It looks as though Republican Senator Richard Burr, the head of the Senate Intelligence Committee, liquidated a sizable percentage of his stock holdings shortly after receiving a classified briefing on the impact of the coronavirus on America. According to reporting from ProPublica, Burr, in 33 separate transactions, sold between $628,000 and $1.72 million in stock on February 13, well before the stock market crash. [Roll Call estimated Burr’s net worth at $1.7 million in 2018, so this would have been represented a significant percentage of his holdings.] It’s also worth noting that, less than a week before unloading these stocks, Burr co-authored a Fox News op-ed in which he said, “The United States today is better prepared than ever before to face emerging public health threats, like the coronavirus.” So, while he was telling the American people that everything would be just fine, he appears to have been working behind the scenes to protect his own financial interests, dumping shares in companies like Wyndham Hotels and Resorts and Extended Stay America, which have since tanked as a result of the coronavirus. [The Senator some up to $150,000 in Wyndham shares, and up to $100,000 in Extended Stay America shares.]
And, yes, it would appear as though this is illegal. Here, with more on that, is an excerpt from the Washington Post.
Federal officials are barred by federal law from using the nonpublic information they learn in their positions for their private financial gain.
Insider trading prohibitions apply to all members of Congress, congressional staff and other federal officials, under the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge (STOCK) Act of 2012. Burr was among three senators who voted against the legislation at the time…
It’s so obvious what happened that even Fox News commentator Tucker Carlson can see it.
What’s great about tucker throwing this marker down is that is will apply to all other senators who pulled this shit. Right? pic.twitter.com/ikHXHzLC9e
— Adam Parkhomenko (@AdamParkhomenko) March 20, 2020
Oh, it’s also worth noting that it was also reported earlier today that Burr told a group of wealthy donors three weeks ago in a private meeting that they should prepare for the worst, warning of the economic and societal effects we are now living through. He did not, however, tell his constituents the same thing.
One last thing. It looks as though Republican Senator Kelly Loeffler did the same thing.
52 Comments
I sure hope the SEC looks at the wealthy donors too. Tucker Carlson did ok here. But Dems do this shit all the time when their ppl screw up. Corruption is corruption. And TC is so blind in his allegiance to Trump that he is willing to overlook his criminality. Or he’s strategic. Like Trump maybe he’ll throw anyone under the bus to preserve his authority.
It’s important to remember that Carlson’s first allegiance is to the party. His actions here speak to his understanding of what is required to keep its base aligned.
More likely TC is an honest man whose values cause him to call out corruption regardless of political affiliation. How many will have to die before some people figure out this is much more than politics?
Looks like the swamp is expanding, even after the fine ethical standard the president has set.
Eos; what a rube. Believes all the fairy tales. The carpenter who came back to life, the Faux Newsless huckster who’s honest, the ruskie stooge traitor who doesn’t deserve being strung up. Con men going way back have always know those holy rollers are easy marks.
John Brown, why are you such a pussified pinhead? Say what you mean directly.
“his criminality”
I hate this technique. Slipping in phrases like your racism, his bigotry, their sexism as if it is a fact not an opinion. Propaganda
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legal_affairs_of_Donald_Trump
Opinions and facts are not distinguished by how they are stated 99% of the time. Facts require assertion as such or documentation. Everything else can be assumed to be subjective. Opinions and facts can be disputed.
So I dispute your implied “facts” that civil lawsuits are evidence of criminality. However, since your evidence did not support the supposed “fact”, therefore the premise is invalid.
Facts are truth. When shown to be false, they are no longer considered to be facts.
It’s like Jean really believes that when she provides blue links, they magically, all by themselves, fill the logical gaps in all of her transparent facades.
Richard Burr, head of the Senate Intelligence Committee which was directly briefed on coronavirus, sold up to $1.7m in stock between January and February
Dianne Feinstein, on the same committee, sold up to $6m in stock in same period
Kelly Loeffler, on the Senate Health Committee, sold up to $3.1m in stock starting on the day her committee was briefed by the CDC
James Inhofe sold up to $400k in stocks including real estate all on January 27
Providing support for claims is always a good idea.
What the fuck did Jesus do to be pumped in with Trump and Fox news? Damn. We did get Jean’s Tucker Carlson shout-out pretty early though. It’s gonna be a greatest hits kind of day. “Hey girls, Mr Microphone here, we’ll be back to pick you up later!”
FF, Oh I suspect that Jean is aware of your tendency to reject facts that are in opposition to your world view. It is pretty obvious. She is correct though, there is no harm in supporting opinions with facts or supporting facts with citations.
“your tendency to reject facts that are in opposition to your world view.”
You don’t think this describes you perfectly? All I did in the beginning was talk facts. My opinion that Clinton was far worse than Trump was all it took for you to categorically reject every factual thing I say (which just about adds up to a mountain of knowledge by now).
HW, No. I don’t think that describes me perfectly although of course, I am human and sometimes find myself in denial when faced with something that causes me cognitive dissonance.
I am not sure you really understand what a fact even is HW. I don’t think as highly of your intellect as you do for sure!
That covid briefing! That out of control, coward continues to expose his utter weakness. No coordination on message. Totally, completely, incompetent.
But that’s why the ruskies wanted him.
Ooh, baby baby it’s a wide world
It’s hard to get by with just a smile, girl
https://youtu.be/08jGgTuXTuw
“I am not sure you really understand what a fact even is HW.”
That’s what a not-too-bright eight year old might say when their worldview is threatened by knowledge beyond their own; denial
“That out of control, coward continues to”
For some reason I think that superfluous comma is funny. If you were saying it it would be a little stumble while you were thinking of what to say but that’s all you could come up with. It’s ridiculous and I am actually laughing out loud at you right now.
Lynne’s basic argument: “Well you’re just a doo-doo-head so I won’t listen to anything you say because it’s all DOO-DOO!!!”
But then it’s like “Clearly you reject anything in opposition to your worldview…”
I really do get some good laughs out of this shit. Besides reading posts by the handful of cool people out of the regulars, one of the redeeming aspects of posting here is actually laughing at the wacky things you and the others say.
I criticize from a love.
https://youtu.be/69kTbYNZvtY
THATS TUFF
https://youtu.be/C_nJRG9XVBI
549 cases in Michigan now
I’m not sure if Michigan should shut down or not?
I wonder what factors the governor is considering?
Burr is on the GOP shit list aka chopping block because, in his role as chief of the Intelligence committee, he let the Russian investigation proceed. What he did is horrific, same as others if true. But I don’t think our conservative friends, including TC, are angry at him for insider trading.
Bob, Mark brought TC into this not me. Dont think I have said anything nice about the guy really. Not even slightly, unless one is part of the GOP base. I agree that two days of TC national news media exposure is a lot to bear. Lots of pestilence these days.
Tough call deciding who has the worst musical taste in this forum. As the primary fanbase of Monkey Power Trio, I guess no one should really be surprised.
You are an expert in humor and an expert at placing value on aesthetic judgments now?
Diseased thought processes.
I have subjective yet informed opinions about many things, yes, FF. That’s not especially unusual. Never said I was an expert. Your conclusion seems a bit hyperbolic, no? Your double standard is showing again.
Here’s another subjective opinion: You are a sad and boring and humorless old man. People like you are the reason conservative places are so fucking boring– except out West where they are more libertarian in bent, and so bent, but at least good fun. I always feel sorry for anyone forced to live with you, but being actually stuck in a house with you? Sheesh. I hope your family own noise-canceling headphones.
Yes, hyperbolic if my judgment was based upon only this one comment you made. Accurate in reality though because you have an established pattern of confusing subjective opinion for objective fact at an unusually high rate. You build many of your little arguments out of opinions and pretend they are facts. Similarly people make fun of you because you think what makes you laugh is objectively funny. You are now considering ranking aesthetic tastes from worst to best. My god, the pattern is so firmly established—just look at your last comment. Because you would not choose to spend time with me you assume that the people that do choose to spend time with are somehow trapped and in pain.
You should look into the mirrors people offer you, Jean. It is a great opportunity that you are passing on, IMO.
You would like me to gage my self-view based on my interactions with a group of trolls who don’t know me on a local blog. Nope.
I don’t blame you for feeling the same way. If your family doesn’t find your constant bloviating and defensiveness intolerable, congratulations! You are indeed a lucky man.
Who we are is distinct from what thought processes we are in the habit of employing.
Another clue: How are you calculating the extent of my luck, Jean?
I’m not calculating anything FF. There are no calculations involved in a subjective opinion.
“Little Kay was quite blue with cold, indeed almost black, but he did not feel it; for the Snow Queen had kissed away the icy shiverings, and his heart was already a lump of ice. He dragged some sharp, flat pieces of ice to and fro, and placed them together in all kinds of positions, as if he wished to make something out of them; just as we try to form various figures with little tablets of wood which we call “a Chinese puzzle.” Kay’s fingers were very artistic; it was the icy game of reason at which he played, and in his eyes the figures were very remarkable, and of the highest importance; this opinion was owing to the piece of glass still sticking in his eye”
Read this again tonight and thought of you, FF. Your ‘reason’ is a fools errand. It’s seriously warped with inflated self-opinion and a vacuum of insularity created by a logical structure organized only to affirm your own beliefs. This is evident to all but you apparently. Someone needs to loosen that glass shard from your eye with their tears. That’s the only way you will be able to see clearly or understand anyone else. Your confoundment at the positions of others is evidence of your own distortions.
You have never once surprised me with a thought or position. They are entirely predictable, as are your defenses of them. Sigh.
Jean,
It easy to prove that there is internal calculation occurring in your subjective opinions. Just remove/ switch some of the variables that you are (mis) assuming in order to achieve the insult-outcome you are aiming at on the other side of your equation. If you remove those (mis) assumptions the outcomes will change. For example, all of your preaching about the limits of reason….Limits to reason? No fucking shit Sherlock! Common sense to most but you rely on those oddly placed accusations to misrepresent people as if you are on some sort of higher spiritual plane. LOL. You seem closer to being a chronic abuser than to being some kind of nurturing earth-mother to me. But who knows maybe there are other sides to you….
Do you not recognize that many of the truth-seeking people on this blog feel an obligation to use reason toward dismantling the misuse of reason on this blog by people like you? We are fighting against obvious sophistry. Breaking it down as a gift to people reading along and a gift to you in the hopes that you will choose more honest exchanges.
Look at your post above. Great story! A treasure! There is a tradition of mirrors and looking glasses making their way into great stories that have informed our culture and selves—about our culture and selves—for a long time. In the Snow Queen there was something evil inside of the glass that made the on-lookers perceive other people as ugly and evil. Similarly, when I look into my black mirror iPhone and see you trying to use a cultural treasure, like Snow Queen, to try to insult, based upon your invented assumptions, about things that are out of your view, like my, HW’s, iRobert’s, or EOS’ familial relationships. And then why I see you speculating on the healthiness of those relationships —it makes me wonder which side you land on in the good/ evil dichotomy offered in classic stories like the Snow Queen. If you think about it you might find that you are the creepy troll—yet you are the one who runs around calling people creepy trolls. You make stuff up for the purpose of evil aims over and over and over again. Your pattern is well established.
PS you left out the best part of the story: the Snow Queen offered Kai red ice skates if he was able to represent “eternity” with the chards of ice he was playing with. Did he get those skates
PSS. Just so it is crystal clear. I am trying to say you, Jean Henry, take beautiful things, useful things, and sublime mysteries—and you, Jean Henry, try to weaponize those things for your own evil, petty, and selfish ends. Can we do worse than that? I don’t think so.
“PSS. Just so it is crystal clear. I am trying to say you, Jean Henry, take beautiful things, useful things, and sublime mysteries—and you, Jean Henry, try to weaponize those things for your own evil, petty, and selfish ends. Can we do worse than that? I don’t think so. “
Oh that’s amazing! Thank you FF. I will cherish you’re words forever.
I use my real full name here and try to engage as earnestly as possible given the sheer madness of this forum lately. By no standard definition am I a troll. People who disagree with me politically often call me one. They are all from different political persuasions. They are usually men. Make of that what you will.
“Trolling is a game about identity deception, albeit one that is played without the consent of most of the players. The troll attempts to pass as a legitimate participant, sharing the group’s common interests and concerns; the newsgroup’s or forum’s members, if they are cognizant of trolls and other identity deceptions, attempt to both distinguish real from trolling postings, and upon judging a poster a troll, make the offending poster leave the group. Their success at the former depends on how well they – and the troll – understand identity cues; their success at the latter depends on whether the troll’s enjoyment is sufficiently diminished or outweighed by the costs imposed by the group.”
Mark has failed miserably on the latter. I often wonder why he has let this go on so long. I don’t think he has any profit motive or political motive. It’s very odd. This forum could blossom again if just a few people were removed.
Laugh it up, dummy.
Nobody on this site has displayed a habit of attempting to place other people, in all of their infinite complexity and mystery, under concepts, more than you, Jean. You even go so out of the bounds of what is appropriate for reason, as to dare to pretend that you are capable of capturing the essential-relational-aspect-of-being-together between family member you have never encountered!
I would guess you have expressed at least a dozen times to each of your perceived enemies that you have an insight into their familial relationships. (It’s always a very insulting judgment.) When in reality, in those instances, there might as well be an infinite distance between you and those other familial relationships that are almost entirely hidden from you. You pretend to have access to insights when you don’t for the purpose of delivering insults. Think about that.
The irony is you are the one who is always making the claim that others are not keeping reason within its proper bounds.
Bruh?? What’s up with that shit??
https://youtu.be/p2cQSPRTdhg
“You pretend to have access to insights when you don’t for the purpose of delivering insults. Think about that.“
It’s a violation grounded in a violation. An evil giving birth to an evil. Dogs returning to their own vomit. Help me out EOS :)
Point is you have some Intellectual and spiritual things you really need to reflect on. I guess studying trolling is a start….Let is know if there is anything we can do to help you on your journey.
FF— for the very last time— being suspicious of reason dies not mean one doesn’t employ it. It just means one doesn’t have confidence in it.
In general, moral certainty or any certainty should be vigorously questioned. There is a lot in philosophy about both the fallibility of human perception of reason and the value of discernment. That’s where I fall. I think many of the people here demonstrate the human tendency to logical fallacies as exacerbated by strict belief systems.
Here Lies Jean Henry
“She blossomed after a few people people were removed”
RIP
“She almost always used her real name”
If nobody finds those posts funny. I apologize for going way too far.
My opinions about people and their personal relationships are very clearly subjective. I know many people who enjoy the company of people I find intolerable. So many women… im just expressing how happy I am not to be them. As a wise older woman told me once, there’s almost no man so screwed up that some woman won’t take him on. It’s part of our social conditioning. More and more women are figuring out what a trap that is. More and more women stay single their whole lives. More and more women get single as older women and stay single. Unmarried women live longer and express greater life satisfaction. (Married men live longer than unmarried men.) I’m not opposed to marriage at all. I just think the whole system needs to get reworked before it works better. Thank goodness for queer people. They are the only hope I hold out for the institution of marriage.
Jean,
Reading comprehension please. I know you ab-use reason. That was central to my main point. Read. Comprehend.
I apologize for the epitaph ideas. Poor taste.
Get it together, Jean. You are a mega disaster.
Tomorrow is a new day!
Fools believe they have a right to any opinion. You certainly have a right to your foolishness.
It is generous of Jean to use her real name here (sometimes). So the warning is out there for folks who might encounter her in real life.
FF believes comprehension is only demonstrated by agreeing with him.
I think Lynne has also pointed up this fatal flaw in his ‘reasoning.’
IRobert— I’m thrilled that you would be intimidated to engage me IRL. Being a bitch has useful editing functions.
Yeah, that’s it, Jean. Everybody is “intimidated” by you.
I heard the story of how you “intimidated” HW when he came in to Jefferson Market. We also all watched as you “intimidated” your friend Mark here on this blog.
Re-read Jean. Your responses indicate you are confused.