If you want to set up an account at The Telegraph in the UK, they apparently have a comparison of the Trump administration's fake video of Acosta and real footage of what happened.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/1 ... o-experts/
The Telegraph asked a video verification expert to analyse the footage, who said it appeared to have been manipulated - you can watch our side-by-side comparison and analysis of the two videos below.
The AP's video expert also concluded that the editing was deliberate:
https://www.apnews.com/c575bd1cc3b1456cb3057ef670c7fe2a
...a frame-by-frame comparison with an Associated Press video of the same incident shows that the one tweeted by Sanders appears to have been altered to speed up Acosta’s arm movement as he touches the intern’s arm, according to Abba Shapiro, an independent video producer who examined the footage at AP’s request.
...It’s also unlikely the differences could be explained by technical glitches or by video compression — a reduction in a video’s size to enable it to play more smoothly on some sites — because the slowing of the video and the acceleration that followed are “too precise to be an accident,” said Shapiro, who trains instructors to use video editing software.
Also, some news agencies are reporting that the fake video originally came from InfoWars, the far right conspiracy site of Alex Jones. So our government representatives are apparently promoting fake propaganda from a site that everyone knows is completely nutty and not to be believed.
http://www.duluthnewstribune.com/news/g ... punishment
The edited video looks authentic: Acosta appeared to swiftly chop down on the arm of an aide as he held onto a microphone while questioning President Donald Trump. But in the original video, Acosta's arm appears to move only as a response to a tussle for the microphone. His statement, "Pardon me, ma'am," is not included in the video Sanders shared.
Critics said that video - which sped up the movement of Acosta's arms in a way that dramatically changed the journalist's response - was deceptively edited to score political points. That edited video was first shared by Paul Joseph Watson, known for his conspiracy-theory videos on the far-right website Infowars.
...A frame-by-frame breakdown by Storyful, a social-media intelligence firm that verifies media content, found that the edited video included repeated frames that did not appear in the original footage.
So who's going to believe anything put out by Trump's minister of propaganda from now on? Because Trump and Ms Sanders have not apologized or retracted the video, and news that the video had been edited has been widespread since yesterday.
Despite their last minute nature, hundreds of people joined protests in various cities to protect the special counsel's investigation.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/mueller-pr ... 018-11-08/
Protests have sprung up across the country Thursday night calling for the protection of special counsel Robert Mueller's probe into possible collusion between President Trump's campaign and Russia. Several hundred had gathered in New York's Times Square and other places like Washington, D.C., Boston, Chicago, North Carolina, Tennessee and Philadelphia.
In New York, demonstrators could be heard chanting "Hands off Mueller" and "Nobody is above the law" as they marched downtown
Including some protests only covered in local news:
https://www.star-telegram.com/news/loca ... 85680.html
About 200 people gathered at Burnett Park in downtown Fort Worth Thursday evening to protest the firing of Attorney General Jeff Sessions and to demand the Mueller investigation into the Trump campaign be protected.
...Protesters chanted, “Whose above the law? No one’s above the law!” as cars passed by at 5 p.m. along Burnett Street. Some cars honked in support.
Someone pointed out on a messageboard that we may never know what Whitaker is doing behind the scenes. Supposedly, he has to sign off on Mueller's indictments and subpeonas.
So now we have a guy who Fox's legal expert (and others) say was not appointed in accordance with the law, refusing to recuse himself despite obvious conflicts of interest, and a clear Trump partisan who may have been appointed as Session's Chief of Staff to be Trump's "eyes and ears" in the Justice Dept...
If Trump gets away with this, we might as well call ourselves Russia.
EDIT
https://thehill.com/policy/national-sec ... sting-urge
Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee are calling for an emergency hearing after Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced he was resigning at President Trump's request on Wednesday.
House Judiciary Democrats are demanding answers for Sessions's ousting in letters written to the panel's GOP chairman and Sessions's replacement, Acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker, respectively.
...In their letter to Whitaker, the Democrats warned that a "constitutional crisis" could ensue if the Mueller probe is not protected, urging the new top cop to recuse himself and place Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein back in the supervisory role for the probe.
“There is little doubt that President Trump’s decision to force the firing of Attorney General Sessions places Special Counsel Mueller’s inquiry at grave risk,” Democrats' letter to Whitaker reads.
If the Republicans had any integrity left at all, this would be a bipartisan call.
And Trump has released a proclamation about immigrants claiming asylum. No, that term is not a mistake - The Hill calls it a proclamation.
https://thehill.com/homenews/administra ... ing-asylum
President Trump on Friday said he has signed a proclamation restricting certain immigrants from claiming asylum, completing a controversial move that is expected to trigger a wave of legal challenges.
...The White House has not yet released text of the proclamation and it remains unclear who exactly would be covered.
This follows new rules yesterday that prohibit people from claiming asylum unless they enter the US at an official entry site:
Under new Justice Department and Department of Homeland Security rules published Thursday, immigrants who illegally cross the U.S. southern border from Mexico would be barred from claiming asylum. All asylum claims must be made at a legal port of entry.
Which, I think, will mean 2 things. 1) The Trump administration will probably refuse to process more than a few claims a day at entry sites and/or declare that they're not taking asylum claims today (not the first time they've done that). 2) As there's no incentive for people now to turn themselves in after crossing the border illegally, closure of the ports of entry means that
more people will be trying to sneak in. This will result in more work for the border patrol, more clashes, more deaths as migrants try to find unexpected routes. And fewer people who are processed officially, entering through normal asylum channels where we know about them and can either approve or deny their asylum claims. In other words, more damn chaos and less rule of law. And more excuses for Trump to waste money sending the military to the border.
Edit: Trump's proclamation has now been clarified at the link above. It's the policy that was rolled out yesterday. It goes counter to the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965, which says immigrants within the U.S. can make an asylum claim, no matter how they entered. Trump is using a provision that
might let him deny entry based on national security concerns. The legality of this move in unclear, but when did Trump ever let that stop him?
Oh, and not one word about the propaganda video from the asshole now flying off to France to enjoy a military spectacle and parade.
But he did defend Whitaker, claim he "doesn't know him" despite appointing him, and claim that the legal experts who say Whitaker is not qualified to be be appointed are wrong. He also mentioned that he might like Chris Christie as the permanent AG. The crook responsible for Bridgegate.
https://thehill.com/homenews/administra ... ssia-probe
I hope the French welcome Dear Leader as he truly deserves.
Oh, and one last present from Sessions to Trump, before he left:
https://thehill.com/homenews/administra ... nt-decrees
Former Attorney General Jeff Sessions, in one of his final acts as the nation’s top cop, curtailed the ability of law enforcement officials to use court-enforced agreements to create change within local police departments accused of civil rights violations.
I suspect Trump didn't like this nearly as much:
https://thehill.com/policy/energy-envir ... l-pipeline
A federal judge blocked the controversial Keystone XL oil pipeline Thursday, saying the Trump administration’s justification for approving it last year was incomplete.
In a major victory for environmentalists and indigenous rights groups, Judge Brian Morris of the District Court for the District of Montana overturned President Trump’s permit for the Canada-to-Texas pipeline, which the president signed shortly after taking office last year.
Morris’s ruling repeatedly faulted the Trump administration for reversing then-President Obama’s 2015 denial of the pipeline permit without proper explanation. He said the State Department “simply discarded” climate change concerns related to the project.
btw, Trump is unhappy his chosen ones might not win in Florida:
https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4 ... count-grow
"
If you look at Broward County, they have had a horrible history," President Trump told reporters at the White House on Friday. "And if you look at the person, in this case a woman, involved, she has had a horrible history, and all of the sudden they’re finding votes out of nowhere and Rick Scott, who won, you know it was close, who won by a comfortable margin, every couple of hours it goes down by a little bit.”
“Bad things are going on in Broward Country, really bad things. We’ve been to court, had a lot of drama. We won. I say this: We easily won. But every hour it seems to be going down. I think that people have to look at it very, very cautiously," he also said.
He also noted that there “could be” a federal role if a recount became necessary.
Florida is in the midst of potential recounts in the Senate race between Sen. Bill Nelson (D) and Gov. Rick Scott (R), as well as the gubernatorial race between Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum (D) and former Rep. Ron DeSantis (R).
And yet some Americans continue to support Trump. It boggles your mind, what version of reality those people inhabit.
Edit 2:
Predictable:
https://thehill.com/homenews/administra ... ct-mueller
Jeff Flake(y) doesn’t want to protect the Non-Senate confirmed Special Counsel, he wants to protect his future after being unelectable in Arizona for the “crime” of doing a terrible job! A weak and ineffective guy!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 9, 2018
...Flake, on Thursday, said he and Sen. Christopher Coons (D-Del.) would go to the Senate floor next week to try to get a deal on advancing the legislation.
The Senate Judiciary Committee last year passed a bill to protect Mueller — or any other special counsel — in the event he is fired, but that legislation stalled amid opposition from GOP leadership. Any new legislation would likely meet the same fate with the Republicans’ expanded majority in the upper chamber.
Edit 3:
And if you can't win them, cast doubts on the legitimacy of the elections. In addition to Florida, Trump is claiming that the Arizona elections were corrupt:
https://thehill.com/homenews/administra ... in-arizona
President Trump criticized the vote count effort in Arizona’s tight Senate race, where Democratic Rep. Kyrsten Sinema has taken a narrow lead over Republican Rep. Martha McSally with half a million votes yet to be counted.
“Just out — in Arizona, SIGNATURES DON’T MATCH. Electoral corruption - Call for a new Election? We must protect our Democracy!” Trump tweeted, offering no evidence for his claim regarding signatures.
And right on cue, the worst Trump partisans and Trump bots are starting threads on political messageboards implying that Republican candidates will only lose these close elections if there's fraud.
Susan Collins shows ethical behavior on Whitaker and backs efforts to protect Mueller:
https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/416 ... estigation
Another prominent Republican who hasn't signed on to the idiocy of Trump:
https://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing ... nt-caravan
Ohio Gov. John Kasich (R) took aim at his fellow Republicans on Friday, accusing them of "fear mongering" about a caravan of migrants bound for a U.S. port of entry and abandoning discussions of the topic following Tuesday's midterm elections.
..."A week before the election all voters heard about was the #caravaninvasion," Kasich wrote Friday. "Now, all that fear mongering has seemed to cara-vanished."
And more Whitaker news. Apparently, that FBI investigation is still active. :
https://thehill.com/homenews/administra ... nvolved-in Rather interesting to have the interim Attorney General as a possible target of an FBI investigation... which he now has authority over.
Seriously, what a bunch of crooks in the Trump administration.