Senator Al Franken in his very systematic manner ultimately slapped down the attempt by many on the right to conflate the Russia Scandal with any actions in Hillary Clinton’s campaign.
Democrats many times allow false stories to get legs and then morph into reality for some. Al Franken is the antidote to that failure.
Now that all hell has broken loose as it is now clear that Donald Trump Jr. and the Trump campaign have definitely colluded with Russian agents, Right Wing rags are attempting to recycle stories that implied the Clinton campaign was doing the same thing.
Many are referring to a misleading Politico article titled “Ukranian efforts to sabotage Trump backfire” that in no way was collusion with a foreign government.
Donald Trump wasn’t the only presidential candidate whose campaign was boosted by officials of a former Soviet bloc country. Ukrainian government officials tried to help Hillary Clinton and undermine Trump by publicly questioning his fitness for office. They also disseminated documents implicating a top Trump aide in corruption and suggested they were investigating the matter, only to back away after the election. And they helped Clinton’s allies research damaging information on Trump and his advisers, a Politico investigation found.
A Ukrainian-American operative who was consulting for the Democratic National Committee met with top officials in the Ukrainian Embassy in Washington in an effort to expose ties between Trump, top campaign aide Paul Manafort and Russia, according to people with direct knowledge of the situation. The Ukrainian efforts had an impact in the race, helping to force Manafort’s resignation and advancing the narrative that Trump’s campaign was deeply connected to Ukraine’s foe to the east, Russia. But they were far less concerted or centrally directed than Russia’s alleged hacking and dissemination of Democratic emails. Russia’s effort was personally directed by Russian President Vladimir Putin, involved the country’s military and foreign intelligence services, according to U.S. intelligence officials.
I won’t link to the rags with this narrative as we must not elevate their rankings in any manner. I’ve been concerned that Democrats just do not know how to fight in these new times. They are fighting the Obamacare war all wrong IMHO as I explained in my article titled “Even as Trumpcare Senate vote delayed Democratic leadership blowing it.” And that is why it was refreshing watching Al Franken deconstruct the false equivalence about the Russia Scandal.
Al Franken broke their narrative without even raising his voice
Earlier Senator Graham referenced the Politico article in the Christopher Wray FBI nominee hearings. It led Wray to imply that the FBI under him would investigate that as well.
Franken did not allow that nugget to hang out there unanswered for long.
“I don’t know about the article, the January Politico article, that suggested that someone in the Ukraine wanted to pass some information off to the Clinton campaign,” Senator Franken said. “But I think I know the answer to this. I think you know the answer to the question. Did the Ukraine — Ukraine, rather — hack the RNC’s database? Did they hack Kellyanne Conway? Did the Clintons want to build a hotel in Kiev?”
With those simple lines, he illustrated how preposterous the false equivalence was. Progressives must leave no claim unanswered. It borders on the dereliction of duty to their constituents.