It’s Wednesday, December 6th, 2017…and here’s The Gouge!
First up, writing at NRO, in light of the Flynn plea, Andy McCarthy offers his expert opinion that whatever the Mueller investigation was intended to be…
“The smoke is clearing from an explosive Mueller investigation weekend of charges, chattering, and tweets. Before the next aftershock, it might be helpful to make three points about where things stand.
In ascending order of importance, they are:
1.) There is a great deal of misinformation in the commentariat about how prosecutors build cases.
2.) For all practical purposes, the collusion probe is over. While the “counterintelligence” cover will continue to be exploited so that no jurisdictional limits are placed on Special Counsel Robert Mueller, this is now an obstruction investigation.
3.) That means it is, as it has always been, an impeachment investigation…
…Assuming I am correct about Mueller’s theory, its fatal flaw as a vehicle for prosecution is the same as it has always been: As president, Trump had incontestable power to exercise prosecutorial discretion and to fire the FBI director.
Because of more ill-advised tweeting this weekend, there is now a suggestion that when Trump fired Flynn in February — and when he allegedly asked Comey to let the Flynn investigation go — he knew that Flynn had lied to the FBI. There are factual disputes here: The tweet was apparently written by a Trump lawyer, not Trump himself; Trump apparently denies knowing Flynn had lied to the FBI (just that he had lied to Vice President Pence); and Trump continues to deny former FBI director James Comey’s sworn testimony that Trump pressured him to drop the Flynn investigation.
For argument’s sake, let’s assume the worst: Trump knew Flynn had lied to the FBI (i.e., that Flynn had committed at least one felony), and he leaned on Comey to close the FBI’s probe. Even with those assumptions, there is still no obstruction case.
The FBI and the Justice Department are not a separate branch of government; they are subordinates of the president delegated to exercise his power, not their own. Even on Comey’s account, Trump did not order him to shut down the Flynn investigation, even though he could have. Trump could have ordered an end of the Russia counterintelligence investigation, but he did not. He could have pardoned Flynn, which would effectively have ended the FBI’s criminal investigation — beyond any possibility of review. We can stipulate that these would have been sleazy things to do, potentially damaging to national security, and still grasp that the president had the undeniable power to do them.
Similarly, the president had undeniable power to fire the FBI director. You can argue that his reason was corrupt, but the truth is that he didn’t need a reason at all — he could have done it because it was Tuesday and he felt like firing someone; he could have done it because he figured that the Justice Department’s criticism of Comey’s handling of the Clinton emails investigation gave him the political cover he needed to dispense with a subordinate he found nettlesome. The point is that even if the president hoped that cashiering Comey would derail an investigation he was addled by, it was wholly in Trump’s discretion to fire the director. Moreover, firing the director did not derail the Russia investigation; it has proceeded apace under the director whom Trump appointed to replace Comey.
The president may not be prosecuted in a criminal judicial proceeding for exercising his discretion, however objectionably, in executive matters over which the courts have no power of review. If Mueller tried to indict him, Trump would have unfettered discretion to fire Mueller and to direct the Justice Department to drop the case.
You may not like that, but that’s the way it is. It is not, however, the end of the matter.
Any powers can be abused. When executive powers are abused, Congress retains the constitutional authority to impeach and remove the president. Obstruction of an FBI investigation may not be realistically prosecutable in court, but there is congressional precedent — in the Nixon and Clinton situations — for obstruction to be a “high crime and misdemeanor” triggering impeachment. Undoubtedly, abuse of the pardon power would also be an impeachable offense, even though it is not reviewable by the courts.
I continue to believe that this is the real danger for President Trump: A report by the special counsel, either through the grand jury or some other vehicle, concluding (a) that the president had obstructed the FBI’s investigation of Flynn and of Trump-campaign collusion with Russia, and (b) recommending that the matter be referred to Congress for consideration of next steps, potentially including impeachment and removal.“
Which means the more the public learns about the incredibly partisan nature of both James Comey’s FBI and Robert Mueller’s team of Trump-hunters, the better it’ll be for Trump.
If this next item from CNN is any indication, were we The Donald, we’d be breathing easier:
“A former top counterintelligence expert at the FBI, now at the center of a political uproar for exchanging private messages that appeared to mock President Donald Trump, changed a key phrase in former FBI Director James Comey’s description of how former secretary of state Hillary Clinton handled classified information, according to US officials familiar with the matter.
Electronic records show Peter Strzok, who led the investigation of Hillary Clinton’s private email server as the No. 2 official in the counterintelligence division, changed Comey’s earlier draft language describing Clinton’s actions as “grossly negligent” to “extremely careless,” the source said.
…The shift from “grossly negligent” to “extremely careless,” which may appear pedestrian at first glance, reflected a decision by the FBI that could have had potentially significant legal implications, as the federal law governing the mishandling of classified material establishes criminal penalties for “gross negligence.”
Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, raised questions over why the change was made after receiving documents from the FBI last month, but the identity of who was behind the edit has not been reported until now…”
Forget about avoiding even the merestappearance of impropriety, these brazen Deep State bureaucrats didn’t even bother to attempt to hide their bias, as The Daily Caller records:
“For nearly four months, Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s office, the Justice Department and the FBI have kept secret the fact that the FBI agent who oversaw the Russia investigation exchanged anti-Trump and pro-Hillary Clinton text messages with an FBI attorney who was also his mistress.
Those messages, the existence of which were revealed in bombshell reports published over the weekend, highlight a pattern of the Mueller team. Many of Mueller’s prosecutors — it has been extensively reported — have made campaign contributions to Clinton and other Democratic political candidates. And a review by The Daily Caller shows that Mueller lawyers involved in the cases against four Trump associates are Democratic donors.
But Peter Strzok’s text messages — which he exchanged with Lisa Page, an FBI lawyer who worked briefly on the Russia investigation — are perhaps the most significant evidence of anti-Trump bias uncovered so far on the Mueller team.
The discovery could also undermine the integrity of Mueller’s expansive investigation. That’s because Strzok is the FBI agent picked in July 2016 to supervise the then-fledgling investigation into possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russian government.
Strzok’s central role in the probe is already raising questions about how and why the collusion investigation was opened in the first place.
Carter Page, a former Trump campaign adviser targeted in the early stages of the investigation, told TheDC on Sunday that he is “curious…whether [Strzok’s] fingerprints” are on a secret surveillance warrant taken out against him in Sept. 2016, just after he left the Trump team…”
This investigation stinks like Harvey Weinstein, Charlie Rose, Al Franken, Mark Halpern, John Conyers and Bill Clinton at low tide.
“A top prosecutor who is now a deputy for Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia probe praised then-acting attorney general Sally Yates after she was fired in January by President Trump for refusing to defend his controversial(Not in the eyes of the Supreme Court!)travel ban.
The email, obtained by Judicial Watch through a federal lawsuit, shows that on the night of Jan. 30, Andrew Weissmann wrote to Yates under the subject line, “I am so proud.” He continued, “And in awe.Thank you so much. All my deepest respects.”
The disclosure follows confirmation that another Mueller investigator, FBI official Peter Strzok, was fired over the summer after allegedly sending anti-Trump texts to an FBI lawyer with whom he was romantically involved. His alleged actions revived concerns about the objectivity of the FBI probes of both Hillary Clinton’s email setup and Russia election meddling.
Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton called the new Weissmann document an “astonishing and disturbing find.” “Andrew Weisman, a key prosecutor on Robert Mueller’s team, praised Obama DOJ holdover Sally Yates after she lawlessly thwarted President Trump,” he said in a statement. “How much more evidence do we need that the Mueller operation has been irredeemably compromised by anti-Trump partisans?”
From where we sit, none whatsoever! Understand what it is we’re in fact dealing with here:
Has the federal bureaucracy always had problems? Most certainly. Has it ever even remotely approached the levels of malevolent partisanship fostered by the Obama Administration?
Under Obama, every department in the entire federal government certainly sold its reputation, if not its soul, in support of this Socialist’s…
…remaking of America. That is, whatever portion they had left after defending Clinton’s sexual depravities in the Oval Office.
Though we’d suggest saying Mueller has a “credibility problem” at this point is like describing the Titanic‘s post-collision condition as “limited saltwater intrusion”. Seriously, one has to have credibility in the first place to have a problem involving same. And the Journal editorial doesn’t even detail Strzok’s damning role in changing the characterization of Hillary’s email crimes from “grossly negligent” to “extremely careless”.
Since a picture’s worth a thousand words, here’s one which sums up Mueller’s entire investigation:
And if it wasn’t obvious before, it’s sure apparent now.
For more on the damage done by the likes Comey, Strzok, Mueller, Yates, Lerner and their fellow travelers in the entrenched Deep State bureaucracy, we offer two more excellent articles from NRO‘s David French…
Both of which beg a comment and a question. First, we’re of the opinion Mueller and Comey were both already corrupted; second, why isn’t Trump reopening a criminal investigation of Hillary’s private email activities?
Next up, writing at Townhall.com, Kurt Schlichter details why, in even the slightest degree…
“Behold another banner week for the heroes of our intrepid mainstream media, that motley collection of pompous and obnoxious incompetents, perverts and – at the risk of repeating myself – liberals. In just the last few days we’ve seen how a major media personality got his network to build him a creepy sex lair in his office and watched as a flat-out lie tanked the stock market – well, not really “tanked,” since the Trump Boom is still booming, though the media is loath to report that fact since prosperity wrecks the official Trumpocalypse narrative. And next week, if (when) the guy the liberal media tried to paint as Judge Jailbait beats the guy the liberal media tried to cover for by not reporting how he thinks abortions are cool up until a kid gets his learner’s permit, the liberal media will take yet another well-deserved failure lap.
The mainstream liberal media is primarily composed of stumblebum leftist jerks who want all the glory and respect due a caste of objective, moral truth-seekers, yet who don’t want to do the hard work of actually being objective or moral or seeking the truth. “I can’t pass, and I can’t tackle, and practice is really a hassle, but I’m wearing a sportsball jersey so I want your adulation and a Super Bowl ring!”
Nah. They think we owe them respect and trust when all they’ve earned is our contempt.
You have Matt Lauer, probably America’s most highly-paid journalist, who “everyone” knew was a skeevy weirdo who’d probably creep out Woody Allen. Well, everyone did know, except us, the media’s audience. Our media overlords didn’t think weneeded to know that little bit of information. Some obscure Texas congressmen sends texts of his ancient junk to a girlfriend and, after he dumps her, she gets mad and puts them up on the web? Oh, that’s news – America must know that vital info. But when the flagship anchor of the flagship show on the flagship broadcast network uses his powers to basically build a sex dungeon in 30 Rock – nope, not news. Shhhhh. Matt’s just bein’ Matt. Move along. Nothing to see here. For gosh sakes, look at how much he hates the NRA!
Remember, to our intrepid media, news is only news if it helps the liberal narrative. If it doesn’t, it’s not news. It’s not anything.It’s un-news. Like the stock market boom. Like wiping out the ISIS caliphate. Like Mueller’s manifest conflicts of interest. Un-news. Remember, half the job of the mainstream media is generating metaphorical tumbleweeds.
And then there’s Brian Ross, the ABC News goof whose 100% false claim about candidate Donald Trump cavorting with Russia gave millions of mouth-foaming anti-Trump weirdos like Bette Midler doppelgänger Joy Behar a collective Muellergasm at the thought that the Flynn plea might not turn into yet another disappointment. And of course it did. Talk about un-news – they were giddy and, as a real journalist demonstrates, the plea means nothing. They were looking for Mueller to convict Donald J. Manson of mass murder and all Mueller’s managed to do was write one of his girls a ticket for double parking outside Sharon Tate’s house.
ABC’s reporting was totally wrong, but they left the lie out there, knowing it was false, for hours. In the meantime, the thought that Trump might be in trouble trashed the market for a while – funny how investors are terrified that Trump might not remain president. Eventually, ABC issued a “correction.” A “correction?” When you are real journalists, you issue a correction when you misreport that Lena Dunham ate fifteen muffins for second breakfast instead of twelve. When you are real journalists, you issue an apology and fire a bunch of people when one of your meat puppets outright lies. (Particularly when said meat puppet has a long history of inaccurate reporting!)
But, of course, the mainstream liberal media hacks are not real journalists. They are transcriptionists for their progressive masters when they aren’t molesting the interns.
And then there’s the Roy Moore thing. The people of Alabama are told by their urban betters that the media’s claims about him were “scrupulously reported” by the Washington Post, as if that conclusory assurance somehow makes its reporting unimpeachable. Gosh, if the people in the Beltway are impressed, then you rural rubes better abandon the West Point graduate you’ve known as kooky but upstanding for decades and elect the socialist. Because, you know, it’s scrupulously reported.
What kind of nut might think a mainstream media outfit would lie about a conservative who is about the take a critical Senate seat? That’s crazy talk. Sure, Fusion GPS (the group of ex-journalists that manufactured and promulgated the fake Trump dossier) had unnamed journalists on its payroll – gosh, the WaPo and the rest of the media sure aren’t curious about who they are – and yes, WikiLeaks revealed journalists working for Democrat campaigns, but it’s super paranoid nutso crazy to think this Moore thing smells fishy. Heck, no one covers the backcountry of Alabama beat better than the Washington Post, certainly not the local Alabama media that has covered Moore for 30 years and never gotten wind of this bombshell through Moore’s multiple elections!How dare you hicks not immediately accept at face value everything the liberal media says!…”
As Jim Geraghty notes at his Morning Jolt:
“…Should all the creeps go? Absolutely, Congress would be a better place without them. But once a party decides that one of their guys should be allowed to stay…
…the other party is not going to enforce its own zero tolerance.
The voters, in Alabama and elsewhere, see this cynical (decidedly one-sided) game, where standards of conduct are used as a partisan tool to knock out the other side’s officeholders.And they shrug and refuse to play, and decide they’re not going to worry about any of the allegations.“
In all seriousness, with what’s come to light in just the last few days regarding the integrity and accuracy of both the federal bureaucracy and the MSM, were you an Alabama voter, would you give a rat’s behind what the talking heads inside Manhattan and the Washington Beltway were telling you?!?
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