Turley turns on Mueller
First Dershowitz, and now Turley:
The concerns over Mueller’s motivations was heightened by the justifications that he has offered for some of his decisions like not reaching a conclusion on the weight of the evidence on obstruction. Many of us view Mueller’s rationale (based on the DOJ policy not to indict a sitting president) to be not just unprecedented but illogical…
As someone who defended Mueller’s motivations against the unrelenting attacks of Trump, I found his press conference to be baffling, and it raised serious concerns over whether some key decisions are easier to reconcile on a political rather than a legal basis. Three decisions stand out that are hard to square with Mueller’s image as an apolitical icon…
Refusal to identify grand jury material
One of the most surprising disclosures made by Attorney General William Barr was that he and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein expressly told Mueller to submit his report with grand jury material clearly marked to facilitate the release of a public version. The Justice Department cannot release grand jury material without a court order. Mueller knew that. He also knew his people had to mark the material because they were in the grand jury proceedings.
Thus, Barr and Rosenstein reportedly were dumbfounded to receive a report that did not contain these markings. It meant the public report would be delayed by weeks as the Justice Department waited for Mueller to perform this basic task. Mueller knew it would cause such a delay as many commentators were predicting Barr would postpone the release of the report or even bury it. It left Barr and the Justice Department in the worst possible position and created the false impression of a coverup.
Why would a special counsel directly disobey his superiors on such a demand? There is no legal or logical explanation.
Excerpt partisan politics, of course.
More:
Surprise letter sent to the attorney general
Five days after submitting his report, Mueller sent a letter objecting that Barr’s summary letter to Congress “did not fully capture the context, nature, and substance” of the work and conclusions reached by his team…
The letter surprised Barr for good reasons. First, Barr had offered to allow Mueller to read the summary before submitting it. Mueller declined but then sent this letter calling for the release of sections of his report, even though they had not been cleared by Justice Department staff. Second, Barr has known Mueller for decades. Yet, Mueller did not simply pick up the phone to discuss his concerns and possible resolutions or to ask for a meeting. Instead, he undermined Barr with a letter clearly meant to insinuate something improper without actually making such an accusation.
Mueller’s letter also requested something he knew Barr could not do, which is to release uncleared portions of the report…
Refusal to reach an obstruction conclusion
…While entirely ignored by the media, Mueller contradicted himself in first saying that he would have cleared Trump if he could have, but then later saying that he decided not to reach a conclusion on any crime.
I have already addressed why Mueller’s interpretation of memos from the Justice Department Office of Legal Counsel is unprecedented and illogical. He concluded that, in barring the indictment and prosecution of a sitting president, those memos meant prosecutors can investigate but not reach conclusions on possible criminal acts.
It is not just his legal interpretation that is incomprehensible. Mueller was appointed almost two years before he released his report. He was fully aware that Congress, the Justice Department, the media, and the public expected him to reach conclusions on criminal conduct, a basic function of the special counsel. He also was told he should do so by the attorney general and deputy attorney general. Yet, he relied on two highly controversial opinions written by a small office in the Justice Department.
Over those two years, Mueller could have asked his superiors for a decision on this alleged policy barring any conclusions on criminal conduct. More importantly, he could have requested an opinion from the Office of Legal Counsel…
More at the link.
Turley is one of those libertarian lawyer/pundits with whom I sometimes disagree and more often agree. He almost never writes anything stupid even when it’s something with which I disagree, and he’s usually crystal clear in what he’s saying and why he’s saying it. Dershowitz is the liberal Democrat equivalent. With Mueller recently, both Dershowitz and Turley have been deeply shocked by the behavior of a man they used to respect and have spent some time defending. It is a mark of how egregious Mueller’s behavior has been that Turley has turned on him, and has made it extremely clear (as well as convincing on the merits) as to why he changed his mind.
Why did Mueller do it? Politics, of course—plus the fact that he thought he could get away with it. Oh, not with the right, or with people like Turley. But the left and the Democrats in Congress have lapped it up, and the sort of criticism Turley raises in his piece probably won’t reach most of the public.
Mueller was just helping to straighten and clear the tracks as the Impeachment Express builds steam. I just hope Trump is holding the IG report and any of the other evidence he has on the attempted coup until the timing is right and the Impeachment train is heading for a trestle ready to be blown apart.
“Turley turns on Mueller.”
Imagine then: Mueller ripping at Turley’s clothing, tongue hanging out; Turley struggling to escape Bob’s grasp; fleeing screaming across the national Mall with Mueller in desperate pursuit of the object of his passion. Not a single D.C. denizen offers a helping hand to poor Jonathan as Bob — former Marine — dives to tackle and bring down his prey.
(Apologies. Sorry. Couldn’t stop. Had to be done.)
Re: Refusal to identify grand jury material
Something’s amiss. From Mueller’s letter to Barr:
Highlight mine.
It sounds like Mueller prepared summaries with all but two sentences ready to go. Yet Turley complains; “Mueller’s letter also requested something he knew Barr could not do, which is to release uncleared portions of the report…”
Why didn’t Barr just review the two sentences and release the summary?
Spin Maju spin.
More bafflement from a first-class mind.
“The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool.”
– Richard Feynman
“It sounds like Mueller prepared summaries with all but two sentences ready to go. Yet Turley complains; “Mueller’s letter also requested something he knew Barr could not do, which is to release uncleared portions of the report…”
Why didn’t Barr just review the two sentences and release the summary?”
Manju’s question hinges on two things:
(1) What did the introduction and executive summaries actually say?
(2)Were they private messages to Barr and thus not part of the Report itself, or were they included in and excerpted from the Report? Mueller’s own statement is ambiguous / unclear about that, and this additional excerpt from his letter makes me lean to the first option:
If they were documents prepared in addition to the Report, Barr had no obligation to use them in any case whatsoever, and Turley is not referring to them.
Now, it may be that these documents were what Barr referred to, when, after issuing his own summary, he said he didn’t want to release the Report piecemeal, which argues for them being included somewhere in the Report itself.
However, because they are an introduction and a summary for each volume, even if they were prepared with redactions marked, this does not invalidate Turley’s assertion that the full Report was not properly prepared as Mueller had been instructed.
Whether private messages or excerpts, Barr may have disagreed with their content; perhaps he thought they did not address the substance of the Report fully or fairly.
(Can they be accessed anywhere? If private, probably not; if excerpts, what pages of the Report are they on?)
Mueller’s behavior when he was FBI director was not the behavior of an honest, honorable or ethical person. I could never figure out why the media touted him as Mr. integrity. I do not find his unethical behavior surprising.
Both introductions and ex. summaries are in the published pdf, pp. 1-10 vol.I, 1-8 vol.II.
Mueller’s investigation was wholly corrupt from the beginning. Remember that Strozk and Page were part of his legal team but then quietly let go without public notice. Sometime later it came to light that they were Trump haters and that they were complicit in the effort to create the false Russian collusion narrative that would be the excuse for impeaching Trump. I recently came across an article that claimed that Weissman, Mueller’s lieutenant, was also involved involved in disseminating the Steele dossier as early as August 2016.
So we have Mueller’s investigators deeply involved in creating the crime that was supposed to have been committed by Trump. What virtuous, moral, and upright people.
Another example of the principled left reacting to the radicals who have seized control of the Democratic Party:
https://www.thenation.com/article/the-real-costs-of-russiagate/
This is from “The Nation” magazine, long a leading intellectual journal of the left.
Okay – back to Introductory Prepositions Class.
“that enclosed the introduction and executive summary for each volume of the Special Counsel’s report marked with redactions ”
So, looks like Mueller was indeed sending Barr copies of material excerpted from the Report, but which represented his own team’s “spin” on the evidence and assertions included in the body of the Report.
Barr’s team would still have had to review the introduction and summaries to see that the redactions provided by Mueller were adequate to satisfy the law.
That might be what Turley meant by “uncleared portions of the report.”
BTW, IIRC, some pundits have questioned why Mueller wanted to produce an introduction and summary that required redactions in the first place, if they were meant for public release, as he obviously intended.
But Mueller STILL had not provided the requested redactions for the FULL Report, and his letter was a thinly veiled attempt to force Barr’s hand with the “prepared” documents, which Barr (for the reasons he stated, and possibly others) declined to accede to.
Back over to you, Manju.
Another point of confusion from the Slate article Manju linked to:
“In the letter, the special counsel asked for his introduction and executive summaries—items later included in the redacted report—to be released to help combat confusion.”
Were they in the original Report or not??
Barr did let them get released to the public, just not on Mueller’s timetable.
manju makes a fool of itself again.
Mueller is the obvious figurehead for a team run by Weissmann who has previously had problems with his theories of obstruction. Like a Supreme Court 9-0 reversal.
Mueller was trying to set the narrative by forcing Barr to release his, Mueller’s, own self-serving summaries. That is why he refused to identify the GJ material in the bulk of the report- he really thought he had Barr outmaneuvered. Barr outplayed him by writing his own damned summary that included torpedoing Mueller’s novel obstruction theories right out of the gate. That is why Mueller wrote his snotty little letter that he leaked to the press.
Mueller blew it, and I think he knows it now. They were trying to get Trump impeached, but didn’t have the courage to make a determination that might face pushback from either the DoJ (it would have), or from Republicans in the House since Mueller and his team would have had to testify in that case. Mueller and Weissmann are cowards- they weren’t willing to walk the talk.
Chris Farrell, Judicial Watch: https://mobile.twitter.com/JudicialWatch/status/1135607079924686849
Just a reminder where the vectors point, is all.
Herr Müller und Manu expose their true allegiance over and over again
https://www.thenation.com/article/the-real-costs-of-russiagate/
This is from “The Nation” magazine, long a leading intellectual journal of the left.
Roy Loftquist: I read that article off a RealPolitics link and couldn’t believe it was “The Nation” magazine. I kept rechecking that it was really “The Nation” (a longstanding hard-left magazine) and I wasn’t misunderstanding the text in a fundamental way.
I’m still not sure how “The Nation” published that article even though it manages a left-wing spin by the end.
Mueller and Weissmann are cowards- they weren’t willing to walk the talk.
Yancey Ward: Yep.
It is now time for law-respecting, constitution-loving Americans to pull on their boots and stomp Democratic cockroaches.
USA is the last best place for decent and devout humans on the planet. It must be saved.
A transcript of a conversation between Trump’s then attorney, John Dowd, and Michael Flynn’s attorney included in the Mueller Report was edited to make Trump seem guilty. This was in the obstruction section of the report. You can read all about it here:
https://www.theepochtimes.com/transcript-in-mueller-report-selectively-edited-to-cast-suspicion-on-trump_2947573.html
Devin Nunes is going over the report with a fine toothed comb looking for more such slanted material. I expect he will find much more.
All-in-all the tactics (AM SWAT raids to arrest white collar perps, solitary confinement for Manafort, attempts to pressure suspects to “compose,” etc.) and the slanted report are the MO of Andrew Weissmann. That Mueller went along with the ultra hardball tactics really makes him look like a fool or a knave. If I were him, I wouldn’t want to have this as my swan song in public service. The honest, tough, ethical, Marine/FBI Director isn’t looking so good. Too bad, so sad.
Like 90% of the inhabitants of the so called DC swamp creatures, Mueller was an escaped python in the murky water. Zero integrity, honesty, or alliance to the Constitution. His history can be discussed over and over again, but he remains a python in the swamp.
I know this post is about Turley but it perfectly illustrates the problem with NeverTrump conservatives. Nobody has to like Trump or turn a blind eye to his bad bahavior but what is alienating NeverTrump intellectuals from not only a growing number of their peers but the overwhelming majority of the conservative public is NeverTrumpers refusal to acknowledge the bad bahavior of ANYONE but Trump.
I mean, some of them have become the political equivalent of Flat Earthers and the fallout from that is only beginning. Mindlessly attacking Trump was one thing when no one thought he would win or when the GOP held both houses of Congress and the Presidency. The Republican establishment is either going to win with Trump in 2020 or likely lose everything, however, and patience for people like David French or Bill Kristol is going to run very thin, very quickly.
Mike
“patience for people like David French or Bill Kristol is going to run very thin, very quickly.”
My patience for them ran out well before the 2016 election. I was *not* an original Trumper, had a lot of doubts about him at first. But even then I saw how he was striking a nerve with the American public and realized that like him or not his issues were going to have to be dealt with. Not to mention that the alternative to Trump was Hillary Clinton. Judicial nominees alone should have made support for Trump a slam dunk for anyone claiming to be on the “right”.
I’m much more favorably inclined towards Trump now but still understand why people get heartburn over him. However it is intellectually dishonest to refuse to engage the Trump phenomenon and how such a political outlier came to be elected President. Even more so now that we see these forces at work all over the Western world – Brexit, yellow jackets etc.
J.J. on June 3, 2019 at 11:38 pm said:
A transcript of a conversation between Trump’s then attorney, John Dowd, and Michael Flynn’s attorney included in the Mueller Report was edited to make Trump seem guilty.
* * *
I haven’t yet seen anyone address the question: if Dowd was suggesting any kind of obstruction, why on earth would a seasoned political attorney leave a VOICEMAIL with the incriminating evidence?
Here is my latest tin-foil-hatware.
I started wondering a couple of days ago about those Russians “with ties to Putin” actually named and (if not named) only slightly disguised in the references to them in Mueller’s report and MSM articles.
If they were leaking Putin’s “deals” with Trump to Western ears (Steele et al.), then why were they not all dead or in prison by now?
(Air-quotes because the deals were nonexistent, per Mueller’s investigation.)
(If — probability now known to be zero — Putin & Trump actually had been conspiring, Putin would not want any evidence or rumors of that to be revealed, because it is no good having secret plans, or kompromat on someone, if the whole world knows about it already.)
If the Russians were furnishing disinformation about Trump’s campaignat Putin’s behest, however, that little problem is itself eliminated.
But why would Putin want Trump to be accused of colluding (conspiring) with him, knowing, as he did, that such was not actually happening?
Possible answer came here, although Horowitz does not address the information in that context:
https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/273894/why-trumps-style-not-problem-david-horowitz#.XPTFephT6EY.twitter
Hillary to Putin: Vlad, we have big trouble. Trump’s administration is going to start looking at all those deals we made!
Putin: No worries, babushka. We’ll make it look like I was trying to get him elected instead of you. Just blame it all on me, and his people will be too busy defending Orange Man to bother about what you had been doing — or harassing me about what I will be doing.
I am actually somewhat surprised that Mueller’s team didn’t “find” any evidence of Trump or his campaign conspiring with someone in Russia!
(Democrats are always “finding” overlooked ballots in car trunks, or sacred rights in Constitutional penumbras — looks like they are slipping.)
Perhaps the belief that Hillary would win was so entrenched and pervasive that no one planted anything beforehand, and they just had to go with what either actually happened (spun as negatively as possible, but not enough to pass muster), or Steele’s (now known to be) blatant inventions.
‘I’m still not sure how “The Nation” published that article even though it manages a left-wing spin by the end.’
It does seem surprising. Until one reads a bit more carefully.
While it has the aura of studied subjectivity, this extremely well-crafted article fastidiously REMOVES Obama (and the other “heavies” in his administration) from the loop, essentially exonerating Obama from any connection with the biggest political scandal in the history of the Republic.
The others will have to fend for themselves. (Of course, we all know Susan Rice had the best of intentions because of that cute little email to herself….)
IOW they will be expected to fall on their swords. (They may even be helped to do so.)
Meanwhile, the House of Representatives and the MSM will provide furious, defensive rear-guard fire in an attempt to drown out the truth and “save the day”.
(Nothing new there…except the intensity.)
Interesting, but very deep-in-the-weeds analysis by Dyer:
https://libertyunyielding.com/2019/06/04/spygate-reminder-comey-said-to-spike-assange-deal-to-limit-release-of-stolen-government-cyber-tools-in-2017/
Long section on pilfered, and published, CIA and NSA cyber tool sets; accusations that Italian government operatives planted incriminating stuff related to Spygate on a corporate server in the USA; and not entirely credible speculations.
That seems kind of odd to me too.
Really deep-weeds stuff about Comey, hacks, Wikileaks, Italians, Hillary, and others.
“Why did Mueller do it?”
And yet, even Mueller could not but have realized that he was—that he is—walking on the razor’s edge.
Might this be the reason for the short, nervous, pallid performance and the quick exit?
And might he suspect that “The Narrative” is on the rocks? That it may no longer be able to protect him? That he may be dragged back into the Coliseum?
Turley is not all that intelligent compared to my standards. His filters and prejudices are just a tad too extreme for his current incarnation to deal with.
Aesop is getting more dangerous now. He has learned how to use block quotes. That puts him in a different league entirely. As for Turley, why he chose his fate and destiny, I have no idea. It seems his group thought he would be able to learn something from the Law.
Aesop, the US intel agencies have been infiltrated and subverted since NKVD, Jesuits, Operation Paperclip at least, and the KGB were around.
None of this is new compared to my Source on the subjects. I wouldn’t say the CIA and NSA and the FBi has always been that way but… mostly that was so, just nobody bothered to tell you American citizens (slaves) that at the time.
I mean, some of them have become the political equivalent of Flat Earthers and the fallout from that is only beginning.
haha. See even random strangers online are talking about Flat Earthers!
As hussein said, we have no time for the Flat Earth society, isn’t that right. And we must Obey what President Hussein said, of course.
The weird anti Flat Earth positions taken by Leftists should be noted for its irregularity.
Aesop, as for Horowitz, his positions vis a vis Russia is too biased to be worth much. He has too many prejudices, just look at this previous incident with Diane West.
As for Putin and tin foil hats, tin foil is to block radiation and 5g, Aesop. People put them in the walls of houses to prevent electromagnetic allergies and reactions from the stronger wireless frequencies. Also, it does not have to be Putin in charge of Russia’s Deep State. It could just be Russia’s version of the Deep State messing with Putin, while also messing with the USA.
Live by the redaction. Die by the redaction.
Here’s the meme that will be pushed good and hard and some will be not pleased about it:
https://video.foxnews.com/v/6044227304001/#sp=show-clips
The short version: Mueller is mincemeat.
And another charming interlude from Team Obama:
https://video.foxnews.com/v/6044368313001/#sp=show-clips
Mueller is just a stalking horse. He’s not important. Watch for the deathblow by the Deep State to come elsewhere. It’ll be more spectacular than that little incident on September 11, 2001.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHOu6o5P73Q
About Flat Earth theory, the kids, teenagers, college students, and now Ph.D people are now getting in on it after mainstream and sports stars hit it up for some ratings.
“…meme…”
The Dowd meme, continued. (It’s serious.)
https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2019/06/dowd-dings-mueller.php
Two days ago the President tweeted this: “Hearing word that Russia, Syria and, to a lesser extent, Iran, are bombing the hell out of Idlib Province in Syria, and indiscriminately killing many innocent civilians. The World is watching this butchery. What is the purpose, what will it get you? STOP!”
Yesterday, Mike Doran (twitter @Doranimated) linked this Independent(UK) article, which begins: “Doctors working in rebel-held northern Syria will no longer share the locations of medical facilities with the United Nations after doing so failed to stop them being targeted by airstrikes.
Some 25 hospitals have been bombed by Syrian government and Russian forces in the past month, as the two allies push an offensive against the last opposition bastion of Idlib.
The coordinates of nine of those facilities were shared with the UN, which passed them to Russia in an effort to protect them from being bombed and encourage some form of accountability for attacks. Instead, they also came under fire.”
[ https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/syria-hospital-bombings-idlib-un-doctors-russia-assad-attack-a8942076.html ]
Barack Obama ushered the Russians into Syria in order that they, together with Obama’s chosen middle-east hegemon, the Islamic Republic of Iran, could save Bashar Assad’s regime, murdering many hundreds of thousands of Sunni Muslim Syrians in the process, as well as displacing from their homes and putting to flight many millions more. So it’s little wonder Obama and his loyal crew seek to bouy up the Iranian mullahs now, otherwise all Obama’s brilliant strategic works might come unglued.
Just think of the horrors in that eventuality: the Iranian people finally freed from their tyrannical regime, then using their freedom to begin to prosper in peace once again, no longer seeking to build expensive, wasteful nuclear weapons; the Syrians no longer being murdered in their marketplaces, homes, schools, hospitals; Assad driven out, the Russians driven out, and poor benighted Syria on the first steps to recovery, their countrymen returning from exile in strange lands. Turkey, Jordan, Iraq, Lebanon no longer bearing the burden of millions of Syrian refugees in their lands. No no no, this must not be, Obama’s genius must not be denied, his great foreign policy legacy must not be undone. No. Never.
In keeping with the cries, howls, shrieks for Kavanaugh’s head; along with the shouts and screams calling for Trump’s impeachment; and following Mueller’s transcendently dishonest performance, the Democratic Party—the Party of ethics and morality, of concern for the law and of patriotism, of caring and compassion—show they mean business:
https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/alan-dershowitz-why-is-paul-manafort-off-to-rikers-prepare-to-be-shocked-and-outraged
So too, the Party’s supporters:
https://pjmedia.com/trending/why-this-jewish-conservative-student-was-forced-to-go-into-hiding/
Their message: “Don’t mess with us because if you do, it means you’re toast.”
The party that deserves to lead the country?
MBunge said: “I know this post is about Turley but it perfectly illustrates the problem with NeverTrump conservatives. Nobody has to like Trump or turn a blind eye to his bad bahavior but what is alienating NeverTrump intellectuals from not only a growing number of their peers but the overwhelming majority of the conservative public is NeverTrumpers refusal to acknowledge the bad bahavior of ANYONE but Trump.”
Yes. Just so.
NeverTrump-ism increasingly has the same kind of wild inconsistency and disproportion that we usually encounter only in the tiresome Israel-Is-The-Only-Nation-State-Worth-Critiquing crowd at the U.N.
Funny, really, to see Jennifer Rubin, Bill Kristol, and the like patterning their ideological lives so neatly on those of upper-class antisemites of the world.
Politics truly does make strange bedfellows.
I keep seeing people–here and there–presenting arguments, among them some technical arguments–that the DNC’s servers were not actually hacked by any outside force i.e. Russia, but that some insider at the DNC downloaded data from the server onto, say, a thumb drive (according to the technical argument, a much quicker download process than hacking from the outside), and walked that data out the door, and then sent it to Wikileaks, with some commenters suggesting that the main actor here may be the mysteriously slain DNC employee Seth Rich.
Of course, we can’t be sure, because–quite oddly–the FBI has reportedly never actually gotten access to those servers to examine them but, instead, according to reports, signed a written agreement to rely on the analysis from a “highly respected private company,”* a firm hired by the DNC–Cloudstrike–for the assertion that Russian hackers were responsible for the theft of material from the DNC’s server.
Thus, the entire case for “Russian hacking” rests on the mere assertion by Cloudstrike.
What if Cloudstrike’s assertion is wrong?
If they are wrong, what does this do to all of the legal cases, prosecutions, analyses, and Reports that have been generated as a result of relying on Cloudstrike’s assertion of “Russian hacking”?
* https://thefederalistpapers.org/us/busted-comey-testifies-dnc-denied-fbi-request-to-inspect-hacked-servers
I think
Manju on June 3, 2019 at 5:27 pm
is confusing things.
What Mueller failed to mark was the grand jury material in the 448 page report. Mueller’s marking of grand jury material in his summaries is besides the point. Barr decided that the entire report (i.e., the 448 page report, redacted as legally required) along with Meuller’s summaries should be repeated together. Meuller even acknowledged that Barr’s decision in that regard was a good faith decision.
<b.Mueller's failure to mark grand jury material in the 448 page report created the delay in releasing everything.
“Turkey is not all that intelligent compared to my standards”
Is anyone?
More coming… or to quote
“We now know the truth” – John Dowd
a federal judge (Judge Emmet Sullivan) released the transcript of a voicemail he left for retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn’s lawyer Rob Kelner shortly after he agreed to cooperate with Mueller.
THE MESSAGE
Dowd resigned as Trump’s lead counsel for the Mueller investigation in March 2018.
The 448-page Mueller report, hints at the voicemail as part of a possible effort by Trump’s team to influence Flynn
“This is clearly a baseless, political document designed to smear and damage the reputation of counsel and innocent people,” Dowd
Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., have highlighted how parts of the transcript were left out, including Dowd saying his request was “not only for the president, but for the country,” he was not asking for confidential information, and he did not appear to be certain that Flynn had decided to cooperate with Mueller’s team.
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Flynn admitted to lying to the FBI about his communications with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak, which were about sanctions during the transition before Trump took office, and reached a plea deal with Mueller’s team.
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
“Isn’t it ironic that this man who kept indicting and prosecuting people for process crimes committed a false statement in his own report?” Dowd said. “By taking out half my words,” he added that they changed the “tenor and the contents” of his conversation with Flynn’s lawyer.
“It’s an outrage. And there’s probably more of it”
sdferr @ 9:19 am – so glad to ‘hear your voice’ again – what I’ve missed most since the demise of PW (that and your music recommendations).
Thanks Stephen, kind of you to say. I’ve missed PW too, but ach . . . . . nuttin’ to be done.
ymarsakar on June 4, 2019 at 7:50 am said:
Aesop is getting more dangerous now. He has learned how to use block quotes. That puts him in a different league entirely.
* * *
Wow!
If only I had known sooner that was all it took!
MAGA – Make Aesop Great Again
A picture is worth a thousand words — and you don’t even have to put it in block quotes!
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/7e26af832a838e475882f14225c98f04765358671f79d695b9ba34cf690f7a15.jpg
Problem with Aesop is he tells fables..
heh
Comments at “Dowd Dings Mueller” on Power Line:
https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2019/06/dowd-dings-mueller.php
Henry Livermore Abbott • 15 hours ago
Every lawyer on this site understood that Mueller’s 11 vignettes of obstruction were worthless: They were unvetted and unchallenged by opposing counsel, not scrutinized for exculpatory evidence, and bound together with Soviet era legal theories.
Depending on what else we learn, Weissman’s license to practice may be in play.
* * *
CosmotKat Henry Livermore Abbott • 15 hours ago
Even those not trained in the law, but thoroughly up to date on the issues, understood this was to be a report based on lies and distortions. The report opens with a distortion regarding the Russian interference in the 2016 election. There is yet to be proof the Russians were the perpetrators of the DNC computer hack. It goes down hill from there.
* * *
Henry Livermore Abbott CitizenKane • 13 hours ago
CK, my references weren’t to ethics but to common procedures for depositions and trials: exams, cross-exams, impeachments, Brady Rule, etc. And because not one of Mueller’s little vignettes have been subject to this process, their current status is no more than a claim. The Dowd elision illustrates the reasons why. I can’t do better than the ancient Romans: Falsus et uno, Falsus et omnibus.[sic – more often “Falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus”]
* * *
HdwJunkie • 15 hours ago
It is safe to assume with Mueller/Weissman in charge, that any exculpatory material was not presented, and most incriminating evidence was likely manufactured, as in this case, via careful edits. License to Lie should be required reading for everyone who reads PLB.
* * *
murphy300 • 14 hours ago
Dowd is correct. If he had NOT made the call he would have been committing malpractice. It’s not that the call was unethical, NOT making the call would have been unethical. And, for the cherry on top, since it was a lawyer-to-lawyer call there was no way it could be portrayed as influencing Gen. Flynn. I wish I could believe that the judges involved in these cases would call out the so-called lawyers who come up with this nonsense, but that is expecting too much.
* * *
Jim Bob 1028 • 14 hours ago
Sorry, guys, but the vast majority of people will never “understand[] what the report does to Dowd” because they get their news from the corporate media.
The release of the full transcript should have been a “bombshell” in the parlance of corporate media, a Google search will reveal that it was all but ignored by the corporate media.
Instead, corporate media ran with the FAKE NEWS that a member of the Trump transition team was arrested for child pornography.
The Mueller Report portrays George Nader as a sleazy lobbyist with Middle East connections who sought connections with politicians of every stripe, not as a member of the Trump campaign or transition team. The best Nader could do was to con Eric Prince — who also had no formal position in the Trump Campaign or the transition team according to Mueller — to fly to an infamous meeting in the Seychelles. Instead, the Mueller Report states directly that Nader had previously made connections with Clinton’s campaign team as well as Trump’s. To the corporate media, though, that’s enough to make Nader a senior member of Trump transition team.
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andrewfalcon • 12 hours ago
My hope is that when all the dust settles, the image of Robert Mueller is in tatters and that his reputation as a Boy Scout is shattered forever. This man is a skunk of the highest order. Whatever honor he accumulated during his military service has long been eclipsed by his nefarious deeds as a classic Washington insider and should bring him dishonor for all eternity.
I know there is talk that Mueller might be a figurehead for this report, that it is the loathsome Andrew Weissmann who is responsible for the lead role in whatever went on during the May 2017 to March 2019 period of the investigation. Weissmann is his own version of skunk and deserves his own place in the Washington DC Hall of Shame. But 95% of the people in this country couldn’t identify Weissmann if their life depended on it. As long as Mueller remains silent and the report bears his name, Mueller is THE GUY. He owns all of it. It is time he starting owning the shame as well.
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Amadeus27 • 12 hours ago
This is easy to explain. Dowd outsmarted Mueller and his team, and this is their revenge.
Listen to Byron York’s fascinating two-part interview of Dowd earlier this year. The strategy was to protect Trump by flooding the zone with information. They sent McGahn and his notes; they waived claims of executive privilege; they asked Mueller what he wanted and gave it to him–everything except an interview with Trump. At the end, Mueller gave up when he couldn’t identify any information that Trump had that had not already been provided. Mueller’s whole plan was to interview Trump, a notoriously undisciplined talker, and trap him into obstruction/lying claims. Dowd took that away from him.
Dowd outsmarted Team Mueller, and they’ll never forgive him.
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AnnieOakley • 9 hours ago
So here’s my question: If Mueller was tasked to determine whether obstruction of justice took place by Donald Trump, any of his family or campaign by means of lying and/or manipulation of facts, isn’t Robert Mueller HIMSELF now guilty of the same obstruction of justice by lying about and manipulating testimony of those whom he investigates for this report?
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Michael Bowler • 6 hours ago
Mueller was hired, with full understanding, to create an impeachment document.
He could have done what he did do a year ago. If he did, and it had the same effect, the Democrats might not have the necessary majority to perform an impeachment. Yup, the release of the report was timed with malice aforethought. I know it, you know it, he knows we know it. Most of the public is only dimly aware that he did anything, let alone what we know…
Scott transcribed part of Dowd’s appearance on Sean Hannity, which makes interesting reading. A commenter remarked that Dowd was always complimentary about Mueller and their relationship, which probably amplified his feeling that his Good Friend Bob betrayed him.
You might say “Dowd turns on Mueller.”
https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2019/06/dowd-dings-mueller.php