Oh what a tangled web we weave

[Markk]

I have stayed in my opinion the”family” as in his sister, his brother James, and Hunter…for the most part. And I will include Archer and Joe in that.

You state “

So lets try to understand…

You state “ . For me, I'm interested in whether there is sufficient evidence to draw a conclusion that Joe Biden acted corruptly. Because, if there is good evidence of corruption, then it's a legitimate issue of concern. And if it is not, then what occurred during the run up the 2020 election is simply a political smear job.”…

Okay, then let’s go through it, there is a lot to go through.

Res, this a a discussion forum, it is not a court of law, not is not binding…if I am right or if you are right either way the world will not come crashing down.

I have made my mind up, in my opinion they are dirty…but equally you have made your mind they are not…so lets go through all the data, and we might find things that support my opinions and things that lend to yours…that is all I am asking.

I don’t know what relationship Archer (rosamond Seneca partners (RSP) ) had with Burisma before the two men were hired…if you know you can lay it out and I will listen, and opine. I do know however that RSP was founded by Hunter, Archer, and Chris Heinz, Hienz being the then SoS John Kerry’s step son. Right or wrong, they received money from Burisma, which has ties to Russia and is owed by a Oligarch who is by every account I have read, deeply corrupt. And that all three men at the time had personal relationships with both VP Biden, and SoS Kerry, and that both Kerry and JB were deeply involved in the Ukraine.

So without any of this being right or wrong, guilty or not guilty, is this all true? If it is true lets move on, and if it is not true lets discuss what is not true about what I wrote.

I'm not treating it as a court of law. But knowing how courts think about evidence is a good resource because they have grappled with the question of what is and is not evidence with respect to claims for hundreds of years. It would make no sense to discard hundreds of years of experience simply because this isn't a court. Not only that, the concepts that lie behind the standard rules of evidence are based on good reasoning, which is exactly what we're doing here. So, when I am talking about concepts, they aren't concepts that should apply only in a court. It's because the represent sound reasoning that everyone should use, including courts.

Now for all your accusations about straw men, which you've never explained, you've introduced an actual straw man. It's this: "I have made my mind up, in my opinion they are dirty…but equally you have made your mind they are not." A straw man is a false representation of someone else's claim or argument. I absolutely do not have my mind made up that the Bidens are not "dirty." In fact, in my view, labeling a person clean or dirty, honest or dishonest, corrupt or not corrupt is a red herring that has no relevance to figuring out what actually happened in a series of complicated events over time. Why? Because placing a simplistic label on a person and then defining them entirely by the label is 100% fallacious. People have almost unlimited motivations whose actions cannot be reduced a single purpose. Honest people lie and dishonest people tell the truth. Clean people do dirty things and dirty people do clean things. People who play by the rules do corrupt things and corrupt people do things that are entire on the up and up. It is a simple mistake in basic reasoning to think you can define people by a label or two and then accurately predict what they will do or have done in the past based on the label.

Let's take just one example. You've labeled MZ "corrupt" and then use the label to decide what his motivations are in making certain decisions. But you've never stopped to think seriously about what MZ's motivations were when he started hiring members for a Burisma. You just assume that his primary motive was to engaged in additional acts of corruption. But you never even think about MZ's actual situation at the time. Corruption was rampant in Ukraine. He was an insider with the previous government, but not with the current government. There was considerable international pressure including from the U.S., on the new government to reduce corruption. He was being threatened with criminal prosecution for corruption. In the actual context, is he thinking "hey, let's use this new guy I know little about and his friend, who I know nothing about other than that he's Joe Biden's son, to set up a corrupt deal with Joe Biden, who is one of the very people stressing anti-corruption corruption efforts, so that I can even get even more money?" Or is he thinking more like "Holy crap. These guys are going to take Burisma away from me. How can I keep that from happening?" The guy may be corrupt, but there's no evidence that he's an idiot. He's already set up to have his meal ticket taken away. Why in the world would he expect Joe Biden to say "sure -- pay my son an inflated salary and I'll steer some sweet, sweet US greenbacks your way" as opposed to using the attempt as evidence of his corruption and having the full force of the U.S. government coming down on him as the poster child of Ukrainian corruption?

That's why your cherry picking of a few events and implying that they are evidence of corruption makes no sense. He's got an obvious interest at the point, keeping his company. If he loses the company, it doesn't matter how much money Burisma gets -- he won't see a cent of it.

All of this is why I'm unwilling to "move on" to your next talking point. Even though you talk about context, you're not really considering context. You're only considering a set of curated facts without taking into consideration the larger context.

A straw-man argument, at least according to my understanding is when a person presents as their argument a obstacle or misnomer that redirect the original argument of, in this case, mine.

I am trying to paint a picture and show you a series of events and facts, when put together paint the picture I Amy trying to convey. A very small part of that picture, is that Archer met with Biden at the White House after he received money from Burisma, and before Biden file to the Ukraine. There are certainly sub stories to this like Biden is the VP and leads the delegation for aid to the Ukraine including aid for Natural Gas, and Burisma is a leader in that industry…bit in general your straw-man is that because we don’t know what happened at the meeting of the two, or three, which ever way you want to look at it, my assertion are false. That is a classic straw-man argument.

This is th e first hit I got for a google “definition of a straw-man argument”… “A straw man fallacy occurs when someone takes another person’s argument or point, distorts it or exaggerates it in some kind of extreme way, and then attacks the extreme distortion, as if that is really the claim the first person is making.”. https://owl.excelsior.edu/argument-and- ... straw-man/

You started this thread, as a straw-man, not addressing my argument but to attack Peter Schweizer…thus in your mind null and voiding my original point.

Let's take just one example. You've labeled MZ "corrupt" and then use the label to decide what his motivations are in making certain decisions. But you've never stopped to think seriously about what MZ's motivations were when he started hiring members for a Burisma. You just assume that his primary motive was to engaged in additional acts of corruption. But you never even think about MZ's actual situation at the time. Corruption was rampant in Ukraine. He was an insider with the previous government, but not with the current government. There was considerable international pressure including from the U.S., on the new government to reduce corruption. He was being threatened with criminal prosecution for corruption. In the actual context, is he thinking "hey, let's use this new guy I know little about and his friend, who I know nothing about other than that he's Joe Biden's son, to set up a corrupt deal with Joe Biden, who is one of the very people stressing anti-corruption corruption efforts, so that I can even get even more money?" Or is he thinking more like "Holy crap. These guys are going to take Burisma away from me. How can I keep that from happening?" The guy may be corrupt, but there's no evidence that he's an idiot. He's already set up to have his meal ticket taken away. Why in the world would he expect Joe Biden to say "sure -- pay my son an inflated salary and I'll steer some sweet, sweet US greenbacks your way" as opposed to using the attempt as evidence of his corruption and having the full force of the U.S. government coming down on him as the poster child of Ukrainian corruption?

MZ is a thug, a murderer, a thief, and many other things. He is tied to Russia in a very big way. He is a wanted man. These are just cold hard facts. I have no idea what you are trying to fabricate here. Do you know for instance Hunter set up a ex Obama DOJ lawyer to help defend MZ? And we all know that Joe had one of the prosecutors fired…these are just facts. You are just making stuff up that have no factual basis and a bunch of if and buts. We do know factually, Hunter worked for and was paid millions by this thug…millions, while his father was VP. This is just fact, no straw-man, no bias, nor made up narrative, just fact.

I’’l let you retract that paragraph and we can move on, or you can double down and I’ll ask you present any factual evidence to it’s validity.

So right or wrong this is just the way it is.

[Markk]

Thanks for the more complete story about the trial.

You're welcome. The facts are extremely complex, and I don't think any typical juror had a prayer of really understanding what was going on. That's true in lots of cases, though. The legal aspects of what occurred afterwards are also pretty technical.

I think two of the board members cut a deal with the government and testified against the three who went to trial. Without insider witnesses, the government could not have made its case.

After the jury found all three guilty (I don't know whether they were all tried on the same charges), all three filed a motion essentially finding them not guilty because the evidence presented at trial was not sufficient for a reasonable jury to have found them guilty. In considering that motion, the judge must construe all evidence in favor of the government and accept reasonable inferences from the evidence in the government's favor. The judge denied all three motions.

But Archer also filed a motion for a new trial, which is a different legal animal. Under previous opinions issued by the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, which is the appellate court that sets precedent for that trial court, the judge could make a less deferential, more independent review of the evidence to make sure that serious injustice wasn't being done.

The facts involved in the case against Archer weren't generally disputed. The whole scheme to defraud the tribes was concocted by Galinis. He planned, executed, and concealed the fraud to the point that no one else knew he was doing it. The scheme didn't come to light at all until Galinis was arrested for an entire different matter. At that point, one of the other board members uncovered the fraud. Three of them planned and executed a cover up of the scheme, which involved creating a new company and back dating the documents to do so. Except that it's undisputed that Archer was never told what had been discovered. And part of the reason for the elaborate cover up was to avoid Archer finding out about the fraud.

Galini ran a con on the tribe. He also conned the board members. But when three of them discovered the con, they simply tried to cover it up rather than inform the tribe and the authorities. Archer, on the other hand, was treated throughout the venture as an outsider. Outside of his presence, the others referred to him as a "whale investor" and a "trick pony." Just as Archer traded on the name and reputation of Joe Biden and John Kerry, the others were trading on Archer's name and connections.

The con on the tribe was just a pieces of an otherwise legitimate business strategy called a "roll up." As I understand it, the purpose of a roll up is to create a holding company that acquires a number of other companies, or partial ownership of companies, resulting in a valuable set of companies that can be operated at a profit or a holding company that can be sold to other investors for big bucks. It's called a roll up, because the holding company uses each acquisition as some kind of financial leverage to buy the next one. And the people trying to execute the roll up try to look for synergies within the acquisitions that would make the combination more profitable. But it's risky, with the main risk being running out of liquidity or other things that can be leveraged before assembling a portfolio of companies that are profitable as a whole. So it all has to happen pretty quickly. If it doesn't, it just falls apart. The other risk is that finding and taking advantage of synergies is fraught with potential conflicts of interest. The holding company can't just screw over one company to benefit the other.

So, what the case involved was five or six guys out working their contacts, doing research, trying to find good targets for acquisition, figuring out how to acquire, etc. So the process is hectic and chaotic. And to a large extent, the investors involved have to trust each other to know what they are doing and to generally play by the rules. That creates a good environment for a con.

When it came to Archer, the main question whether he "knowingly and willingly" participated in the fraud on the tribe. The actual fraud was Galinis' representation that most of the proceeds from the bond sale would be invested in an independently managed annuity. Instead, the funds went into an account for a fake business with a name similar to the entity that was suppose to purchase and manage the annuity. The account was set up and controlled by Galinis. Some of it was siphoned off by Galinis. The rest was used to purchase much of a second bond issue. And most of that was used to purchase much of the third bond issue. Basically, the tribe was selling bonds to itself, which generates a huge amount of debt to repay without generating anything that would allow the debt to be paid off.

Unlike the other defendants, there was no direct evidence that Archer had knowledge of the fact that the tribe was being defrauded. Even the government's witnesses admitted that they hadn't known about the scheme until Galinis was arrested. And all of the witnesses admitted that, even after they discovered the scam, no one told Archer about it. In fact, they took steps to actively conceal the scheme from Archer.

So, the government's case against Archer consisted almost entirely of documents, some of which it didn't use any witnesses to explain or provide context. The argument was, essentially, that Archer had touched the bond issue enough that he must have known about the fraud. It also took very aggressive positions on what was meant in certain e-mails, despite the lack of any testimony. The biggest weakness in Archer's case is that he was quite willing to cut corners and lie when he thought the consequences didn't matter. For example, when Galinis asked if his purchase of a condo could be done through one of Archer's accounts, he said yes. The purchaser would get the money; Galinis would just get privacy. And Galinis was very private when came to the vast extent of his wealth (which, of course, was not vast at all). So, Archer did misrepresent facts on a few occasions that would have been harmless, if the bond sales had not been a scam. Because it was, they hurt his case.

Archer's defense was that he wasn't in on the con; he was one of the conned. The jury sided with the government and found him guilty. The trial judge reviewed the evidence carefully and concluded that there was a risk that an injustice had been done to Archer based on the complexity of the case and the nature of the evidence on which Archer's conviction was based.

The government appealed. The Court of Appeals reversed. It "clarified" it's opinion in one of the cases the trial judge had relied on, resulting in a standard that was more deferential to the jury. It also determined that the evidence was sufficient to meet the "clarified" standard. (I'm using scare quotes because the line between clarifying and changing is extremely thin.)

The judge gave Archer a significantly shorter jail term than the other defendants. I'd have to double check, but I think one year was a mandatory minimum.

CFR to what you just wrote in that context…here is the DoJ press release… https://www.swfinstitute.org/news/91791 ... ioux-tribe

[Res Ipsa]

What you’re describing is not the strawman fallacy. The strawman fallacy consists of misrepresenting the other person’s position (building the strawman) and then attacking the made up exaggeration and not the other person’s actual position (burning the straw man). You’ve done it a number of times in this thread.

What I did in the OP was in no way a strawman. You made a claim that was almost word for word the same as the statement PS made in his book. And you cited Peter as your source.

I didn’t exaggerate anything about your position or Peter’s. I went to the book, read the statement, and then tracked down the evidence and read it. And I found two important things. First, the log contained no evidence that a meeting had occurred. Nothing in the log said anything about the purpose of the visit or what happened during the visit. PS simply made the meeting part up. And he did it in a way that makes the sequence of events look suspicious.

Second, he failed to disclose that Archer’s seven year old son was with him, which was crystal clear from the log. Including that fact in the description of the visit makes it look less suspicious.

That’s not attacking a straw man. That’s attacking the credibility of what you consider to be a reliable source. I’m just that one example, PS both made stuff up and failed to disclose relevant facts in a highly misleading way. I also showed his strong political bias and how the book fits in a consistent pattern based on past actions.

Nowhere have I claimed that this is evidence that Joe Biden isn’t corrupt. It’s evidence that PS is a highly biased, manipulative author. His book may reference important evidence, but that evidence, to the extent it exists, is found in the footnotes. But we shouldn’t trust PS’s description of the evidence or accept his framing of the story, because he he has shown he cannot be trusted to present a complete version of the relevant evidence. We’d be a fool to take him at his word, just as we’d be a fool not to fact check a Michael Moore film.

Also, I have never taken the position that the two sentences we started with represent the entirety of your case. I understand that there’s more. But you’ve already tried to Gish Gallop several times on me, and I’m going to play that game. You’ve got X number of facts that you think prove your case, most of them not obviously related to each other. But what we need to do is evaluate each piece before seeing whether, together, they tell us anything. Right now, the only thing that connects the dots is your pre-determined opinions that the Bidens are dirty. But you can’t make a valid and persuasive case by assuming the very thing you are trying to prove.

So, no straw man. When you accuse someone of straw manning you, you should be able to identify your actual position and the straw man. Otherwise, claiming straw man when you just don’t like the other guy’s argument is a red herring.

As to your last paragraph, what you describe as facts are not facts at all. They are labels. “MZ left Ukraine when he was under investigation” would be a fact. “MZ is a thug” is not. The label may be fair or accurate, but it not a fact. If one is interested in figuring out what happened, one should not confuse labels with facts.

And now you want to gallop off to some completely different without woodshedding the dozen claims you’ve already made. Not gonna happen — at least not with me. I’m going to woodshed each and every claim you make to test just how valid it is. I’m not going to accept at face value “here are 53 scattered facts that are literally true, case closed, fortnite dance. (Intentional exaggeration for effect) I’m going do my best to make sure we are looking at an accurate, complete set of facts before I draw any ultimate conclusions.

Finally, why in the world would I retract that paragraph. You’ve claimed to know MZ’s motive in taking certain actions. But that’s just an assertion. It’s really just WAG unless you’ve got his secret diary or have developed telepathy. I’ve described a different motive that is just as fact based as your own. Not only that, I think my WAG for motive makes much more sense than yours. Do you think asset forfeiture as a consequence of a criminal conviction isn’t a real thing? Here in the US, we do it even when there is no criminal conviction.

I don’t know what MK’s actual motives were and either do you. But I think my guess is at least as good as yours. Absent additional evidence, I see no reason to retract my guess while leaving yours on the table.

[Res Ipsa]

You're welcome. The facts are extremely complex, and I don't think any typical juror had a prayer of really understanding what was going on. That's true in lots of cases, though. The legal aspects of what occurred afterwards are also pretty technical.

I think two of the board members cut a deal with the government and testified against the three who went to trial. Without insider witnesses, the government could not have made its case.

After the jury found all three guilty (I don't know whether they were all tried on the same charges), all three filed a motion essentially finding them not guilty because the evidence presented at trial was not sufficient for a reasonable jury to have found them guilty. In considering that motion, the judge must construe all evidence in favor of the government and accept reasonable inferences from the evidence in the government's favor. The judge denied all three motions.

But Archer also filed a motion for a new trial, which is a different legal animal. Under previous opinions issued by the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, which is the appellate court that sets precedent for that trial court, the judge could make a less deferential, more independent review of the evidence to make sure that serious injustice wasn't being done.

The facts involved in the case against Archer weren't generally disputed. The whole scheme to defraud the tribes was concocted by Galinis. He planned, executed, and concealed the fraud to the point that no one else knew he was doing it. The scheme didn't come to light at all until Galinis was arrested for an entire different matter. At that point, one of the other board members uncovered the fraud. Three of them planned and executed a cover up of the scheme, which involved creating a new company and back dating the documents to do so. Except that it's undisputed that Archer was never told what had been discovered. And part of the reason for the elaborate cover up was to avoid Archer finding out about the fraud.

Galinis ran a con on the tribe. He also conned the board members. But when three of them discovered the con, they simply tried to cover it up rather than inform the tribe and the authorities. Archer, on the other hand, was treated throughout the venture as an outsider. Outside of his presence, the others referred to him as a "whale investor" and a "trick pony." Just as Archer traded on the name and reputation of Joe Biden and John Kerry, the others were trading on Archer's name and connections.

The con on the tribe was just a pieces of an otherwise legitimate business strategy called a "roll up." As I understand it, the purpose of a roll up is to create a holding company that acquires a number of other companies, or partial ownership of companies, resulting in a valuable set of companies that can be operated at a profit or a holding company that can be sold to other investors for big bucks. It's called a roll up, because the holding company uses each acquisition as some kind of financial leverage to buy the next one. And the people trying to execute the roll up try to look for synergies within the acquisitions that would make the combination more profitable. But it's risky, with the main risk being running out of liquidity or other things that can be leveraged before assembling a portfolio of companies that are profitable as a whole. So it all has to happen pretty quickly. If it doesn't, it just falls apart. The other risk is that finding and taking advantage of synergies is fraught with potential conflicts of interest. The holding company can't just screw over one company to benefit the other.

So, what the case involved was five or six guys out working their contacts, doing research, trying to find good targets for acquisition, figuring out how to acquire, etc. So the process is hectic and chaotic. And to a large extent, the investors involved have to trust each other to know what they are doing and to generally play by the rules. That creates a good environment for a con.

When it came to Archer, the main question whether he "knowingly and willingly" participated in the fraud on the tribe. The actual fraud was Galinis' representation that most of the proceeds from the bond sale would be invested in an independently managed annuity. Instead, the funds went into an account for a fake business with a name similar to the entity that was suppose to purchase and manage the annuity. The account was set up and controlled by Galinis. Some of it was siphoned off by Galinis. The rest was used to purchase much of a second bond issue. And most of that was used to purchase much of the third bond issue. Basically, the tribe was selling bonds to itself, which generates a huge amount of debt to repay without generating anything that would allow the debt to be paid off.

Unlike the other defendants, there was no direct evidence that Archer had knowledge of the fact that the tribe was being defrauded. Even the government's witnesses admitted that they hadn't known about the scheme until Galinis was arrested. And all of the witnesses admitted that, even after they discovered the scam, no one told Archer about it. In fact, they took steps to actively conceal the scheme from Archer.

So, the government's case against Archer consisted almost entirely of documents, some of which it didn't use any witnesses to explain or provide context. The argument was, essentially, that Archer had touched the bond issue enough that he must have known about the fraud. It also took very aggressive positions on what was meant in certain e-mails, despite the lack of any testimony. The biggest weakness in Archer's case is that he was quite willing to cut corners and lie when he thought the consequences didn't matter. For example, when Galinis asked if his purchase of a condo could be done through one of Archer's accounts, he said yes. The purchaser would get the money; Galinis would just get privacy. And Galinis was very private when came to the vast extent of his wealth (which, of course, was not vast at all). So, Archer did misrepresent facts on a few occasions that would have been harmless, if the bond sales had not been a scam. Because it was, they hurt his case.

Archer's defense was that he wasn't in on the con; he was one of the conned. The jury sided with the government and found him guilty. The trial judge reviewed the evidence carefully and concluded that there was a risk that an injustice had been done to Archer based on the complexity of the case and the nature of the evidence on which Archer's conviction was based.

The government appealed. The Court of Appeals reversed. It "clarified" it's opinion in one of the cases the trial judge had relied on, resulting in a standard that was more deferential to the jury. It also determined that the evidence was sufficient to meet the "clarified" standard. (I'm using scare quotes because the line between clarifying and changing is extremely thin.)

The judge gave Archer a significantly shorter jail term than the other defendants. I'd have to double check, but I think one year was a mandatory minimum.

CFR to what you just wrote in that context…here is the DoJ press release… https://www.swfinstitute.org/news/91791 ... ioux-tribe

LOL! The DOJ Press release describes the government’s view of the case. The trial judge carefully reviewed the evidence and rejected the government’s view of the case. I read both the judge’s opinion and the opinion of the 2nd Circuit that reversed her. Together, they give a comprehensive picture of the evidence on which the conviction was based. Based solely on the evidence, if I had been a juror, I would have a hard time with the notion that the government had proved, beyond a reasonable doubt, that Archer knew that Galanis was defrauding the tribe. On the other hand, it is crystal clear that Galanis created the scheme and executed the scheme in a manner that hid what he was actually doing from the entire board. I hope he got the maximum sentence allowable.

If you want a link to the opinions, I’d be happy to provide one. But I said lots of stuff in that Post. If you will identify particular points that you think I got wrong, I’d be happy to give you a more specific reference.

Now, I said a whole lot of things in that post. In general, they are based on the two published opinions.

[Markk]

CFR to what you just wrote in that context…here is the DoJ press release… https://www.swfinstitute.org/news/91791 ... ioux-tribe

LOL! The DOJ Press release describes the government’s view of the case. The trial judge carefully reviewed the evidence and rejected the government’s view of the case. I read both the judge’s opinion and the opinion of the 2nd Circuit that reversed her. Together, they give a comprehensive picture of the evidence on which the conviction was based. Based solely on the evidence, if I had been a juror, I would have a hard time with the notion that the government had proved, beyond a reasonable doubt, that Archer knew that Galanis was defrauding the tribe. On the other hand, it is crystal clear that Galanis created the scheme and executed the scheme in a manner that hid what he was actually doing from the entire board. I hope he got the maximum sentence allowable.

If you want a link to the opinions, I’d be happy to provide one. But I said lots of stuff in that Post. If you will identify particular points that you think I got wrong, I’d be happy to give you a more specific reference.

Now, I said a whole lot of things in that post. In general, they are based on the two published opinions.

Okay…CFR for your the two opinions you read, and I’ll get review…

[Markk]

Res wrote…What you’re describing is not the strawman fallacy. The strawman fallacy consists of misrepresenting the other person’s position (building the strawman) and then attacking the made up exaggeration and not the other person’s actual position (burning the straw man). You’ve done it a number of times in this thread.

Again look at your OP, it is a classic straw-man. your intent, even if unintentional as I believe, was to skirt around my assertions, by attacking PS and his character. Read the OP, and your second post which is clear. All I said is that I first read it in a PS book and then cross referenced. Then you attacked PS as being a smear merchant.

But we have made headway, however slowly, and facts and timelines are being established so that is positive.

If I presented a Straw-man, which we all do at times, point it out and I will take a look at it.

Thanks

[Res Ipsa]

Res wrote…What you’re describing is not the strawman fallacy. The strawman fallacy consists of misrepresenting the other person’s position (building the strawman) and then attacking the made up exaggeration and not the other person’s actual position (burning the straw man). You’ve done it a number of times in this thread.

Again look at your OP, it is a classic straw-man. your intent, even if unintentional as I believe, was to skirt around my assertions, by attacking PS and his character. Read the OP, and your second post which is clear. All I said is that I first read it in a PS book and then cross referenced. Then you attacked PS as being a smear merchant.

But we have made headway, however slowly, and facts and timelines are being established so that is positive.

If I presented a Straw-man, which we all do at times, point it out and I will take a look at it.

Thanks

I addressed your assertions head on. The claim that Archer “had a meeting” was made up and the claim that Archer made a “private visit” was misleading because omitted the fact that his seven year old son went with him.

You cited PS as your source, and I also argued that your source was not reliable. In no way, shape, or form is that a straw man. I addressed exactly the claim you made and the reliability of the source you cited. You may not like the fact that I attacked the credibility of a source you trusted, but that has nothing to do with the straw man fallacy.

[Markk]

Again look at your OP, it is a classic straw-man. your intent, even if unintentional as I believe, was to skirt around my assertions, by attacking PS and his character. Read the OP, and your second post which is clear. All I said is that I first read it in a PS book and then cross referenced. Then you attacked PS as being a smear merchant.

But we have made headway, however slowly, and facts and timelines are being established so that is positive.

If I presented a Straw-man, which we all do at times, point it out and I will take a look at it.

Thanks

I addressed your assertions head on. The claim that Archer “had a meeting” was made up and the claim that Archer made a “private visit” was misleading because omitted the fact that his seven year old son went with him.

You cited PS as your source, and I also argued that your source was not reliable. In no way, shape, or form is that a straw man. I addressed exactly the claim you made and the reliability of the source you cited. You may not like the fact that I attacked the credibility of a source you trusted, but that has nothing to do with the straw man fallacy.

I disagree.

Moving forward…please provide me with the links you based your opinions on about Archers Trial, I want to make sure we are reading the same material. Also can I access the old board archives?

[Res Ipsa]

Trial judge's opinion granting Archer's motion for new trial: https://www.leagle.com/decision/infdco20181116d38

Court of Appeals opinion reversing trial judge and reinstating verdict: https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/ap ... 10-07.html

The old posts are available, but the search function is wonky. Canpakes, Marcus, and Jersey have figured out how to find stuff, but I haven't wrapped my brain around it yet.

[Markk]

Trial judge's opinion granting Archer's motion for new trial: https://www.leagle.com/decision/infdco20181116d38

Court of Appeals opinion reversing trial judge and reinstating verdict: https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/ap ... 10-07.html

The old posts are available, but the search function is wonky. Canpakes, Marcus, and Jersey have figured out how to find stuff, but I haven't wrapped my brain around it yet.

Thanks, a lot of information (an under statement )

My first question, agreeing with the Governments conclusion…if indeed Archer was hood winked by Galanis, and He believed the bonds were indeed legit, why did he lie to the banks as to where the money came from, and state that the monies can from real estate investments from his LLC? in my opinion, that is evidence enough to imply guilt in regards to his knowledge that the money was ‘dirty.’

There are also e-mails from Cooney to Archer that might imply to move the money around to avoid scrutiny.

In the end the jury made their decision, and the trial judge over stepped her bounds based on case law, and did not show enough to evoke article 33.

From a practical point of view, I find it really hard to believe that a person like Archer would be so naïve as to not understand where these millions of dollars are coming from. If that is true why the heck would Burisma, Kerry or anyone else give this guy employment. If we get into it at some point, Rosemond was a multi billion dollar investment firm doing business all over the world, and in my opinion in this case, a BS’er can’t BS another BS’er.

The bottom line is justice was served, and Archer lied and more. His defense that he was used and also a victim along with the NA tribe, was only bought by one person, the trial judge. Archer is a convicted felon and going to prison. Reading here opinion one can clearly see bias in her decision, at least in my opinion…and in full transparency she is a Obama appointee while the appeal just is a Bush/Trump appointee…so like always this is spun into all this.