. He lied, covered up his conduct, violated military law, ignored the advice of others and—after those bad acts were exposed and he was forced to step down — has asked for immunity from prosecution. If Trump didn’t know this, well, that is frightening about his naiveté. If he did, which seems much more likely, it is terrifying about the president’s judgment.

Trump fired Flynn only after news reports revealed his lies and cover-ups, including his multiple conversations with Kislyak. Since, Flynn has registered retroactively as a foreign agent.

Take a moment to let that sink in: Donald Trump’s national security adviser was a paid agent of a foreign government. And while that government was Turkey, the money came from a Russian oligarch, who like all the Russian oligarchs keeps his fortune and his life only so long as Vladimir Putin does not want him robbed or whacked. Putin’s Russia Today propaganda television operation also paid Flynn handsomely.

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Sometimes presidents and their advisers must lie. That is a reality in our world. But Trump and his seconds—including Spicer, Sanders and now McMaster— all told gratuitous lies that can serve only one purpose: to cover up the indefensible conduct of the president in obstructing the FBI counterintelligence investigation and his reckless disclosure of super-secret information to the hostile government in Moscow.

How much clearer can the picture be of what is really going on here, that America has a president who is contemptuous of the Constitution, compromised by the Russians and willing to try any lie to hang onto power?

The next encyclopedia should include a photo of Trump. It should go next to the entry on “clear and present danger.”