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Home » After Mueller: what now?

After Mueller: what now?

The New Neo Posted on by

I just published a post that reflects my belief that the left and other Trump-haters (as opposed to mere Trump-critics) won’t be able to stop going down the road they’ve been on ever since Trump became president.

But there is another way they could go, at least theoretically:

I think trout will swim down Great Ormond Street (see reference) before those who’ve been beating and beating this drum will ever admit to wrongdoing or even error. But I guess we’ll see. In the meantime we have:

As for those who actually perpetrated the mess, those in the FBI and DOJ and Steele and others instrumental in spinning the web of intrigue, they should pay in some way but will they? The American public has been steeped in outrages, like the metaphorical frog in boiling water, and perhaps it has grown indifferent to such things. However:

Now, Mueller’s investigations leave one major mission unfinished: meting out justice to the intelligence, congressional, FBI and DOJ officials who appear to have used a political dirty trick to falsely weave an unproven narrative of Russia collusion.

Unverified political opposition research never should be treated as actionable intelligence or Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) evidence, as it was in this case.

Just hours before Mueller’s report arrived, new evidence emerged of just how egregious the FBI acted in the early days of the Russia probe.

Fox News’s brilliant reporter Catherine Herridge obtained new text messages Friday showing Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe and his chief lawyer, Lisa Page, were discussing credibility issues and “bias” about a key human source whose work was to support the FISA warrant used to first spy on the Trump campaign in October 2016.

Those credibility issues likely were hidden from the judges who approved the warrant of Trump campaign adviser Carter Page (no relation to Lisa Page). As I have reported, the FBI also possesses emails showing concerns with the evidence it was going to use to support the FISA warrant.

The article goes on to list some of the other important failures to disclose in the application for the FISA warrant, which is required to disclose any exculpatory evidence and yet did not. Then:

Such omissions are so glaring as to constitute defrauding a federal court. And each and every participant to those omissions needs to be brought to justice.

An upcoming DOJ inspector general’s report should trigger the beginning of that accountability in a court of law, and President Trump can assist the effort by declassifying all evidence of wrongdoing by FBI, CIA and DOJ officials.

I wouldn’t suggest sitting on a hot stove till that happens, though.

I keep wondering what the political fallout of this will be. Will it cause a significant number of voters who still trust the media and the Democrats to turn on either or both? I simply don’t know. I will say that I’ve long been impressed (and I don’t mean that in a good way) by the ability of most people to stick to their beliefs in the face of what would seem overwhelming evidence that they need to make a change.

Comments

After Mueller: what now? — 27 Comments

  1. Scott Adams has opined in his podcast that based on his knowledge of human behavior only 5% to 10% of those who believed the hogwash will change their minds after being confronted with the facts.

    Only yesterday, after much back-and-forth, was the Wikipedia entry on the Charlottesville “fine people” hoax corrected to the truth — that Trump was NOT referring to the Nazis. It took this long, despite video and transcripts of his statements condemning the Nazis and explicitly stating that he was not calling them “fine people”.

    The MSM have repeated the Big Lie so often and for so long that it has become the Truth.

  2. I fear the continuing playout of this affair will simply confirm the willful Democratic Leftist desire to end the rule of law. The fat black dude, Malcolm Nance, on the MSNBC clip, testifies to that.
    We are seeing lynch mobs in the media and in the public square.

  4. Some months ago Trump supposedly came within a hair’s breadth of unclassifying and releasing all information associated with those FISA warrant applications. Then at the last second he turned the whole issue over to the DOJ Inspector General for analysis and I think eventual report.

    My assumption was that this constituted a giant piece of leverage. Once it’s released, you can’t unrelease it; and while that might have positive ramifications for team Trump, the leverage is gone.

    On the other hand, what the heck is the deal with the panel of judges called FISC? Do they have any powers or authorities other than rubber stamping a yes, no, or maybe on warrants? I profess ignorance, but should we consider the possibility at this point that this is a fig leaf institution?

  5. “Such omissions are so glaring as to constitute defrauding a federal court.”

    Not only is it defrauding a federal court, but a special sort of court that was instituted to protect American citizens from unwarranted government surveillance. Which makes it even more egregious and dangerous.

    “And each and every participant to those omissions needs to be brought to justice.”
    Just so. But will they? That is the question. The citizens, if we will but raise our concerns with our elected representatives, could have a say. We must demand justice at every turn.

  6. Woodward, from six months ago:
    https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2018/09/14/woodward_no_evidence_of_collusion_between_trump_and_russia_i_searched_for_two_years.html

    Page, from six months ago:
    https://thehill.com/hilltv/rising/406881-lisa-page-bombshell-fbi-couldnt-prove-trump-russia-collusion-before-mueller

    But as a wise (and prescient) reporter says, “Just because nothing has been proven DOESN’T mean that Trump is NOT GUILTY”….

    And it’s precisely this that will continue to fuel the Dionysian orgy of accusations and allegations by the Democrats and their cohorts in the MSM.

    (Blood lust is always a bit tricky to control.)

  7. They tried to kill the ‘King’ and failed. Now it’s time for the King’s Justice. We are also far past the time when prior concerns about creating an irreconcilable political divide stayed our hand.

    To not prosecute their agents of sedition is to guarantee their continuation.

    No amount of conciliatory gestures will lessen the Left’s ideological fanaticism. We either bring the full force of the law to bear upon the Left’s lawbreakers and seditionists now or we ensure in the not too distant future… nationwide armed conflict.

    And, when nationwide protests predictably follow, ignore the peaceful ones and bring the law’s hammer down on the violent ones. It’s time to take the kid gloves off.

    The Left has a right to peacefully and lawfully advocate for change in America. It does not have the right to cheat Americans out of their heritage. It’s time they were forcefully taught that lesson before we have to do so in the harshest of ways.

    And it’s past time we impressed that upon them… before they force us to demonstrate that we will do so, if forced to. One way or another, this has to end, it’s time to get real.

  8. A lot of what happened is extremely abstract except to people who are knowledgeable about the law. Bribery and corruption are not. I’d like to see all the media types proscuted who were bribing FBI and DOJ officials to maintain acess and for leaks. The IG report had two whole pages of diagrams linking the MSM and law enforcement. Time to prosecute. That will get peoples attention, or more likely, shut up the MSM who will refuse to report on it.

  9. The anti-Trumpers will never stop. A few people may change their position, but most will double down on their hatred and hysteria.

  10. My suggestion is for Mr. Trump to do the Hercules thing, and divert the river thru ALL Executive Branch offices and CLEAN THEM OUT.

  11. Sam,

    Indeed. Pres. Bush failed to do this, big mistake.

    Pres. Trump should be doing it too, but I imagine it’s a tough row to hoe for him in some respects. For one thing, he seems to be having a real problem finding trustworthy people who are not backstabbers or people who won’t fold under pressure. For another, he needs not to alienate anybody politically consequential without considering it carefully first, given his general lack of support by his own party’s more influential members.

    Just musing….

  12. People need to face up the the fact that the idea of the FISA Court as a protector of our liberties is a fraud and a joke. All the protestations made over the years that the FISA Court puts the spy and counter-intelligence agencies to a rigorous test are false. They are either wishful thinking or cynical chum for the chumps. The FISA Court rubber stamps what the agencies want to do without asking any tough questions or giving it much thought. The Chief Justice, who assigns the FISA Court judges, needs to light a fire under these bums. I wonder why he hasn’t? (Hint: the FISA Court acts the way official Washington wants it to act.)

  13. On the malleability of principles (Devil’s Advocate style).

    When the FBI “cleared” Hillary (despite describing in detail how she broke the law), Republicans called “lock her up” and Democrats countered, “But she must be innocent, because she hasn’t been indicted.”

    So now, assuming that Mueller scare-quote “cleared” President Trump of collusion (because we don’t yet know what possible other problems he describes in his report), Democrats are calling out “keep investigating and impeach!” while Republicans counter, “But he must be innocent, because he hasn’t been indicted.”

    Karma seems to be exploiting the guaranteed job security provided by our political class.

  14. Malcolm Nance is a demonstrable liar. Here’s what he wrote for “Small Wars Journal” years ago:

    “…2. Waterboarding is not a simulation. Unless you have been strapped down to the board, have endured the agonizing feeling of the water overpowering your gag reflex, and then feel your throat open and allow pint after pint of water to involuntarily fill your lungs, you will not know the meaning of the word. …”

    I went through Navy SERE training about the time Nance claims to have been an instructor. Dunno. Never met the man. Maybe he is who he says he is. But what he is spouting is nonsense, physiologically. About thirty percent of drownings are known as “dry drownings.” No water enters the lungs because the victim dies of a heart attack before the sphincter allows water in to the lungs.

    Then there’s the fact that less than a quarter of a teaspoon of water in your lungs will lead to pneumonia. That water doesn’t belong there, does it? Your body will treat it as an infection.

    https://www.lung.org/lung-health-and-diseases/lung-disease-lookup/pneumonia/learn-about-pneumonia.html

    In short, if waterboarding worked as Nance describes thousands of trainees would be going to morgues which is not something an advanced nation such as ours want to see happen to expensively trained aviators, special warriors, and occasionally lowly intel officers such as myself. I went through SERE. I was waterboarded. I lived. Everyone I know who was waterboarded lived. To believe Nance means that is not possible.

  15. I mean, seriously folks. Nance talks about “pint after pint” of water entering your lungs. What do you do with water? After they unstrap you from the board at SERE you just cough a couple of times and it’s gone?

    At rest, a typical man’s lungs can hold 1.5 pints of air (I bunked with a Navy dive physiologist for a while) so what is this idiot talking about? Pint after pint? After you are waterboarded at SERE you continue training. How do you do that when the Navy has replaced your entire lung capacity to hold air with water? The insanity of what Nance is obvious to everyone except the “fire can not melt steel (fire is what creates steel BTW) ” nutjob crowd. Nance has created a rich living by telling willing leftists that what the believed all along is true.

  17. It might present a difficulty since the Small Wars Journal article doesn’t provide information about who authored it. Sort of like how atheists deny the author of creation while being forced to admit there was a moment of creation. No matter. The internet has no limits.

    https://delong.typepad.com/egregious_moderation/2007/11/malcolm-nance-w.html

    “November 08, 2007
    Malcolm Nance: Waterboarding is Torture… Period (Links Updated # 8) (SWJ Blog)…”

  18. I look at the whole thing through the FBI. After Waco, nobody was disciplined. That’s two items. First, they did it when they didn’t have to. Could have not done it. Secondly, as an institution, they didn’t seem to see the problem.
    After trying to frame Richard Jewell, a couple of guys got two weeks off.
    After withholding exculpatory evidence in the Ted Stephens case, one guy got a week off.
    So we see the actions, which is one thing, and the indifference to horrible crimes committed by their agents.
    Why would an honorable agent remain with the FBI after Waco? Or apply for a job?
    The rest of the DoJ was similarly uninterested in the issue.
    And, of course, the corruption available to the 302 process.
    The fed prosecutors have a 97% clearance rate; guilty verdicts or pleas. Saddaam Hussein would have envied that.

  19. Peter Turchin in his Ages of Discord describes similar periods as having a surplus of elites.

    Madness Rules the Hour: Charleston, 1860 and the Mania for War by Paul Starobin describes a world very similar to what ours is becoming. The new Republican Party ran on a platform of banishing the twin relics of barbarism, slavery and polygamy. We need a party that can rally popular support against the twin relics of collectivism, communism and socialism.

    IMO our new party is yet to be formed. I keep hoping the Libertarian Party can become the vehicle, but so far it is a lot more like the Free Soil Party. The LP does serve as a place for people who understand the Non-Aggression Principle to self identify.

    There needs to be an understanding of the virtue of free market solutions. What is being proposed by the Uniparty are support for academia and government imposed programs with their armies of overpaid employees, who fight to the bitter end to preserve their inflated incomes and power. The only fight is over who runs it. Trump is not Lincoln. Andrew Yang and Howard Shultz probably aren’t either, but Yang is trying.

    When the Planter Class saw the future in the 1850’s, they created a conscript army of brainwashed racist poor whites and fought until their society was totally destroyed. We now have the makings of such an army in our indoctrinated heavily indebted non-STEM college graduates, who can see no future that looks good to them. They can however be mobilized to fight for collectivism.

    The original Ghostbusters probably explains everything. I may re-watch it.

  20. Steve57:

    I would guess that Mr. Nance got his information from the movie “The Railway Man” and didn’t know the difference between the lungs and the stomach. The Japanese “Water Cure” torture could and did kill.

  21. When the Planter Class saw the future in the 1850’s, they created a conscript army of brainwashed racist poor whites and fought until their society was totally destroyed. We now have the makings of such an army in our indoctrinated heavily indebted non-STEM college graduates, who can see no future that looks good to them. They can however be mobilized to fight for collectivism.

    For the record, about 45% of each cohort is obtaining a baccalaureate degree nowadays. About 55% of such degrees are issued in occupational subjects without qualification. About 15% are issued in communications, psychology, or computer science and technology. Each has an occupational side and an academic side. The academic side of psychology has a social research side and a natural science side. Shy of 5% re issued in mathematics, statistics, economics, chemistry, geology, or physics.

  22. Why would an honorable agent remain with the FBI after Waco? Or apply for a job?
    The rest of the DoJ was similarly uninterested in the issue.

    I think there are thousands of agents who are interested in local issues and crimes and have no interest, other than some vague hope to progress in their careers, in politics. Some of these people we read about came, not from the basic agent class but parachuted in at the top. Strzok has some relatives in federal agencies and his Wiki bio makes him sound like an alterboy.

    Maybe he is not.

    Strzok was still working for the CIA on June 9th, 2017, according to a public information release of information here:

    No mention of this in Wiki.

    Mueller same thing. He was never a sworn agent until being named as Director.

  23. Mueller same thing. He was never a sworn agent until being named as Director.

    For whatever reason, after Hoover’s death only two career cops (Clarence Kelley and Louis Freeh) have served as FBI director (and Freeh’s a member of the bar). They keep putting lawyers in charge for some reason, and lawyers have been at the wheel for about 3/4 of the time since 1974.

    Rosenstein, Mueller, and Comey have each spent the bulk of their law career as attorneys employed by the Department of Justice. Rosenstein has little employment history to speak of outside the Justice Department. Comey had a tour in the private sector in middle age (one of those baffling hires financial sector firms make). Mueller had brief tours in private practice interspersed with long tours of federal employment ‘ere leaving the government at age 70. Andrew McCabe was hired by the FBI 20-odd years ago after a brief run in private practice. I think Sztrok was in the military or some such, hired around the same time. IIRC, Sztrok’s father was an engineer who held public and private sector positions which led to the family moving around a great deal and living abroad a great deal.

    Partisan Democrats keep telling me in fora like this that Mueller, Rosenstein, and Comey are ‘Republicans’. Comey was registered to vote in Virginia, which has no party registration. I’ve noodled around a bit looking for Mueller’s registration. I can’t even find the jurisdiction. It could be Maryland, DC, or California. I did locate Rosenstein’s (in Montgomery County, Md.) and he is indeed a registered Republican. (One considered trustworthy enough to get a U.S. Attorney’s position in Eric Holder’s Justice Dept).

    In terms of social background, McCabe and Mueller both attended boarding schools, something atypical even among the upper class (and hardly done among the professional-managerial bourgeoisie). Rosenstein and Comey (particularly Rosenstein) appear to have grown up much closer to the median.

  24. his Wiki bio makes him sound like an alterboy.

    An blawger I follow, who had had 35 years in practice in downstate Illinois including a certain amount of trial work, said he had never in that time encountered a witness in court who conducted himself quite the way Peter Sztrok did in congressional hearings. The sneering condescension was quite outside his experience. (He’s a general practitioner whose work is predominantly in the realm of bankruptcy and criminal defense).

  25. See what I mean, Jellybean? Waterboarding isn’t torture. Not the way we do it.

  26. My daughter is an agent and Freeh was Director when she was in the Academy. He would come down and run with the agent trainees. Freeh got crossways with Clinton because Freeh wanted to investigate the bombing of the AF barracks in Saudi. He was probably the last real FBI guy as Director.

  27. But to Mr. Nance they both involve water so ….. he’s got a ticket to ride and he don’t care. A media whore.

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