We must get the notes of the Helsinki Translator

[tomhagen]

[Crutchez_CuiBono]

1. If putin was able to record it...

so were we. The intel services have recording microphones so small you wouldn't believe. AND ways of recording that don't require a "tape recorder" per say. The people who need to know, DO. However, the people who need to know seem to be strangely quiet and that's cause for concern. ESPECIALLY when we have heads of "security Depts" like Nielson who seems to be in dts pocket. At the end of the day, her boss and "good buddy" is John Kelly. that's how she got the job. ICE is part of Homeland Security created during wartime, DHS should all be abolished now bc it's redundant, and was ever since 911. That's what countries do during war, ramp up. But then, after the war, they ramp down. It enlarged govt by 17% when it was created. (ALMOST 1/5th increase in govt...by folks who say small govt is their goal....uh huh.) Those funds (that we ay in taxes) would pay for a lot of healthcare and infrastructure imho. Good people overall, but redundant when it was created, and moreso now.
Ramping down never happened bc they had 340 million of us scared of a few 1000 (supposedly)ever morphing "terrorists".
We have a new enemy, and it isn't a muslim w a burhka as they have used for 2 decades.

[mr_lebowski]

2. Skeptical there even really were any, think it's a front to make it seem like meeting couldn't have

been THAT secret if two others who could report on it ... were let in ...

It also conveys to the public a sense he and Putin couldn't be talking on the phone.

There's a number of vids on the internet of Putin giving speeches in English, some of them quite long.

And given that the Russian alphabet and ours are totally different, it's not like he could read it from a prompter w/o reading our language ... not like how i could give a speech in Spanish without really knowing Spanish cause its the same alphabet (save 3 letters I think)? Be more like one of us trying to give a speech in chinese using a prompter.

[Crutchez_CuiBono]

3. putin knows English very well.

The translators have been interviewed or are already security assets to begin with. The security services of the country have been at this for 75 years. Unlike the average American...thinking ahead proactively...is very much part of their SOP.

[mr_lebowski]

4. So why, if he does, did they need translators? At most I think they could've got away with having

one 'handy' just in case they get 'stuck' where they can't understand each other, but they wouldn't need any 'there the whole time'.

I think it may be they may be putting one over on the world with this 'two translator story' for the reasons I mentioned above.

They for SURE could've still had some completely private 'time' w/o them present, and spoken w/each other fine.

[Crutchez_CuiBono]

6. Maybe its bc

they WERE the microphones themselves or the machines they used were rigged?
I totally agree with what you say.

[enough]

5. And why in the world would we trust a Trump-picked translator to be truthful about it.

She might or might not be truthful, but how would we ever know?

[Crutchez_CuiBono]

7. Gov translators come from a pool generally.

I didnt get the impression dt has one he drags around w him, but, ive been wrong before. RUSSIAN translators area special breed for a reason. Thankfully. For all of us. dt thinks hes brilliant.
The room itself was probably wired by MANY countries wayyyyy before they even got there.

[PoorMonger]

8. I dunno

About the idea that anybody on our side knows what was said. Coats sure didn’t give that impression this week — and he would be someone who absolutely should get that intel.

Someone, maybe McFaul , was saying that the notes would be in the translators personal system of shorthand which can be hard for others to figure even if they get a copy. But still, another person, either Isikoff or Corn, brought up that it would be helpful and totally within normal process for the senate or congress or both , to call for hearings with Pompeo, Coats & Mattis ( all people who should be read in by now on specifics and ask them what they know of the content. Even if they know nothing it would be useful, and daming for Trump if they publicly have to admit he is hiding it. I would demand such hearings before even entertaining the idea of a follow up in the White House

[smirkymonkey]

9. Why was this "private" meeting ever allowed at all?

Has anything like this ever been done before? An incompetent, compromised president who is being accused of conspiring with a hostile foreign power requests a completely private meeting with said foreign power and nobody bats an eye at it? Am I missing something? How can he keep saying "no collusion" when it is clear that is exactly what is going on here?

I don't get it. What was the rationale behind allowing this "secret" meeting - without other state officials or diplomats - in the first place?