How do you know Trump's in bad trouble about the documents?

Because he won't talk about them, that's why. Trump's silences are often more important than the bluster that's coming out of his mouth. That's almost always hot air, intended to obfuscate and confuse.

What he very specifically isn't talking about is what exactly he had...and what he was doing with it. Not a peep about either. That's distinctly telling.

If whatever Trump was in possession of wasn't incredibly incriminating and dangerous and wasn't going to freak everybody out, he'd be screaming at the top of his lungs about that. Airing his dirty laundry in public and then letting Fox News and the conservative media launder it for him for his base is his signature move. But he isn't. If he really just wanted whatever he was holding as trophies or souvenirs or for some innocuous ego purpose for some odd reason, he'd be screaming and yelling about that too. But he isn't doing that either.

Instead what Trump has insisted is that as president he could declassify anything with the wave of a hand - with the emphasis on "anything"...and the inference is, by extension he as Private Citizen Trump could then do whatever he wanted with them.

What that suggests is that what Trump was in possession of was really incendiary stuff indeed, and that what he was doing with that stuff was even worse, and there is one motherhuge bomb going to drop at some near point there. Because has it been mentioned about a million times an all-out FBI raid was a strong move? Because it was a strong move. If they whiffed on it it's arguably the biggest institutional failure in FBI history. But Merrick Garland is an ex-judge...and a careful, careful dude.

A red-flag indicator there's big troubles under the rug? After an initial hub-bub, GOP heavies are all quietly backing away from Trump now on the Hill. His defenders are purely in the conservative media at the moment, or they work directly for Trump. Everybody else is getting distance.

Just a thought.

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Q - It may seem like I'm a Trump apologist on this nuclear

Aug 29, 2022, 9:42 PM

documentation leak but I'm really not. I just have a lot of experience with TS-SCI stuff (including the nuclear stuff). The controls placed on nuclear device documents are unlike any other in the US Government (even for TS-SCI). If there were a set of those missing for 19 months in Trump's basement then it is more than just Trump's head that should roll. Truthfully, knowing exactly the nuclear documents for which a President typically keeps close, I can see no world in which nuclear schematics would be among them. I know you have a deep seated distrust of Trump and don't put anything past the man but the level of nuclear documents a President must keep up with is way above the nuts and bolts level that you mention and let's face it - Trump has the attention span of a two year old and wouldn't bother with that level of documentation even if he could understand what he was looking at.

I would also caution you not to get to caught up in the medias hype about TS-SCI (Top Secret - Special Compartmented Information). Just about every TS program/document is further defined into an SCI sub-category. The fact that something is TS-SCI doesn't necessarily mean the information is any more special than any other TS document. I've been read on and off to more TS-SCI programs than I can recall as that is just normal for TS information. The reason the US Government does things this way is to limit access to programs and documents so that only folks with the proper clearance AND a need to know can access the information and program. For instance, even though I had a TS clearance for most of my career, when I was involved in Central/Latin American operations I did not have access to TS documents dealing with European operations since it was not in my theater. When we had some folks temporarily assigned to USSOUTHCOM from NORTHCOM during the Haiti Earthquake relief operations, we had to "read them on" to some of our USSOUTHCOM TS-SCI programs while working in our AO and once they went back to NORTHCOM they were "read off" of our TS-SCI programs. This happens all the time in the TS classified world...

Also - realize that not everything with a TS-SCI marking is really some State secret of world shattering importance. I routinely had to participate in what amounted to radio communications checks between certain commo nodes in the USA where the date/time schedule of the radio checks themselves were classified TS-SCI - not exactly the type of stuff that is a threat to national security. Just be aware that there are way more things classified under the TS-SCI umbrella than most people realize with a lot of it being rather mundane/routine stuff (such as those commo checks) and even public knowledge. Unfortunately, there are a lot of things that don't need to be TS-SCI but are put into those buckets by the bad habit our Government has of over-classifying things. My biggest gripe with the whole classification system when I was in the Army was that it tends to unnecessarily over-classify things on a routine basis (Senator Patrick Moynihan wrote the book "Secrecy: The American Experience" about this bad Government habit). It unnecessarily makes things a pain in the ### to deal with especially when the same info that is highly classified can be found in public newspapers.

The fact is - we simply don't know what Trump had squirreled away at Mar-a-Lago. It is very possible he had TS-SCI stuff in his possession for which it was totally appropriate (all former Presidents retain their security clearances and have these documents to write their memoirs, put in Presidential libraries etc...). It is also possible Trump had things that were totally inappropriate - we just don't know.

Typically, because former Presidents are afforded Secret Service protections and are expected to still have access to classified information, they have approved storage facilities made available to them - usually a SCIF in their residence. I know George Bush had/has one and suspect Barrack Obama does as well. There is a 2019 The Palm Beach Post article that talks about Trump's SCIF at his Mar-a-Lago residence when he was President. I know many in the media are breathlessly reporting "no SCIF" at Mar-a-Lago but that reporting does not pass the common sense test as Trump hosted many staff/NSA meetings at Mar-a-Lago when he was President and was stated to have done so in a SCIF at Mar-a-Lago.

Furthermore, the documents may have had TS-SCI markings but as I covered in another thread - Trump had the declassification authority as President and may have declassified these documents prior to leaving office - regardless of the markings. We simply don't know what is true at this point and I would caution anyone who thinks that something that was marked TS-SCI automatically means it was a document not within Trump's purview to have.

The unknowns in this whole thing are just too great right now but after seeing how the DOJ, intel community, and media ran wild with the Russian collusion garbage, I am admittedly skeptical of any reporting based on unnamed "sources". But to make things interesting I will offer my wild take as to what stuff I think Trump was hoarding that the DOJ really wanted. I believe he had personal copies of all the Crossfire Hurricane documents that he declassified the last full day of his Presidency and that the DOJ summarily refused to release to the public. I'm betting there was a lot of unflattering stuff reflecting badly on numerous 3 letter agencies and they wanted to get it out of Trump's hands to keep it from ever being seen by the public. It wouldn't be the first time the bureaucracy classified embarrassing information to deny the public's right to know.

Once we know the facts I'll gladly remove my foil hat and join the real world but I'm more confident in Trump having previously classified Crossfire Hurricane documents in his possession than any nuclear documents of consequence.

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yep. if its declassified, then lets hear what it contained***

Re: yep. if its declassified, then lets hear what it contained***

Catch 22 to borrow and old phrase

Re: How do you know Trump's in bad trouble about the documents?

Do you know how u know someone has TDS?

keep digging. got your musket at the ready for the war?***

Re: keep digging. got your musket at the ready for the war?***

Re: keep digging. got your musket at the ready for the war?***

Nevermind that this is actually a huge story...

You don't.***

“If you’re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?” - DJT

Re: How do you know Trump's in bad trouble about the documents?

i don't even know what to think at this point

Re: i don't even know what to think at this point

Re: i don't even know what to think at this point

We can "what if" it until the cows come home, and while I

it sounds easier to share nuke codes

Re: it sounds easier to share nuke codes

Re: it sounds easier to share nuke codes

i hear yeah

Guys - for the most part I've avoided the whole Trump

thanks for the insight

Re: Guys - for the most part I've avoided the whole Trump

Q - It may seem like I'm a Trump apologist on this nuclear

Re: Q - It may seem like I'm a Trump apologist on this nuclear

Re: Q - It may seem like I'm a Trump apologist on this nuclear

well, Trump was almost black to that community, until he ran

Re: i don't even know what to think at this point

some documents been released?

You got him this time for real. He will be in prison.

Because the DOJ admitted he was right

Re: How do you know Trump's in bad trouble about the documents?

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