I mean, if you knew absolutely nothing else about any of this, wouldn’t the fact that the president of the United Stares has been under FBI investigation for being a Russian agent be the biggest political story in the history of the country?
And the worst part is, there’s really nothing that that contradicts this conclusion. When you think of all the moves Trump has made to advance Russian interests as against those of our own country, it’s not an unreasonable conclusion to reach.
It’s going to make that confirmation hearing with William Barr awfully interesting next week, that’s sure.
JohnT is right. We need to get this guy gone yesterday.
I post about my contempt for Trump precisely so that our future robot overlords can examine the record and see that I am not to blame.
Actually, he is currently under investigation for this. The CI investigation was wrapped into the Mueller probe not long after they were both opened. Remember, Mueller’s mandate is to look into Russia’s attempts to interfere in the 2016 election (note all the indicted Russians), which is as much a counterintelligence issue as it is a criminal one.
In short: The Mueller investigation pretty much started with Trump as a target.
Ben Wittes has a pretty good writeup about this, which some might find worthwhile:
https://www.lawfareblog.com/what-if-obstruction-was-collusion-new-york-timess-latest-bombshell
Here is a preview of what you’re going to miss:
“… and his children.”
Is anyone else starting to think that the Trump family may not be on the level?
Here’s what I’m wondering: Suppose the special counsel finds something that is an absolute national security emergency and must be dealt with immediately. What’s supposed to happen, I guess, is that they give the information to the attorney general and expect that person to discharge his or her constitutional responsibilities.
But if that’s a dead end, like if the AG won’t take action or deliver the report to Congress, what are they supposed to do? Just sit on it and watch while something disastrous happens? Or would the SC be obligated to inform congress themselves?
And should we read anything into the fact that, as far as we know, that hasn’t happened yet? I’m inclined to believe that whatever Mueller has is bad, maybe very bad. But can I be confident that, if it were truly nation-destroyingly bad, we would already know about it by now?
Fortunately, the House can call Mueller in to testify (perhaps publicly) if his report is quashed, altered, or “folded, spindles, or mutilated”.
Not likely to happen over past two years, but very likely with the current House.
US v Nixon settled that. The Executive can’t just claim privilege to cover things up like that.
Also, my understanding — subject, as always, to correction — is that any redactions by the AG must be reported to the relevant Congressional committee(s).
Whether that applies to deep-sixing the report in toto may be a matter for the courts.
And his children.
Ivanka Trump is reportedly under consideration to lead The World Bank
Hey! I could be an NFL quarterback. I’ve watched it on TV!
This is like a very, very bad magic show. Um… the rabbits over there, and that isn’t a hat.
I would endorse the idea of Ivanka as an NFL quarterback.
I don’t understand the idea that he supposedly can’t be indicted. What if he clearly killed Miss Scarlet in the kitchen with the candle stick?
Literally, though what if he dose something so clearly illegal, say attack someone on live TV. What is done?
Must he be impeached before he can be arrested?
(Guessing he would be sent to Bethesda for evaluation)
Jarrad, Junior and Eric can be on the team as well.
I would endorse Gallagher as President over the current cluster. It would be a big step up.
Hell, I’d buy season tickets… but I suspect she wouldn’t make it out of Game 1.
Here’s a pretty good Twitter thread. I don’t know this account, but the analysis seems reasonable, and it was retweeted approvingly by another guy who’s a decently well regarded political analyst.
The guy points out from the NYT article that the FBI doesn’t just spin up CI investigations on a whim, and in this case especially, they only went forward with the inquiry because they had “strong evidence”. They were becoming concerned before the Comey firing. So, completely separate from the obstruction issue, the FBI had enough evidence to take the extraordinary step of initiating a CI inquiry targeting the motherfucking President of the United States. That’s some cheap paperback thriller shit right there.
The CI investigation was rolled up into the Mueller investigation, meaning that (in this guy’s opinion), while we were all fretting about the Mueller investigation being ended, Mueller had the CI investigation up his sleeve. And that investigation would just be taken up by the FBI even if the SC was fired. The obstruction case is secondary to the CI case!
Also, this guy argues that the FBI was doing ongoing surveillance through 2017 and 2018, and sharing everything with Mueller. So, when people would come out of meetings with Mueller all goggle eyed and saying Mueller knows everything, well, Mueller knows everything!
And finally, one of Obama’s last orders before heading out to windsurf in Hawaii was to open up the NSA’s raw Intel databases to the FBI and CIA. Before that, if FBI wanted to get information from the NSA’s creepily large data set, they’d have to submit a request and the NSA would provide filtered results. Now, the FBI can access all those goodies directly.
Mueller never interviewed Kushner and some other players because he didn’t need to, and because he didn’t want to tip anyone off to the CI investigation. And he was probably pretty indifferent to interviewing Trump.
The NSA knows everything. The FBI knows everything. Mueller knows everything.
Mother of god.
If that is the case, then Mueller makes a mistake, and accidently leaves a full, unredacted copy of his report at the Starbucks a block over from the NY Times main office.
Oops.
How long can the Senate go on saying, “We won’t vote on any bills at all until President Known Russian Asset gives the OK, even if it is harming the nation according to Russia’s master plan?” When the report drops and McConnell says, Climate Report style, “I just don’t believe it!”, what then? It seems like there should be consequences for aiding and abetting a known Russian asset, but since it is Congress there is probably some Confederate-era “get away with murder” clause I am not familiar with.
If you’ve been following along over these past 3 years, I think you can safely assume the Special Counsel has found many somethings that are an absolute national security emergency and must be dealt with immediately. Unfortunately, with only Republicans in power and no protection to speak of over the past 2 years, together with 35-40% of the citizenry brainwashed daily by Fox “News” into false beliefs about the “deep state” and other bullshit, the Special Counsel must make sure that the evidence he brings is well timed and rock solid.
I don’t think many people appreciate just how difficult it is to gather evidence when it can only be obtained from abroad. It takes a lot of time. Two years is nothing. Mueller has worked at a breakneck speed, and personally, I am in awe of all he has accomplished in that time. For specific insight into those accomplishments, you need only read his various pleadings that are already in the public record: Indictments, sentencing recommendations, etc. If you want an ongoing report, it’s all there.
In a normal congressional situation, yes! We should already know about what is actually happening by now! So the fact that Republicans in Congress have actively worked to smother transparency into these facts is even more alarming than learning we have a Russian asset at the head of our government. Think about that!
Getting one’s head around the unavoidable conclusion that the conspiracy reaches beyond just the occupant of the Oval Office and his henchmen is truly staggering – but how can we not? Consider that Mitch McConnell has been aware of Trump’s disturbing closeness to Russia for the entire time he has been Leader of the Senate. He was read in on the intelligence even before the 2016 election that concluded “with a high degree of certainty” that Russia was attempting to subvert our election, together with Trump’s coziness with the Russians. Nonetheless, he refused to issue a bipartisan statement with President Obama warning us of these facts, instead saying he would publicly claim that Obama was politicizing the election if Obama made such a statement on his own. My god.
Now think about all that McConnell and other Republicans have done to stymie the investigations: Devin Nunes and his midnight ride to manufacture “evidence” that Obama “wiretapped” Trump Tower; the refusal by Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee to pursue evidence of TrumpCo’s wrongdoing by declining to issue subpoenas or follow up on obviously false witness testimony, etc. The constant efforts at misdirection, pretending that the pursuit of justice is somehow “evidence” of a “deep state”… these are a recap of just a few of the actions taken by a Republican Congress to protect the Russian asset in the White House. And this doesn’t even touch on the Russian tendrils reaching into the NRA, Facebook, Twitter, etc.
So are you sure we would already know it by now if what Mueller has is, as you say, nation-destroyingly bad? My question to you is, how much more do you need to see or learn to understand it’s been nation-destroyingly bad the whole time?
As for what the Special Counsel can do on his own, he has already been doing it. Again, read his pleadings. He is warning us in every way available to him of the dangers, and they should scare the shit out of every person in this country who actually wants to live in a democracy.
Right, but I’m saying that, if there were something really, really bad, like the White House planning to trade the whole nuclear arsenal for the right to build a golf hotel in Moscow or something, and Mueller found out about it, wouldn’t the whole thing have blown up? So the fact that it hasn’t blown up yet might mean that whatever Mueller has, it’s not existentially bad (although it probably is still pretty bad). Or am I thinking about it wrong?