Mueller :
'If we had confidence the President clearly did not commit a crime, we would have said so. We did not,'That was my key takeaway, which was something we already knew. I’m sure if Donald could understand what he was saying, he’d be right pissed.
Sounds like he said that he laid out the evidence without conclusion and Congress (and the American people) have to take it from there.
That’s what subpoenas are for.
Effectively, Mueller said: It’s up to Congress to act and adjudicate whether the president broke the law. If I thought he didn’t commit a crime, I would tell you that—but I think he did.
“the work speaks for itself”? It fucking does not. If it did Trump and Barr wouldn’t have been able to twist the words to mean the complete opposite of what was intended.
Now we have the cure for insomnia. Muller’s speech. Will pass out before two minutes have passed, guaranteed. BO-RING!
It’s one of those newfangled Subpoena Wraps™, only available through the House of Representatives for a limited time only!
Holy shit…That is one person who will do anything to stay above and apart from the political fray. Yes, the report speaks for itself…but unfortunately there are people who are actively denying and lying about what the report says.
I do feel vindicated that the one specific part of the report that he talked about and summarized was the Intro to Volume II where he explained why they weren’t reaching a conclusion on whether the President committed the crime of obstruction. Hopefully, his reiterating of this will make it harder for Trump, Barr, and the other Trump apologists to deny it and pretend that section of the report does not exist…although I am not so optimistic on that score.
This was Mueller:
Two line summary:
Can any of you read?
Nancy, Tag! You’re it!
I think what he said is not that he won’t spoke to Congress, but he doesn’t really see the purpose because he won’t go beyond what was said in the report. However, my point has been that I don’t want Mueller to speak to Congress because I think I will learn stuff beyond what is in the report; I want him to speak to Congress in order to rebut the lies and deceptions about what is in the report. At least he tried to do that in regards to the Intro to Volume II, although I don’t know how much good his short statement on that will do.
This is disappointing but not entirely unexpected. As always, he wants to just stick to the facts and avoid getting himself or the people who worked with him embroiled in partisan politics. even with his statement that the report speaks for itself Congress needs to subpoena him. Even if all he does is read out sections of the report we need him to confirm that he meant what the reports says and that unlike Trump and Barr claim, it is far from a complete exoneration of Trump.
Interesting to see that while the initial headlines in the NYT and CBS are on other things, the Wall Street Journal headline was “Robert Mueller Says Charging Trump With a Crime Wasn’t an Option”.
Yes, this expresses my feelings on it.
Trump Tweet:
Somehow, I don’t think Trump wrote this himself. No CAPS or !!!
Unfortunately, in the world of law and courts and DOJ regulations, there are facts and the truth (the report, Mueller’s statements today). But in the broader (“real”) world, there is framing, perception, spin, the story about the story, and indeed politics. Mueller refuses to play in that world, to the detriment of us all. IMHO, if he had just 1% more plain language framing, then he could eliminate the wave of bullshit that will result from this statements (just like resulted from the report).
And he spelled (and used) “insufficient” correctly.
He refuses to make himself and his staff the point of the spear. I think it is his duty to do so, but it wasn’t his job. He did his job, there it is.
And, so far, the dog has not barked in the nighttime. Where are the tweets claiming that his statement affirms total vindication? He says that if he could have exonerated, he would have, he did not. What he did do was outline ten incidents that would clearly be criminal interference in the absence of contrary evidence. What the lawyers call a primo fascist case.
He also re-affirmed his adherence to DOJ policy that forbids indicting a sitting President. If there was no basis for such an indictment, he would not have needed to mention it. But he did.
And if this amounts to exoneration and vindication, I am the Queen of Romania. I am not. Case you were wondering.
:d:d:d:d:d:d:d:d:d
OK, the dog whined in the nighttime. Insufficient evidence means innocent. But impeachment is a political action, not a criminal trial. The predominant evidence is that Il Douche committed an abuse of power. Not once, but ten times that we know of.
Impeachy keen!