From everything I have read, I don’t think that Mueller is doing any of the calculations you are suggesting. He’s generally accepted as one of the best and most trustworthy law enforcement officers in living memory, and actually is one of the best and most trustworthy law enforcement officers. He’s just going to do what he’s allowed to do, in the most reasonable way that he can, according to whatever the evidence might be, and he’ll prosecute crimes and make recommendations in accordance with all of that.
Comparing himself to Kenneth Starr or targeting/not targeting the President for any reasons outside of evidence and national security are probably not going to even enter his mind.
This morning, the NY Times is reporting that there is a draft of a letter, written by Trump and Miller no less, that outlines the reasons for firing Comey is in Mueller’s hands. It was never used because White House council “believed that some of its contents were problematic”. If they thought it was problematic then, it’s probably more so now.
I’m fairly certain that Trump has laundered money in his life. I’m fairly certain there was collaboration/collusion with a foreign power. I’m damn certain that he tried to obstruct justice.
On the money laundering thing, that’s a maybe/maybe not if you are pursuing the question of complicity. A fair case could be made that he was a dupe of the Russians, so eager to rescue his fiscal situation that he didn’t use proper suspicion and caution. This man is a narcissist to the bone, I would have no problem thinking that he believed that it was because only Putin had the insight and intelligence to recognize Trump’s genius, while Western bankers were a bunch of bean-counting weenies.
I keep seeing this as the plot of The Producers, where the main characters plot to produce a sure-fire flop of a Broadway show to screw multiple investors. Does anyone know how someone might launder money by shoveling into a real estate venture doomed to fail? For instance, that massive luxury hotel in Azerbijan.
The Russian foreign ministry announced that the United States special services will be searching their San Francisco consulate. In totally unrelated news, there is smoke billowing from the Russian San Francisco consulate. Apparently to heat the building in this 100 degree weather we’re having in the bay area, or something.
*"After sending a crew to investigate the fire department determined that people in the building were using the fireplace, San Francisco Fire Department spokeswoman Mindy Talamadge told the Associated Press. *
*“It was not unintentional. They were burning something in their fireplace,” she said.
The AP reported hearing someone from inside the building say consular staff were burning unidentified items in a fireplace."*
I suspect that if Trump’s presidency collapses, it will have little to do with Russian “collusion” and everything to do with the unmasking of Trump the big shot businessman, with Trump exposed for the con man that it is. Trump is not a billionaire anymore than Bernie Madoff was a Wall Street investment guru. He’s a fraud. And this is probably what Trump is really worried about - I’m not even sure he’s truly worried about criminal prosecution, though he certainly has every reason to in the long run. I suspect he’s terrified of ordinary people, most notably his supporters, finding out that he sucks at business and has to use extra-legal means to keep his little (well, big) scheme going.
I’m seeing this on a lot of news sites, but I’m not sure why. I would imagine Mueller has a lot of things related to the Trump campaign and White House in his hands. That’s what a special counsel is supposed to do. So why is this making the news? Seems a strange nugget of information to leak, without also leaking the contents of the letter.
Since Comey told Trump (and it was confirmed) three times that he was not under investigation, I can see why Trump would fire him for not willing to say so publicly. Trump was not trying to get Comey to lie. He was trying to get him to say publicly what he told him privately.
Trump may not have been under investigation when Comey first told him, but Comey knew that it was likely that Trump would come under investigation later (which turned out to be true), and therefore it would be incredibly unwise to state it publicly.
Hard to keep track of all of this. Do you have any sites of the confirmation that Comey said he was not under investigation? Other than something Trump claimed?
Yes. Comey said it in his testimony. I watched it. Link to article about it. Link to testimony. I do recall that Comey said those others he conferred with, with one exception, agreed that was the correct course of action. I haven’t checked the transcript for that bit, though.
That he told him he wasn’t under investigation AT THE TIME does not mean that he would never be under investigation. He wasn’t promising never to investigate Trump, he was saying he wasn’t under investigation, and he wasn’t yet, at the time.
That’s a political request for political purposes, which is contrary to the duty of the FBI director. You don’t say someone isn’t under investigation if you think they’re going to be under investigation later.