Dershowitz is completely fed up with Mueller
From Dershowitz [emphasis mine]:
The statement by special counsel Robert Mueller in a Wednesday press conference that “if we had confidence that the president clearly did not commit a crime, we would have said that” is worse than the statement made by then-FBI Director James Comey regarding Hillary Clinton during the 2016 presidential campaign…
Comey was universally criticized for going beyond his responsibility to state whether there was sufficient evidence to indict Clinton. Mueller, however, did even more. He went beyond the conclusion of his report and gave a political gift to Democrats in Congress who are seeking to institute impeachment proceedings against President Trump…
Until today, I have defended Mueller against the accusations that he is a partisan. I did not believe that he personally favored either the Democrats or the Republicans, or had a point of view on whether President Trump should be impeached. But I have now changed my mind. By putting his thumb, indeed his elbow, on the scale of justice in favor of impeachment based on obstruction of justice, Mueller has revealed his partisan bias. He also has distorted the critical role of a prosecutor in our justice system.
To Dershowitz—who, whatever his politics (and he remains a Democrat as far as I can tell) is a strong defender of liberty and the safeguards against abuse of power by the legal system—that latter offense, “distoring the critical role of a prosecutor in our justice system,” may even be worse than the first offense, because it is systemic. When you destroy a system of protection, there is danger to everyone, not just to partisans.
Dershowitz continues [emphasis mine]:
Virtually everybody agrees that, in the normal case, a prosecutor should never go beyond publicly disclosing that there is insufficient evidence to indict. No responsible prosecutor should ever suggest that the subject of his investigation might indeed be guilty even if there was insufficient evidence or other reasons not to indict. Supporters of Mueller will argue that this is not an ordinary case, that he is not an ordinary prosecutor and that President Trump is not an ordinary subject of an investigation. They are wrong. The rules should not be any different.
Remember that federal investigations by prosecutors, including special counsels, are by their very nature one-sided. They hear only evidence of guilt and not exculpatory evidence. Their witnesses are not subject to the adversarial process. There is no cross examination. The evidence is taken in secret behind the closed doors of a grand jury. For that very reason, prosecutors can only conclude whether there is sufficient evidence to commence a prosecution. They are not in a position to decide whether the subject of the investigation is guilty or is innocent of any crimes.
And that is why, whatever a person’s feelings are about president Trump, all people should be outraged at this. But they are not; not at all. And that’s a terrible sign of the ignorance of the populace, and the partisanship that would overrun basic guarantees of liberty to us all.
I keep putting this video out there, but it keeps (unfortunately) being relevant:
Of course, the way the impeachment rules are written in the Constitution, it’s pretty clear that the House can impeach by saying a president committed a certain high crime/misdemeanor, and if the Senate is willing to convict, the president will be removed from office. But that’s a separate issue from the one here, which is that a special counsel should say only what Dershowitz indicates: whether there is “sufficient evidence to commence a prosecution” and if so, what that evidence might be. To suggest there is insufficient evidence but that the prosecutor can’t prove innocence, and therefore the political remedy is to impeach, goes way beyond whatever a special counsel should be doing and is an abuse of power.
VDH has likened the obsession of leftists and the Democratic Party to that of Captain Ahab in his pursuit of the whale in Moby Dick, while, to others, Javert from Victor Hugo’s famous novel might come to mind. Some have spoken of addiction or TDS, but the fact remains that no amount of evidence, nor any rational analysis, will ever dissuade these delusional fools from believing in a conspiracy theory more ridiculous than anything from the mouth of Alex Jones.
It’s quite discouraging to read anti-Trump articles and comments on the web and find no concern whatsoever for the basic principle of innocent until proven guilty.
As in the responses to National Review’s Rich Lowry’s article in Politico today:
“The Wayward Special Counsel”
https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2019/05/29/the-wayward-special-counsel-227029
I’m always scratching my head on how one might even try to bridge such a gap.
If the President is impeached, whom will remove him/her from office? To paraphrase Andy Jackson, you have reached your verdict, good luck enforcing it. There’s your Constitutional crisis.
Cardassian justice: https://youtu.be/p82XpCY0CGg is what Herr Mueller is aiming for.
The ancient Greeks are instructive here: those whom the gods choose to destroy, first they drive mad.
I R A Darth Aggie: Iowahawk got off another tweet killshot in response to Jim Geraghty’s post:
“The New Bad-Luck Curse in Politics”
https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/annie-leibovitz-the-new-bad-luck-curse-in-politics/
Iowahawk:
Whom the gods would destroy they first make pose for Annie Leibovitz
The aftermath of Trump’s election has been an eye opener for both Dershowitz and McCarthy.
I share Dershowitz’s opinion of Mueller’s intent to fan the flames of impeachment. So far Pelosi continues to resist but she’s caved to her fanatics before.
But getting rid of Trump will not satiate the Left’s lust for power, it would enflame it. Pence would be crucified in the press as a religious fanatic and would stand no chance of election. The ‘activist’ Left’s victory over Trump would result in their ascendence into full control of the democrat party. Pence’s defeat would entrench it.
They would then proceed to cut down all the laws in order to get after all who oppose them. As example; Kamela Harris just proposed that Congress pass a law that the States have to gain DOJ approval before they can enact abortion laws. But why would the activist dems stop at abortion laws?
Which will result in the ‘devil’ i.e. the “deplorables and irredeemables” turning round to finally confront them with a “terrible swift sword”.
Once again I am reminded of George Orwell’s assessment of those on the Left; “So much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire, by people who don’t even know that fire is hot”…
I M P E A C H M E N T
…when sanity is no longer an option.
Coming to a theater near you.
“No responsible prosecutor should ever suggest that the subject of his investigation might indeed be guilty even if there was insufficient evidence or other reasons not to indict.” — Dershowitz
“To suggest there is insufficient evidence but that the prosecutor can’t prove innocence, …” — Neo
Mueller’s statement was a mess of ambiguity and innuendo, but there are one or possibly two standard Democrat manipulations on display and related to the above statements.
First, Neo and Dershowitz are correct that Mueller did emphasize (repeatedly, I think) that he was unable to prove Trump’s innocence. This alone is a horrible corruption of our prosecutorial system.
One Clintonian tactic is an argumentative bait-and-switch that begins with a patently and factually true statement followed by a considerably more vague or amorphous statement that sounds similar or related to the first one. We are supposed to think that both statements are obviously true, when in fact the second one may be highly contentious or largely false.
Mueller states that he can’t prosecute (or refer for prosecution) President Trump because of the Constitution. (About which he cares so deeply.) He then hints that there may have been an ocean of evidence that could have led to a prosecution, but (poor me) my hands were tied. He implies that because an actual prosecution can’t go forward they were hampered in fully developing the evidence and writing the report, which is obviously false.
The second tactic contained in this gambit is Democrat political ju-jitsu. A Constitutional principle that was clearly intended to protect the President from a powerful hate-group, has been cleverly, if dishonestly, used to smear the President; implying that he’s a criminal without showing any significant evidence. “The Constitution made me do it.”
______
The Obama political ju-jitsu that really bugged me was the “confidential investigation.” “Oh, we’ve opened an investigation into that abuse, and we’d love to tell you what we’ve learned, but all investigations are confidential.” It’s also true that there is no significant investigating being done, and the pseudo investigation will last forever. The justice system protections become weapons.
Dershowitz is a great lawyer and a passionate defender and brilliant human but he really has to be whacked over the head before he sees the error of statist policies and personnel. In this case, finally, he sees that Mueller is not – as repeatedly, mantra-like, stated on cable tv – a dignified, dispassionate and highly respected official, but, rather, a swamp weasel who’s been working the levers of power on his own behalf the whole time. DUH!
Dershowitz just waking up to Mueller’s partisanship makes him like the sleeping dormouse at the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party.
Somebody finally slapped him awake. At last.
But it won’t last.
Depend upon it. Leopards do not change their spots and Democrats do not change their dodentry.
The greatest indictment of our anti-Trump elites is that not one of them has bothered to ask one simple question over the last three years.
“So, we get rid of Trump. And then what?”
Look what trying to remove Bill Clinton and failing did. It cemented the Clinton machine as the dominant force in the Democratic Party for a generation. Even after 16 years and another Democrat in the White House, Bill and Hillary still so completely controlled the party that the only person who ran a meaningful primary campaign against her in 2016 was a guy WHO ISN’T EVEN A DEMOCRAT. It’s not hard to see how withstanding a Democratic impeachment effort would only make Trump even more powerful in the GOP.
Now imagine actually removing Trump from office. Take all the anger and bitterness of Clinton’s impeachment and Nixon’s forced resignation combined and multiply it by about a hundred. Tens of millions of Americans would become irretrievably alienated from their own political process and more than happy to support the next person who comes riding that white horse.
Mike
The Special Counsel’s investigation is oe sided. No evidence is heard from the other side. Except, in this case, President Trump, using his bully pulpit, kept proclaiming his innocence. By openly proclaiming his innocence, the Special Counsel prosecutors decided he was trying to obstruct their investigation. The perp is, in their opinion, not allowed to do that while the prosecution is compiling their evidence. Why? Because he’s a powerful man with a big megaphone. What they fail to take into account is the megaphone of the MSM, which was daily proclaiming Trump’s guilt. Not to mention many Deep State denizens such as Comey, Brennan and Clapper parading their expertise as “informed experts” to aver Trump’s guilt. Does an innocent man have the right to proclaim his innocence? Even one as powerful as the President of the United States? Therein lies the crux for the impeachers. Can they convince the Senate that a crime was committed? IMHO, no. They may
impeach, but they will not succeed in removal. There was
no obstructipon of justice
Depend upon it. Leopards do not change their spots and Democrats do not change their dodentry.
Gerard vanderleun: I seem to have the impression you voted Democrat for more than an election or two … until 9/11 anyway. Of course, you don’t participate in these comment threads beyond smash and grab, so no matter.
Or maybe you just wanted to work your nice neologism, dodentry, into ascii here.
However, I wouldn’t write Dershowitz off. This may be a bridge too far for him. I think of David Mamet’s memorable:
“David Mamet: Why I Am No Longer a ‘Brain-Dead Liberal’”
https://www.villagevoice.com/2008/03/11/david-mamet-why-i-am-no-longer-a-brain-dead-liberal/
People — even Democrats — can change. I believe this blog is dedicated in part to that notion.
It all comes down to economics and covering your backside. The goal is to investigate Trump until another administration gets elected. They are counting on two years. I think it will be six years. Mueller made money with uranium one and so did a lot of other people.
https://theblacksphere.net/2018/12/did-mueller-receive-500000-for-uranium-one-deal/
And this;
https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2017/10/how_much_did_mueller_and_rosenstein_know_about_uranium_one.html
Dershowitz’ comment on the nature of a grand jury is apropos. I got to serve on a grand jury for the first time recently, and it was fascinating. How the sausage gets made, etc. It enables me to appreciate what he says.
…Mueller made money with uranium one and so did a lot of other people.
JHCorcoran: I vaguely remember that but had forgotten. Into my EverNote database. Thanks.
(BTW–If you read a lot of internet and want to save the good bits, EverNote is mighty handy. It also works as an adblocker.)
The gods have not yet defeated me in battle. The mad thing is probably not relevant any more.
Gerard vanderleun: I seem to have the impression you voted Democrat for more than an election or two … until 9/11 anyway. Of course, you don’t participate in these comment threads beyond smash and grab, so no matter.
That’s a good memory. I can’t verify it either way. Someone named vanderleun has been on and off here being anti Left since at least a few years after I was here.
https://nypost.com/2019/05/29/america-left-to-face-the-nasty-consequences-of-robert-muellers-actions/
Mueller is a Deep State pig. Is there any other way to say it?
The Deep State consists of over a million Democrats who cannot be fired due to the Civil Service code adopted in the late 19th century to protect us from partisanship! They hire their own.
POTUS control applies to only about 9000 total federal positions.
Every once in a while I get optimistic about the future of our America, but I’m increasingly being pushed into anticipating a violent response to the maddeningly deluding and insane Democrats. They have obviously morphed in my lifetime into oppressors who will oppress now and forever. We are now the equivalent of Germans in the year 1930.
We are now the equivalent of Germans in the year 1930.
No, Spaniards ca. 1934.
Huxley: Thank you for the EverNote suggestion. Good idea!
Cicero: I have been watching Ken Burns “The Civil War” and what is happening in States now is not unlike what was happening in the mid 1800’s in terms of the divide. However, the South split because of their economy, which is very different from what is going on today. I am not anticipating civil war, but I do think the Dems are out of their minds and totalitarian. I hope and think they have a losing strategy.
McCarthy –
https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/05/robert-mueller-investigation-was-always-impeachment-probe/
J.J. on May 30, 2019 at 8:05 pm said:
The Special Counsel’s investigation is oe sided. No evidence is heard from the other side. Except, in this case, President Trump, using his bully pulpit, kept proclaiming his innocence. By openly proclaiming his innocence, the Special Counsel prosecutors decided he was trying to obstruct their investigation. The perp is, in their opinion, not allowed to do that while the prosecution is compiling their evidence. Why? Because he’s a powerful man with a big megaphone. What they fail to take into account is the megaphone of the MSM, which was daily proclaiming Trump’s guilt.
* * *
Recall the “John Doe” investigations in Wisconsin, shut down as unconstitutional because they specifically forbade any targets or witnesses to even reveal that they were targets or witnesses in the investigation…therefore having no opportunity to contest the government’s position on any points of “evidence” — and I use the scare quotes on purpose.
One story at the end of the long tale:
https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2018/01/wisconsins-comey-over.php