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Mueller Investigation Part 2: Release The Report


GreyhoundFan

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From another thread! 

22 hours ago, AmazonGrace said:

Democracy probably died already while no one was looking

It occurred to me this morning that we will know in a few weeks if the Trump Crime Family coup has succeeded.  They've installed loyalists in the right places.  Barr will be in charge of redacting from the IC aspect of the Mueller Report.  Treasury is blocking the release of his taxes.  It will be seen if his cronies on the SC are sufficiently loyal. 

I was watching Rachel Maddow yesterday -- this would have been her show from Tuesday night, I think and it really caught my attention that Barr is in charge of redacting from the intelligence aspect of the report, when Mueller's people were in charge of everything else.  It has to be that this is where the bombshells are and he will redact accordingly.  Barr is Machiavellian.  Just google "William Barr's role in Iran-Contra" or "William Barr support of  Caspar Weinberger pardon"  or "Iran-Contra" if you are of a more recent generation.   

William Barr was in support of a pardon for Caspar Weinberger, SecDef under Reagan.  Had Weinberger gone to trial, it would have exposed, as as Reagan's VP, Bush 41's role in Iran Contra and the subsequent cover up and ruined his changes in what turned out to be a successful presidential run. 

Brief refresher: What Does William Barr Have to Do With Iran Contra

<snip> 

Quote

A quarter century ago, the president’s attorney general, William Barr, staunchly opposed the independent counsel’s investigation of wrongdoing in the White House, and he also firmly supported Bush’s use of pardons as a means of self-protection. Are we to believe that Barr’s relationship with President Trump will be any different? 

      

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Another thought.  I suspect that separating out the redactions into four different sections drastically lowers the possibility that any one person can leak the report in its entirety.  Is it possible that only Barr has full access to the full report?

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image.png.15210c0e9cd5459590b1e6490221521b.png

 

Kellyanne is such an idiot.

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13 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

Kellyanne is such an idiot.

Well, yes and no.  From Day 1, she has created talking points for the Base.  Using a picture of Obama and linking that to information on a FORMER Obama appointee, and undermining the Mueller Report using social media to amplify it is classic Alt-Reich agitprop and it's brutally effective at cementing the the Base and their world view.  It's important to remember that although Trump's approval rating is relatively low, it's still remarkably high among Republicans.  If it's one thing these ass hats are good at, it's staying on message and controlling the narrative. 

 

 

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Here’s a 43-tweet mega thread by Seth Abramson, that you should read (if you have the time) before tomorrow’s release of the heavily redacted report. In it, he lays out why we shouldn’t focus so much on the obstruction of justice, but instead we should be looking at how much the presidunce is a threat to national security.

 

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For @ThreadReader's unroll of Seth's epic tweet thread click here

@fraurosena, one of the first things Trump did, literally in his office WITH RUSSIANS, was compromise American/Israeli intelligence.  There were realistic fears that Trump had zero sense of what national security is, which I think is true relative to the Russians and for a recent example (ancient history in Trump time) Erdogan in Turkey. 

And this: 

Again, pending the release of the Mueller "Summary as redacted by Barr" Report, remember that Whitaker, Barr, Barr's son-in-law as WH lawyer, Mnuchin, the head of the IRS, all the "acting" Cabinet secretaries, Kavanaugh, recently seated Federal judges and who knows who else, are all part of strategic replacement TO PROTECT TRUMP in order to promote an extremely conservative agenda.  So...not for Trump himself, but because of what can be put into play (for example, alt-Right wet dreams of dismantling regulatory entities, bidness can run amok, dismantling Roe v. Wade, religious "freedom" laws, protect Citizens United) while Trump is fiddling away in the White House. 

Free Jinger, of course, began as a snark site about Fundies.  I've spent quite a few years (decades!) wringing my hands over the influence of Fundiegelicals and Teavangelicals as voting block and in government, but I'm coming over the last month or two to be extremely worried over the jaw dropping influence of ultra wealthy/ultra powerful extremely conservative Catholics at the highest levels in this administration.  It's a thing. 

 

Edited by Howl
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27 minutes ago, Howl said:

For @ThreadReader's unroll of Seth's epic tweet thread click here

Just wanted to say thank you.  I always appreciate the tweet thread unrolls.  ? 

I've been reading The Source: How Rivers Made America and America Remade its Rivers by Martin Doyle.  It's a good overview of how/why some regulatory entities came into being and the ill effects of big business run amok on the average citizen.  Our nation is really taking a big step backwards on many fronts, including the areas of environmental protection and public health (highlighted in the book). 

The very wealthy people who control the purse strings and misuse religion to their advantage are also making huge political inroads (with Trump as a huge coup) as they dismantle education, which leads to lack of critical thinking skills unto the next generation or two, etc.  (I'll stop now, as I'm getting cranky thinking about the awfulness.)

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Wow,  @CTRLZero, I'm adding that book to my reading list.  Have you read Cadillac Desert?   Or The Emerald Mile?  The latter might be of interest if you are coming at it from the view point of loving rivers, rather than a policy/management perspective. 

48 minutes ago, CTRLZero said:

The very wealthy people who control the purse strings and misuse religion to their advantage are also making huge political inroads (with Trump as a huge coup) as they dismantle education, which leads to lack of critical thinking skills unto the next generation or two, etc.  (I'll stop now, as I'm getting cranky thinking about the awfulness.)

Perhaps one horrible/good thing is that the Trump administration is so in-our-faces with this that it can't be ignored. 

Edited by Howl
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Thanks for the recommendation, @Howl, I'll add The Emerald Mile to my list.  Have you read Down the Great Unknown by Edward Dolnick?  It's about John Wesley Powell's adventure down the Colorado River after the Civil War.  We enjoyed the history so much that we have taken (and plan future) trips around some of the sites mentioned in the book.

My husband had a career in an environmental regulatory agency, and Cadillac Desert was frequently passed around back in the 80's.  It's a classic, and I definitely need to pull it off the shelf for another read.  I worked off and on in water rights adjudication, so I've always had an interest in all things riparian.

Thanks, again.  Nice to have a little thread drift while we are awaiting the main [redacted] event.

 

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While we're on the thread drift topic of the environment, here's a video about the Green New Deal that delves into the subject:

 

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3 hours ago, CTRLZero said:

Have you read Down the Great Unknown by Edward Dolnick?  It's about John Wesley Powell's adventure down the Colorado River after the Civil War. 

Added to the list!  The Emerald Mile  (the name of a dory) is about the fastest descent down the Grand Canyon, when the Glen Canyon Dam came "that close" to failing and epic amounts of water were being released in an effort to keep the dam from over topping. 

But a lot of the book is about the history of the Colorado River.  Fedarko is such a skilled and engaging writer that he can deliver an amazing amount of detail in a graceful way.  

Another recommendation: We Swam the Grand Canyon: The True Story of a Cheap Vacation that Got a Little Out of Hand; Not a lot of literary merit but is a cracking good true adventure that took place in 1955.  It looks like the book was reissued as a paperback in 2008. 

And yes, what a lovely respite from the general crazy!  I wish we could redact Trump, et al..

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Hoooo, boy.  I bet a lot of people are taking Ambien + PeptoBismal cocktails just to get 1 or 2 hours of sleep tonight. Tomorrow they'll find out if their testimony shows up unredacted.  Wonder if Hopey Hicks is in there. 

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"3 ways the Mueller report still threatens Trump"

Spoiler

It’s Mueller Eve, and we’re presumably about to learn a bunch of new details about interactions involving President Trump’s campaign and Russia, as well as Trump’s actions vis-a-vis the investigation.

What we know thus far — importantly — is that Robert S. Mueller III didn’t accuse Trump of either conspiracy with Russia or obstruction of justice. Attorney General William P. Barr has come under fire for his letter summarizing the Mueller report’s principal conclusions and personally clearing Trump of obstruction. But assuming he accurately relayed those top-line findings, that’s still hugely significant. Practically speaking, Trump’s base was probably never going to desert him — and GOP members of Congress were never going to support impeaching him — without a real smoking gun. It seems Mueller didn’t find one, and that matters.

But that doesn’t mean Trump will get off scot-free. While Barr’s letter has been criticized for being too friendly for Trump, including by members of Mueller’s team, there’s a real argument to be made that it set the unhelpful expectation that Mueller had somehow exonerated Trump. And despite his own claims of total exoneration, Trump has continued eviscerating the Mueller investigation. That suggests that he’s girding for some potentially bad news Thursday.

What might that bad news be? Below are a few possibilities.

1. Trump’s actions were very obstruction-y, but he’s the president

The biggest question heading into Thursday is what Mueller says about obstruction. That’s because this is the crime Mueller chose not to expressly clear the president of, according to Barr’s letter.

That’s unusual. Generally speaking, prosecutors either decide to charge or not, and leave it at that. But Mueller decided to add that qualifier.

Here’s how Barr characterized it:

After making a “thorough factual investigation” into these matters, the Special Counsel considered whether to evaluate the conduct under Department standards governing prosecution and declination decisions but ultimately determined not to make a traditional prosecutorial judgment. The Special Counsel therefore did not draw a conclusion one way or the other as to whether the examined conduct constituted obstruction. Instead, for each of the relevant actions investigated, the report sets out evidence on both sides of the question and leaves unresolved what the Special Counsel views as “difficult issues” of law and fact concerning whether the President’s actions and intent could be viewed as obstruction. The Special Counsel states that “while this report does not conclude that the President committed a crime, it also does not exonerate him.”

The question is why Mueller chose this path. Did he do it because the evidence was compelling but perhaps not conclusive — because he believes the actions could be obstruction but that he simply couldn’t decide? Or did he just decided to punt on the question because Justice Department guidelines say Trump can’t be indicted anyway?

Assuming Mueller expounds upon his reasoning here, that will be key. The former would mean the evidence could be pretty damning, but perhaps not damning enough — including to cost Trump much politically. That latter could be worse for Trump, in that Mueller could describe actions that would be considered criminal for anybody else, but Trump’s status as a sitting president would mean the decision was left up to Congress.

2. A narrow verdict on ‘conspiracy’

Ever since the Barr letter came out, more than a few smart people have pointed to Barr’s and Mueller’s specific choice of words when it comes to interactions between the Trump campaign and Russia. Specifically, they never use the words “collusion” and instead say there was no “conspiracy” or “coordination.”

Barr’s letter summarizes Mueller’s report by saying:

As the report states: “[T]he investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.”

And then in a footnote, Barr says:

In assessing potential conspiracy charges, the Special Counsel also considered whether members of the Trump campaign “coordinated” with Russian election interference activities. The Special Counsel defined “coordination” as an “agreement — tacit or express — between the Trump Campaign and the Russian government on election interference.”

The Post’s Philip Bump wrote a couple of weeks back about how these distinctions could be significant. Essentially, it could still mean that there was some evidence of collusion more broadly — as House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.) continues to argue — but that it didn’t rise to the level of actually coordinating and conspiring. Perhaps information was shared and assistance was encouraged, but there was no actual, specific agreement.

Government watchdog Larry Noble summarized this point nicely: “Defining coordination as requiring an agreement between the parties creates a massive hole in the wall against foreign corruption of our elections. For example, does Mueller believe that, unless he can prove there was an agreement to do so, it is not illegal for the campaign to provide information to the Russians, such as polling data, to help them target their ads supporting Trump and opposing Hillary Clinton? What if there were meetings between Trump campaign officials and agents of the Russian government where information about the Russian and Trump strategies to get him elected were exchanged, discussed, and its use encouraged, but there is no proof of an agreement as to what specific activity will take place?”

Criminality matters, and the fact that Mueller appears to have found no crime here matters greatly. But what if he found something that could be read as amounting to the broader concept of “collusion” with a hostile foreign government? That could still be politically problematic, depending upon how serious and how clear the evidence.

Or we could simply be parsing all of this too closely. Mueller might say it really wasn’t even a close call — and that’s why he made the call on this one, even as he didn’t on obstruction.

3. It could embarrass or expose those around Trump — and cause turmoil

NBC News’s Carol E. Lee, Hallie Jackson and Kristen Welker wrote a must-read story on Tuesday laying out the stakes of the report not for Trump, but for those around him:

One person close to the White House said there is “breakdown-level anxiety” among some current and former staffers who cooperated with the investigation at the direction of Trump’s legal team at the time.

There is also concern that new facts in the report could be disclosed that do not reflect favorably on the president, two people familiar with the discussions said.

“You have a whole bunch of former White House officials and current White House officials, but especially former White House officials, who were told to cooperate,” the former White House official said. “So people went and did that, and now the uncertainty is just how much of that information is going to be in that report and how identifiable to individuals is it going to be. And nobody knows.”

Another person familiar with the discussions said the officials who are worried are those who said negative things about Trump. This person said the “million-dollar question” swirling around Trump world is how much of the report will be redacted, specifically if it will be a “net plus or minus” 100 pages of the more than 300-page report.

This White House has leaked like a sieve, in part because people inside it and the administration seem to be so concerned about how unwieldy and unmoored the entire operation is. But it’s one thing to make the decision to voluntarily leak to a journalist; it’s another to be compelled to tell the truth to investigators.

To the extent this provides detail about the inner workings of the White House and what those around Trump truly think about him and various actions that have been taken, that could paint a very unsavory picture. While Trump might not be accused of crimes, what if it becomes clear that those around him were attesting to the reported chaos or describing his actions in details that reflect poorly on the commander in chief? What if former White House counsel Donald McGahn’s 30 hours of interviews prove truly embarrassing for Trump, in some way? Stephen K. Bannon’s reportedly said of the 2016 Trump Tower meeting with a Russian lawyer: “Even if you thought that this was not treasonous, or unpatriotic, or bad s---, and I happen to think it’s all of that, you should have called the FBI immediately.” What if others say similar (if less colorful) things?

And what happens when people are fingered — by Trump or other White House staff — as having been the sources of derogatory information. The White House has already been a place rife with competing factions willing to throw others under the bus; a juicy Mueller report could put that internal feuding on turbo.

 

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I haven't seen the press co, but apparently it's a doozy.

However, it seems he presidunce is still mighty troubled by the release of Barr's Obfuscation Report:

 

Why is nobody asking about Barr's previous proven lies to Congress about a DOJ report*, and how that completely undermines his credibility now? Anything he has to say about any report should be considered a lie until the full report has been released. Confront him with that, for crying out loud. Stop being polite, ffs!

*When he was deputy AG under H.W. Bush he pulled the same stunt he is pulling now, not releasing a report and only summarizing -- it was about the FBI being able to arrest anyone anywhere in the world whenever they wanted -- and he lied to Congress about the contents of the report, which was later released in full, proving his lies.

 

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I truly despise both Dumpy and Barr:

image.png.12a23b0af190c32b698bf2a14aad810b.png

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It’s so frustrating to be at work today when I want to be home glued to the news.  

Hoping you guys will keep me up to date as I check as much as possible.

 

I am not expecting anything major, no bombshells, I just hope Sarah Sanders was one under breakdown levels of stress and he yells at her for something because I’m petty like that.

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11 minutes ago, SilverBeach said:

What about Volume 2?

Never mind, I was so excited I overlooked it. Watching Jay Sekulow on MSNBC now.

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"William Barr just did Trump another huge favor"

Spoiler

When Attorney General William P. Barr announced he was going to hold a news conference before the release of the Mueller report Thursday, there was instant pushback. How can the media ask questions about a report it hasn’t seen? Would this just be a whole bunch of pre-spin from a man already accused of being too friendly to the president who appointed him?

Barr’s performance did nothing to argue against those allegations.

In a lengthy opening statement, Barr found just about every way possible to say that there was no coordination, cooperation or conspiracy between the Trump campaign and Russia. He also said Trump was right about “no collusion,” expanding the Mueller report’s clearing of Trump to a more nebulous term with little legal significance.

But perhaps more importantly, on obstruction of justice, he seemed to go to bat for Trump personally, offering a sympathetic take on the president’s state of mind and cooperation. Here’s the key section, from his prepared remarks:

In assessing the President’s actions discussed in the report, it is important to bear in mind the context. President Trump faced an unprecedented situation. As he entered into office, and sought to perform his responsibilities as President, federal agents and prosecutors were scrutinizing his conduct before and after taking office, and the conduct of some of his associates. At the same time, there was relentless speculation in the news media about the President’s personal culpability. Yet, as he said from the beginning, there was in fact no collusion. And as the Special Counsel’s report acknowledges, there is substantial evidence to show that the President was frustrated and angered by a sincere belief that the investigation was undermining his presidency, propelled by his political opponents, and fueled by illegal leaks. Nonetheless, the White House fully cooperated with the Special Counsel’s investigation, providing unfettered access to campaign and White House documents, directing senior aides to testify freely, and asserting no privilege claims. And at the same time, the President took no act that in fact deprived the Special Counsel of the documents and witnesses necessary to complete his investigation. Apart from whether the acts were obstructive, this evidence of non-corrupt motives weighs heavily against any allegation that the President had a corrupt intent to obstruct the investigation.

Let’s break this down.

The first objectionable aspect is Barr’s decision to sympathize with Trump. It was an “unprecedented situation,” according to Barr, and Trump was facing “relentless speculation.” That’s a pretty loaded term. He was “frustrated and angered by a sincere belief” that the probe was undermining him. How does he know it was sincere?

Barr was asked about this in the Q&A portion, and he emphasized, “The statements about his sincere beliefs are recognized in the report that there was ‘substantial evidence’ for that.” We will have to see what the report says.

But even then, why offer this kind of preemptive defense of Trump’s motives? And why focus on all the ways in which Trump was absolved of culpability? Why take a shot at the media’s “relentless speculation?” As more than a few people have noted, it’s the kind of statement you’d expect from a Trump defense attorney rather than the attorney general.

Barr could have attributed all of these things to the report by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, but he didn’t. We’ll see whether Mueller drew the same conclusions, but this was a very conspicuous inclusion in Barr’s prepared remarks. And the way it was framed was pretty much exactly what people were concerned about on Wednesday night when the Barr news conference was announced.

The second problematic part is when Barr says that “the White House fully cooperated with the Special Counsel’s investigation.” There is evidence of extensive cooperation by the White House in fulfilling documents requests, providing staff for interviews, etc. But we also know that Mueller wanted to interview Trump and that the White House fought it for months. Eventually, the White House issued written responses.

“Extensive cooperation” might have been justifiable; “full cooperation” was not. Not with Trump declining to give an interview. And given that so much of this rests on Trump’s frame of mind, his decision not to explain himself directly to Mueller seems a pretty significant bit of uncooperativeness.

We should all see the full report and then judge Barr’s alleged pre-spinning. But the danger here was always going to be that this would look like a political performance from an attorney general whose neutrality in this whole matter has been in question throughout. Barr wrote an unsolicited memo attacking the foundation of Mueller’s obstruction probe. He said in 2017 that the central event in the obstruction probe — the firing of FBI Director James B. Comey — was A-okay. And both his letter summarizing the Mueller report’s principal conclusions and his recent congressional testimony seemed to err on the side of benefiting Trump.

Barr made no effort Thursday to be mindful of that history and combat his perception problem. And even if he was accurately portraying the report, he seemed to pull out many of the most pro-Trump aspects of it, without dwelling on what might be problematic.

That’s what critics had feared. Thankfully, it won’t be the final word.

 

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*stops reading report for a moment*

Most important phrase I've read from volume 1:

The evidence was insufficient to charge [with a criminal offence]

Meaning there was evidence of criminal offences, but the evidence that there was, might not stand up in a court of law. 

*resumes reading*

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