Kremlingate part 2

https://thehill.com/policy/national-security/438576-thousands-of-russian-accounts-targeted-sanders-voters-to-help-elect

VIPS Fault Mueller Probe, Criticize Refusal to Interview Assange

https://consortiumnews.com/2019/04/16/vips-fault-mueller-probe-criticize...

"...There remains, however, a huge fly in the ointment. Barr's summary makes it clear that Mueller accepts as a given - an evidence-impoverished given - that the Russian government interfered on two tracks..."

CIA Deputy Director Lies To the President of the United States, Showing him Fake Photographs Alleged To Be From The British Government of Ducks and Children Poisoned By A Russian Spy Operation in Salisbury on March 4, 2018 - And the New York Times Refuses To Correct Its Record.

http://johnhelmer.net/cia-deputy-director-lies-to-the-president-of-the-u...

ICM par excellence! The New York Times: Lying Liars Lying Again and Again. 

From Barr's press conference this morning:

"Consistent with long-standing Executive Branch practice, the decision whether to assert Executive privilege over any portion of the report rested with the President of the United States.  Because the White House voluntarily cooperated with the Special Counsel’s investigation, significant portions of the report contain material over which the President could have asserted privilege.  And he would have been well within his rights to do so.  Following my March 29th letter, the Office of the White House Counsel requested the opportunity to review the redacted version of the report in order to advise the President on the potential invocation of privilege, which is consistent with long-standing practice.  Following that review, the President confirmed that, in the interests of transparency and full disclosure to the American people, he would not assert privilege over the Special Counsel’s report.  Accordingly, the public report I am releasing today contains redactions only for the four categories that I previously outlined, and no material has been redacted based on executive privilege.

In addition, earlier this week, the President’s personal counsel requested and were given the opportunity to read a final version of the redacted report before it was publicly released.  That request was consistent with the practice followed under the Ethics in Government Act, which permitted individuals named in a report prepared by an Independent Counsel the opportunity to read the report before publication.  The President’s personal lawyers were not permitted to make, and did not request, any redactions."

Mobo:   Hopefully the above will reduce the upcoming pundit class chatter about unfair redactions and obstruction.  

I don't see how this sad squishy end to Russiagate is is anything but a disaster for the Democratic Party and non-Fox MSM in the US.   I think it's undeniable Trump will benefit, his chance to get re-elected is greatly increased, and his fake news narrative reinforced.   An entirely self made disaster.    I'm glad it's over, and hopefully US progressives within and outside the Democratic Party will return their focus to more important issues.

The Mueller report clearly states that attempts by President Trump to obstruct the investigation failed because others refused to “carry out orders or accede to his requests.”

From the report: “Comey did not end the investigation of Flynn, which ultimately resulted in Flynn’s prosecution and conviction for lying to the FBI. McGahn did not tell the Acting Attorney General that the special counsel must be removed, but was instead prepared to resign over the President’s order. Lewandowski and Dearborn did not deliver the President ‘s message to Sessions that he should confine the Russia investigation to future election meddling only. And McGahn refused to recede from his recollections about events surrounding the President’s direction to have the special counsel removed, despite the President’s multiple demands that he do so.”

https://politicalwire.com/2019/04/18/trump-aides-refused-to-carry-out-his-orders/

Mobo2000 wrote:

Mobo:   Hopefully the above will reduce the upcoming pundit class chatter about unfair redactions and obstruction.  

I don't see how this sad squishy end to Russiagate is is anything but a disaster for the Democratic Party and non-Fox MSM in the US.   I think it's undeniable Trump will benefit, his chance to get re-elected is greatly increased, and his fake news narrative reinforced.   An entirely self made disaster.    I'm glad it's over, and hopefully US progressives within and outside the Democratic Party will return their focus to more important issues.

In Barr, Trump has finally found his Roy Cohn, so desired for so long. Barr wrote an unsolicited 19 page memo to the DOJ last summer outlining why he was convinced that a President could not conceivably commit obstruction of justice, whatever the fact situation may be. Everything he says must be considered as politically motivated garbage. The redacted report has just been released, and already the highly misleading nature of Barr's version is being pointed out.

As for the political fallout, I think you may be mistaken. According to this article, a recent poll shows that 60% of Americans still belive that Trump obstructed justice. Also, "The poll shows that even with the Mueller probe complete, 53% say Congress should continue to investigate Trump's ties with Russia, while 45% say Congress should not. A similar percentage, 53%, say Congress should take steps to impeach Trump if he is found to have obstructed justice, even if he did not have inappropriate contacts with Russia."

Finally, the Democrats' successful midterm election strategy did not involve harping on Russia. It was all about other issues. Bernie Sanders and all of the other major Democratic presidential contenders have so far concentrated almost entirely on issues other than Russian collusion, or Trump's behaviour in general. I think you need to give some examples of important Democrats other than the likes of John Podesta and Neera Tanden going crazy over Russiagate in the last year.

Michael:   Sure Barr is a Trump toady and puppet, but I've never seen Russiagate as having anything to do with a fair and impartial application of American law.   I'm speaking more to public perception.   The poll you linked says : "The poll shows 35% of Americans think that Trump did something illegal related to Russia — largely unchanged since the earlier poll. An additional 34% think he's done something unethical."      This would include lying about taxes or shady real estate deals.  But the MSM narrative was that Trump was a russia asset and/or traitor and on this, the report exonerates him and the press are walking it back or changing the subject.   Americans can't help but notice this.

Also bear in mind the Trump counteroffensive on this is just beginning.   I agree that the Dems have pivoted away from Russiagate in their campaigning, and that's telling, isn't it?   It shows its not a political winner.   I wished they realized that 2 years ago.   But Trump will not pivot away from it, he will launch investigations into the investigation, and he now has considerable power and moral authority to make changes at and issue new orders to the intelligence agencies.   BTW I consider it entirely gag inducing to write a sentence containing both "moral authority" and "Trump", but here we are.

Josh:   Would you put your own thoughts on the table a bit on this?   I'm not looking for a fight or to "rub it in", I'm  curious because I have agreed with and/or respected your take on many other issues here.   Is there a possible end senario that may still come out of this that we could take as a positive for progressives in the US?   Do you still think impeachment for obstruction of justice is remotely possible?   Or something else that would be an improvement?

OK thanks.   I think that does remain a possibility, I suspect it's likelihood is dependent more on how successfully Trump advances the interests of American empire than what the investigations reveal.   If he remains in power for another term and is successful at it, I think all will be forgotten or forgiven.  

"As predicted, Mueller employs suggested wording to suggest 'links' and 'ties' between Trump and Russia, while acknowledging there is no evidence to actually allege anything concrete."

https://twitter.com/aaronjmate/status/1118906950736121856

josh wrote:

Impeachment should be a possibility.  If the Democrats in the House leadership weren't cowards.  At least they can start an investigation into whether there should be impeachment.  That took 6 months or so during Watergate.  But the meat in the coconut is the financial investigations.  Like Al Capone, that's what will get Trump in the end.  But that may not come to fruition until after the election.  So, politically, it may not matter.

I think that impeachment chances have been based on an understanding of the old saying that when you shoot at the king you have to kill or be killed.

An unsuccessful impeachment will actualy lead to increased chances of re-election.

On top of this, the Democrats know how they want to run against trump. Running against Pence or someone else means a whole new campaign.

Earlier on there was a better argument for impeachment. Now it is very poor -- it is risky and would take up significant time and the election is only a year and a half away.

Impeachment increases the chances that the Democrats will lose -- even if you believe that it may increase marginally chances that the Trump won't be the President and another Republican can take his place.

Why go there?

NDPP wrote:

"As predicted, Mueller employs suggested wording to suggest 'links' and 'ties' between Trump and Russia, while acknowledging there is no evidence to actually allege anything concrete."

https://twitter.com/aaronjmate/status/1118906950736121856

 

While concluding that the Russian government stole the emails and gave them to Wikileaks as part of a plan to defeat Clinton and elect Trump.

https://mobile.twitter.com/JYSexton/status/1118917585825935363

Here is an article on Slate which makes the case that the report was intentionally written as a roadmap for impeachment on the grounds of obstruction of justice. Lots of specific excerpts that seem pretty convincing, at least to me.

josh wrote:

Sean in Ottawa wrote:

josh wrote:

Impeachment should be a possibility.  If the Democrats in the House leadership weren't cowards.  At least they can start an investigation into whether there should be impeachment.  That took 6 months or so during Watergate.  But the meat in the coconut is the financial investigations.  Like Al Capone, that's what will get Trump in the end.  But that may not come to fruition until after the election.  So, politically, it may not matter.

I think that impeachment chances have been based on an understanding of the old saying that when you shoot at the king you have to kill or be killed.

An unsuccessful impeachment will actualy lead to increased chances of re-election.

On top of this, the Democrats know how they want to run against trump. Running against Pence or someone else means a whole new campaign.

Earlier on there was a better argument for impeachment. Now it is very poor -- it is risky and would take up significant time and the election is only a year and a half away.

Impeachment increases the chances that the Democrats will lose -- even if you believe that it may increase marginally chances that the Trump won't be the President and another Republican can take his place.

Why go there?

Might sound quaint and old fashioned, but to uphold the rule of law.  And to deter future presidents from engaging in attempts at obstruction of justice.  At least the House judiciary committee should spend time investigating whether to impeach.  From what I’ve seen, there is more than enough evidence in the report to move to impeach.  But it ultimately is a political decision.

As for, you only get one chance, that is true with respect to the particular facts at issue.  But if a whole new set of new facts, such as financial fraud and misfeasance are unearthed, there is no reason why the same president cannot be impeached again.

This is not about a legal failure or anything like double jeapardy. This is a political process and if you run at it and fail you will make some believe he is an innocent victim of a political witchhunt and make it more likely that he will win.

In the present case, I think it is better just to assemble the best political response for the election. It is a bit late for an impeachment proceeding to make any sense. And that said its chances are poor given the Senate.

Michael Moriarity wrote:

Here is an article on Slate which makes the case that the report was intentionally written as a roadmap for impeachment on the grounds of obstruction of justice. Lots of specific excerpts that seem pretty convincing, at least to me.

https://theintercept.com/2019/04/18/dear-democrats-mueller-just-handed-you-a-roadmap-for-impeachment-follow-it/

Josh didn't provide a description of the Intercept piece he linked a couple of posts up, but it is a humdinger. Mehdi Hasan writes an open letter to House Democrats about why the report compels them to at least hold impeachment hearings over obstruction of justice. Read the whole thing, but this is the conclusion:

Mehdi Hasan wrote:

Your leader in the House, Speaker Nancy Pelosi, said last month — prior to the publication of the Mueller report — that she believes impeaching Trump is “just not worth it.” Sorry, what? If a president who has repeatedly and brazenly misled the American people; welcomed the interference of a foreign government in the U.S. election process while also trying to benefit from it; obstructed justice on multiple occasions in order to try and cover it all up; and also — lest we forget! — praised neo-Nazis as “very fine people,” is not “worth” impeaching, then … which president is? When will it ever be “worth” it?

And what, then, is the point of Article II, Section 4 of the Constitution? If you’re not willing to remove this president from office, in the wake of this damning report, you might as well remove the impeachment clause from the Constitution. If not Trump, who?

According to the special counsel’s report, Trump’s response to Mueller’s appointment in May 2017 was to exclaim, “Oh my God. This is terrible. This is the end of my Presidency. I’m fucked.”

Well, House Democrats, the truth is that he isn’t “fucked” until you do your job.

WikiLeaks Calls For Unredacted Mueller Report

https://on.rt.com/9sl7

"WikiLeaks have always been confident that this investigation would vindicate our groundbreaking publishing of the 2016 materials, which it has. We disapprove of the large redactions which permit conspiracy theories to abound. Full transparency please!" The report did make clear that WikiLeaks' publishing supposedly hacked materials 'would not be criminal unless the publisher also participated' in the hacking conspiracy..."

If the objective is getting Trump out of the White House, Nate Silver's drip, drip, drip suggestion/comments are worth a read in the following article:

Is The Mueller Report A BFD?

Welcome to a special, extra edition of FiveThirtyEight’s weekly politics chat. The transcript below has been lightly edited.

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/is-the-mueller-report-a-bfd/

 The worthiness should be more than obvious despite its publication in advance of the redacted Mueller release. But of course to ascertain that you'll have to actually read/listen. As well insufficient knowledge of background and/or implications seems an important and obvious deficiency on this and other issues here. In any case here's something current by Glenn Greenwald well worth hearing...

Glenn Greenwald on Mueller Report (and vid)

https://twitter.com/democracynow/status/1119218360712081409

"Pulitzer-prize winning journalist Glenn Greenwald says the investigation by Robert Mueller fails to prove what much of the media claimed about the Trump campaign's connections to Russia."

Shepard Smith Delivered the Best Burn I Heard All Day

But for Fox News, it was a controlled burn.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/04/shepard-smith-fox-news-mueller-report.html

Ha! Ha!

Sen. Mitt Romney said Friday that he was “sickened” by President Donald Trump’s actions described in special counsel Robert Mueller’s report.

In a statement, the Utah Republican said that while it was “good news” there was not enough evidence to bring criminal charges related to conspiring with Russia and that there was no conclusion of obstruction of justice, he blasted the White House and Trump campaign officials for their actions. The report, released Thursday, demonstrated repeated efforts by Trump to interfere with Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.

“I am sickened at the extent and pervasiveness of dishonesty and misdirection by individuals in the highest office of the land, including the President,” Romney said. “I am also appalled that, among other things fellow citizens working in a campaign for president welcomed help from Russia.”

Romney blasted members of the Trump campaign for not informing law enforcement about Russia’s actions and went after former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort for “actively promoting Russian interests in the Ukraine."

“Reading the report is a sobering revelation of how far we have strayed from the aspirations and principles of the founders,” Romney said.

https://www.politico.com/story/2019/04/19/romney-sickened-mueller-report-1283543

Primary opponent:  Trump is a one man crime wave.

https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/439789-gop-primary-challenger-trump-is-a-one-man-crime-wave

'Worst Moment For US Media Since Iraq Invasion' - Chris Hedges

https://youtu.be/ElAfzUl3oRQ

"Pulitzer prize-winner and host of 'On Contact', Chris Hedges joins Rick Sanchez to discuss the conclusion of the Mueller probe and media reaction to the long awaited Mueller Report."

Why Russiagate Will Never Go Away

https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/04/19/why-russiagate-will-never-go-away/

"Russiagate has been a godsend for those who profit from destruction. The biggest threat to free and fair elections in the US is American oligarchs followed by Israel..."

On Contact: Russiagate & Mueller Report w/ Aaron Mate

https://youtu.be/odEnNBlOJdk

"Chris Hedges discusses with The Nation reporter Aaron Mate how despite the categorical statement in Robert Mueller's report that Donald Trump and his campaign did not collude with Russia, the conspiracy theories by the nation's mainstream media show little sign of diminishing."

Untrue and that's why the Dems wouldn't permit the FBI to examine their servers. You're so stupified by all that msm propaganda you consume that you seem to have forgotten that the NSA has absolutely everything on everything. The reason they didn't offer up anything in support is that there isn't anything chump. Trump can be brought down on a myriad of issues but 'Russiagate' isn't one of them. 

NDPP wrote:

Untrue and that's why the Dems wouldn't permit the FBI to examine their servers. You're so stupified by all that msm propaganda you consume that you seem to have forgotten that the NSA has absolutely everything on everything. The reason they didn't offer up anything in support is that there isn't anything chump. Trump can be brought down on a myriad of issues but 'Russiagate' isn't one of them. 

You quote approvingly Mueller’s conclusion as to no collusion.  But call Mueller’s conclusion as to Russian hacking untrue.  If anyone’s following propaganda it’s you.  Not to mention being a hypocrite.