Home » A little background on Flynn’s original defense lawyers’ conflict of interest, and a few other things as well

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A little background on Flynn’s original defense lawyers’ conflict of interest, and a few other things as well — 37 Comments

  1. Again, everything that’s happened to Flynn suggests the solution is institutional death for the Department of Justice along with scarifying the federal criminal code. In particular, replicate what’s done in New York and other states: a requirement for a perjury or false statements charge is that the subject be under oath or he have affixed his signature to a written instrument with a jurat. Replicate what the police department in Slidell La does: record interviews and have certified stenographers type up transcripts. Replicate what’s done on the local level and put prosecutors and police in separate departments. Strip prosecutors of any franchise to initiate investigations.

  2. These government people seem to be wanting to run the country instead of follow the constitution and law and being public servants. This stuff makes me sick at my stomach because if it is actual fact and and I do think it is we have been sold down the river so far we probably will never make it back.

  3. While you’re right that those who framed him seem determined to make it stick.
    it seems to me relevant that everybody knows somebody is guilty.

    So it’s either Flynn or … those who framed him.

    It’s a death cage match. Somebody comes out guilty.

    except
    except
    no indictments, no problem.

    I’m certain Flynn was mistreated. I’m hoping there are indictments.

    Trump seems to be hoping that, too. Here with Sharyl Attkisson:
    http://fullmeasure.news/news/full-episodes/full-measure-may-24-2020-interview-with-the-president

  4. The Podesta brothers, one of whom ran Hillary’s campaign, were also questioned about FARA but, wonder of wonders, there was no prosecution.,

  5. Thanks to you once again for such finely detailed investigating, Ms. Neo. As others have noted, the prosecution/persecution of Flynn is all about the arbitrary and selective application of extremely powerful tools in the hands of extremely powerful extremists, being brought to bear against the suffering individual.

    …”the practice of obtaining something, especially money, through force or threats.”

    …” obtaining benefit through coercion. In most jurisdictions it is likely to constitute a criminal offense.”

    …”the gaining of property or money by almost any kind of force or threat of violence, property damage, harm to reputation, or unfavorable government action. ”

    Yes, I think the word extortion fits by definition. The Why? of this will be is the most interesting part.

  6. A bit tangential perhaps, but the media has been such a large component of the problem, and the turn-about of the Democrats from critics of big government and the IC in particular, I bring this post to your attention, in order to point out a significant mindset in the people who are supposedly the sophisticated Washington observers.

    https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/remember-when-liberals-despised-the-national-security-state/

    The post begins by describing an incident in April 1975, when “former director of national intelligence Richard Helms, then the U.S. ambassador to Iran, left a hearing room where he had been grilled for three hours about CIA misdeeds then coming to light in the wake of the Watergate scandal.”
    Helms lashed out at CBS reporter Daniel Schorr for airing a story alleging CIA assassination attempts against various foreign leaders, calling them lies.
    (I do not take a position; the point is that Helms accused Schorr of committing fake news.)
    Then the author recounts an earlier incident during the 1964 Goldwater campaign when Schorr did, in verifiable fact, broadcast a “bogus story” about Goldwater “appealing to right-wing elements in Germany.”

    It should have been a firing offense, but Schorr survived it. Hence, in 1975, he was in Washington covering national security matters and filling the CBS airwaves with abundant scoops laying bare security agency abuses then tumbling out of two congressional investigations and another promulgated by the Gerald Ford administration.

    Schorr’s relentless reporting on these matters reflected a fundamental reality of American politics in those times. If you worked within the national security establishment and involved yourself in abuses of power, you would do well to beware the forces of American liberalism, for they would assuredly come after you. Liberalism was, in those days, the watchdog of American politics, rooting out abuses of power at the CIA, the FBI, and other law enforcement and national security agencies.

    Conservatives back then tended to defend those agencies or at least warn ominously against undermining their ability to do their jobs. Liberals seemed more motivated by the age-old warning—often embraced by conservatives in other contexts—that power corrupts and that especially those holding stealthy power needed to be watched closely and reined in.

    Thinking back on those days, one wonders about today’s liberal establishment. How could it be so blasé about what are clear abuses of power by law enforcement and intelligence officials in the now-infamous Russian collusion probe? How could it be so aggressive in defending those actions even as their abusive nature becomes increasingly clear? Where are the Dan Schorrs of today?

    Excuse me?!?!

    Nothing about their switch from disclosing abuse in the secret agencies to abetting it needs some kind of angst-ridden explaining.
    The Dan Schorr of yesterday demonstrated clear bias against Republicans on two different occasions — one that was proved false, and one that is still debated.
    The Dan Schorrs of today are still demonstrating clear bias — against Republicans.
    Maybe Schorr was the stopped clock, and most likely there are GOP abuses, but the media (no need now to even modify it as “left wing” because there wasn’t any other kind) were never motivated by any concern about reining in corrupt power unless it was being wielded by the right.

    They only come after Republicans, and they always lie if the truth doesn’t fit their agenda.

    They were then, and are now, perfectly happy with wielding that power themselves.
    They haven’t changed their views on the abuse of power: they just want a monopoly on it.

  7. We shall see what the electorate does in November, but I think the behaviour of the Democratic party has from the very beginning of its reaction to the 2016 election felt justified in going outside the law or any standard of truth to retain power. And been naively open about it. They don’t seem to have any sense that they are rather like that knight in the Monty Python film who, after he has both legs and arms cut off, still wants to fight and insists his wounds are ‘just a scratch’. I don’t think many of them have enough self insight to see they may be condemning their party to oblivion. I know from ordinary Democratic friends and family who still see the situation through the lens of the MSM that the Democrats believe they can regain power and even change the legal structure to ensure permanent power, but I don’t think they have understood how transparent they are. What I think is going to happen is that Trump will continue to peel off centrist voters who can see what is going on and vote accordingly. Candice Owen’s Blexit movement is an obvert example of this peeling off process, but I suspect it is going on inside many voters. Persisting in framing Flynn is an astonishing example of an unforced error. I don’t see them getting away with it despite the apparent collusion of many Republicans like Ryan and Graham in the larger schlomozzle. I think the jig is up and they are dead men walking.

  8. Usually when people get caught doing something wrong, they’ll at least stop the bad behavior while denying they ever did it in the first place. What’s going on now with Judge Sullivan is like Bill Clinton walking out on the White House lawn with Monica and getting serviced in the middle of his impeachment trial.

    Mike

  9. “Persisting in framing Flynn is an astonishing example of an unforced error.” – Lorenz

    A couple of days ago, J E Dyer addressed the question of why the Democrats didn’t quit pushing the Flynn case once it blew up after Powell came on board and their own perfidy became ever more apparent — what was the motive driving their quite unhinged persecution of the general? Some suggested Obama ego, or protecting his legacy, and other typical political motives, but she thinks it goes much deeper.

    https://libertyunyielding.com/2020/05/25/real-jcpoa-asking-the-right-question-about-michael-flynn-and-judge-sullivans-folly/

    Lee Smith made a convincing case in his recent article at Tablet that the infrastructure for smear-marching the Iran “deal” to completion in 2015 was the same one used to attack Michael Flynn, with the same actors, methods, and core motives. That is a very important point.

    But it’s his question at the very end of the article that needs our greatest focus. Smith doesn’t propound an answer to it. It’s the one I’ve been wrestling with for the last three years now, without a satisfactory conclusion as yet

    It’s not as much who benefits as it is what is the benefit?

    What do the beneficiaries lose if Flynn is no longer flopping with a hook in his jaw?

    It has always been fatuous and superficial to declare that the benefit was merely sustaining Obama’s “legacy.” (Which was not Lee Smith’s claim, incidentally. His vision is much more penetrating than that.)

    The motive doesn’t come from pride in a legacy, not for the high crimes and misdemeanors attending the Iran “deal” (the JCPOA) or the anti-Trump campaign, with its relentless supporting effort in the Flynn attack vector.

    It’s something else. It’s something worth burning down everything to hang onto.

    The starting point is clearly the nexus Smith identifies, of the anti-Trump campaign with the Iran JCPOA. There are two facets of that. One is the nefarious methods used by the Obama alumni in both cases to attack legitimate domestic political opposition. Regarding this facet, the concern would appear to be exposure of those methods and who was involved in them.

    But when you think about it, just about everyone involved has already been exposed at this point. We have a very good idea of what they did. The legal reprisals have barely begun, but the political fallout is already being felt. Those fated to go under the bus are mostly there already; they have no live futures left in politics or the halls of government power.

    The consequences from facet one are being processed and bled out as we speak. I suspect it’s facet two we need to be focused on.

    Facet two is the nature of the JCPOA itself. The factors in it are Iran, nuclear weapons, and the balance of power in the Middle East.

    And by far the most important mindset we need to adjust properly is this one. The JCPOA, in its reality – not in what it purports to be – is an instrument for keeping the Iranian nuclear weapons program alive, but also, for the time being, short of triggering an annihilating attack on it by the U.S. or Israel.

    It was evident back in 2015 that you wouldn’t push for just this specific JCPOA if you actually wanted to prevent Iran from getting nuclear weapons. Rather, you would push for it if you wanted to fence Iran’s program off for some period of time from its political opposition in Washington, D.C. and Jerusalem.

  10. “…much deeper…”

    Yes.

    And it’s the very ESSENCE of the Obama administration.

    As such, viewing it as an “unforced error” can only be a non sequitur (and precisely the sort of misapprehension that a decent person would make).

    We are dealing with a level of wickedness that is difficult—perhaps impossible—for any decent person to comprehend.

    The stuff of (Rhodesian?) fiction, of movies.

    Of Nazism and Communist regimes.

    And since 2008 (at least), the stuff of the “fundamentally transformed” Democratic Party, along with other elements of America (and American institutions) that that party has—successfully—fundamentally transformed.

  11. Regarding Sullivan’s “bizarre” decision, it is really NOT SO BIZARRE…if the goal of the good judge’s actions is to keep Michael Flynn (essentially a political prisoner) twisting in the wind for as long as possible—for as long as Obama and his henchmen deem necessary. That is, forever and a day.

    Which is THE ONLY THING that makes sense here.

    So….what might Sullivan and his wretched allies do to make sure that can be accomplished?

    What will Sullivan do to delay, to stall, to drag this thing out for as long as he can, to subvert justice, to ensure that the abuse, destruction and public degradation of Michael Flynn continue?

    Let’s see….
    Demand time to “marshall” his arguments (for this “complex” case)?
    Claim illegal “Trumpian” government “interference” and “politicization”?
    Demand adamantly (and with all the righteous indignation that he—and the MSCM can muster) that HIS (Sullivan’s) human rights are being violated by the rogue Trumpian administration? That HE (Sullivan) cease being abused and railroaded by the Trumpian regime?
    Feign illness?
    Mental distress?
    Victimization?

    Once again, the whole thing is a “Fatal Distraction” meant to turn the tables by focusing on Trump’s “Illegal” government and “demonstrating” just how Trump and his supporters are the TRUE threat facing America.

    And drag this national obscenity out..indefinitely.

    These guys never stop. And never will.

    Palestinian Rules!!

  12. When did evil resulting in Obamagate begin to be visible?

    Barry writes: “And since 2008 (at least), the stuff of the “fundamentally transformed” Democratic Party, along with other elements of America (and American institutions) that that party has—successfully—fundamentally transformed.”

    One turning point was when the media decided to lustily lie to the people. And we saw this in 1999, when the New York Times decided that Ken Starr was a sex-hating Puritan, and thus President Clinton was impeached only over sex – despite no mention of the word within the Bill of Impeachment.

    In fact, it was not about sex but three actual crimes like perjury and obstruction. The Bar only held him accountable for one, and thereby lifting his license to practice law. The Republican Senators vacated their oaths of office not to do so. Nevertheless, the NYTimes mythology “it was all about mean Republicans who hate sex,” an invention and lie, became the Truth that was taught.

    The media craziness and their leadership of the Democrat Party was just starting. But this is when I think US decline began.

    Between late 2003 and the next year when Michael Moore’s fake documentary “Fahrenheit 451” swept away all reason, decline was in someplace sense obvious.

    Prestigious and the most important Democrat Senators from Rockefeller in West Virginia, Ted Kennedy, and Dick Durban called out George Bush as worse than Hitler, worse than Stalin, and worse than Saddam Hussein! (Don’t hold me to those names to those leaders, but the acid and ridiculous triumvirates were all there, then.) All over abuse in a prison in Baghdad attracting little attention there bu generating over 50 front page stories in the New York Times.

    Rule by the crazy mob in the US had taken root: gasbagging and gaslighting was now the way political was was going to be conducted in the US, while Bush turned another and another cheek.

    Giving the US political system an other and another and another election to generate improvement, in the end, only saw the unrepentant Marxist re-elected. When that happened, The psychopolitical blogger drsanity turned the light out on new posts. My Tea Party friends saw this as the message to generate a US exit plan, if at al possible.

    Trump’s side has just begun to expose all His perfidy. Believe it or not, these are still early days in this saga.

    John Solomon and Sara Carter, the reporters who picked up the investigative torch from two anonymous FBI agents in White Hats in December, 2017, reckon that we only know 10 to 30% of the Obamunist corruption or treason story. (From a recent Sebastian Gorka interview program.)

    If so, then this story, Obamagate, will last through the next administration as well – that is, if Trump wins a second term.

    I don’t know about any mythical filling up of Galt’s Gulch in that time. I’m only highly sceptical about any return to the world from it, over the next four years. Or any Restoration of the Rule of Law or Return to Reason that would make it worthwhile. The irrational are attached to the Ruling Class at the hip. How could Trump and his ally’s ever sever that fundamental tie?

  13. “…misled, induced, and framed…”

    It’s clearly the Obamination SOP.

    (And one would have to add the travesty of investigation abuses committed against Carter Page along with the attempted destruction of quite a few others.)

    But it works—and how! it works—leading to specious drivel such as this (albeit written by a pathetically partisan, if “earnest” sounding, “Lawfare” hack):
    https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/04/ben-wittes-five-conclusions-mueller-report/588259/
    Key graf:
    “Mueller does not accuse the president of crimes. He doesn’t have to. But the facts he recounts describe criminal behavior.” etc., ad nauseum.

    Multiplied several million—billion—times over. By a ubiquitous, corrupt (but generally respected and believed(?)) media.

    Which is THE CRUX of the matter: it most definitely works. It pays. (Can it possibly be peeled back? Ever be refuted? Ever be wholly disproven? Can these accused, including Trump—especially Trump—ever be exonerated, given the sheer multiplier effect of this disgusting campaign?)

    For even if the vicious plot does somehow get exposed—revealed in part or in whole—though that of course was/is NOT supposed to happen—CANNOT BE ALLOWED to happen!—it is so convoluted, intricate and complex, so well-constructed and meticulously fashioned, that it sounds like it CAN ONLY be the ridiculous concoction of a hysterical conspiracy theorist. QED

    (Is there an award for evil genius? Maybe there should be. What would Mueller et al. give them, I wonder….)

  14. The Dan Schorr of yesterday demonstrated clear bias against Republicans on two different occasions — one that was proved false, and one that is still debated.

    Schorr was one of the left’s potent weapons on Vietnam and on Iraq.

    The first big abuse by Obama’s team was Papadopoulis. His book is well worth reading. One reason he was not hurt worse was that he outsmarted the team by being an honest man. He was “given” $10,000 in cash as a “retainer” by a mysterious Israeli in Cyprus. He was suspicious and left the cash with a lawyer in Greece. When he arrived in the US, he was immediately arrested by FBI with no warrant and they assumed he would have the cash on him or in his luggage. When it wasn’t there, a Keystone Kops scenario followed.

    Flynn was just not suspicious enough,.

  15. When it wasn’t there, a Keystone Kops scenario followed.

    What makes this right is that Andrew Weissmann gets disbarred. Won’t happen, of course.

  16. Mike K reminds us of an important point that seems to be overlooked far too often: someone working with the FBI set up Papadopoulis to be arrested on arrival in the US from a trip he had been invited on by people working with the plot. If Papadopoulis had arrived in the US with $10,000 and not declared it, he would have been guilty of a currency violation. That would have been a quick way to gather him up so they could begin to put pressure on him.

    How many of us would think to leave that payment outside the US upon return from a trip? It appeared to be a valid payment (retainer) for employment he was promised. But the fact that it was exactly the amount of money that would trigger a charge of violating currency transfer laws was a tipoff that perhaps Papadopoulis recognized in advance.

    I think that was clearly a trap. And I believe it was set up by people working for the Obama administration. Crafty, devious, evil. All those things. Papadopoulis was either very lucky or very smart to avoid that trap.

    As for the JCPOA, I believe the simplest explanation is the best: it was created to strengthen Iran, not to keep them in check. I see the strong hands of Valerie Jarrett and John Kerry, with their Iranian connections, behind this effort. It was not about nuclear weapons, it was about changing the power balance in the Islamic world in favor if Shia Islam. And Obama was a very willing accomplice to the effort.

  17. “…the simplest explanation is the best…”

    Indeed.

    And so, what happens if we take this piece of Occamic (Okhamic?) wisdom just a “tiny step” further?

    IOW, what (foreign policy objective—or should that be, “moral imperative”?…) has the Mullahcracy pledged to fulfil from Day 1? And reiterated, and reiterated and reiterated after that, ad infinitum?

  18. Gateway Pundit reports Judge Sullivan arranged for a speaking engagement for James Comey at Howard University for a $100000!!! You cannot make this stuff up!!

  19. There is a rather curious article (along with a follow-up) in what I consider to be a generally respectable and reliable Israeli news site (that is, if middle-of-the-road-to-perhaps-slightly-left-of-center journalism is something one might consider “generally reliable” or “generally respectable), in which we find Charles Tawil, that “mysterious Israeli” referred to above (or one of them), being interviewed:
    https://www.timesofisrael.com/israeli-named-by-trump-russia-probe-convict-dismisses-absurd-spy-allegations/

    One might ask, why is this guy being interviewed in the first place? And why in the “Times of Israel” of all places?

    And the answer would seem to be in clear view: as the link says, to “[dismiss] absurd spy allegations” while putting the ball right back in Papadopoulous’s (i.e.,Trump’s) court. (Someone’s covering all the bases, I guess…)

    And so we read about the whole sordid episode from Mr.—“Israeli businessman”—Tawil’s POV.

    Fair enough (in fact, fascinating enough); but something rings more than just a wee bit false, as our “non-spy” does seem to be “protesting just a bit too much” (taking a leaf out of that master-of-fiction, Susan Rice’s book?)….

    In any event, Papadopoulous was, among other things, probed by Mueller’s “team” regarding suspicions that he may have “acted on behalf of the Israeli government” (sure! why not?), which was no doubt a deft if not classy touch by the Mueller crew (and Papadopoulos’s Israeli “business partners” (or potential business partners…).
    https://www.timesofisrael.com/convicted-ex-adviser-to-trump-probed-over-israel-ties-launches-us-congress-bid/

    Ah, spycraft… (Surely they shouldn’t have to “try so hard”.

    File under: Where is Joseph Mifsud when you REALLY need him?

  20. @ Barry Meislin, on “What will Sullivan do to delay…?”
    Well, what if Wilkinson will have Sullivan drench his reply with legalese, so that the MSM follows none of it?
    Then, have her “explain” it to the cameras, so as to guide the MSM to interpret it, as implying that those Circuit judges who vote vs. her client are so Rayciss, that the MSM can then go full agitProp, for antiFa/ BLM to deploy “civil disobedience” (e.g. sit-ins etc., by the Circuit courthouse doors).

    Whatever delay tactics Sullivan uses, will be an unprecedented test for the U.S. judicial system.
    If the Circuit court lets itself be rolled in this case, millions of Deplorables will conclude that, as a practical matter, they should expect only faux justice from this system.

  21. Wouldn’t it be super cool, if DJT could get Pence to announce his retirement, w/ Ms. Powell to take his place!
    Even most Hoosiers would be ecstatic, esp. if, by that time, Flynn is a free man.

    To the entire GOP grass roots, her role in freeing him makes her the MJ of U.S. law.
    For them, she all-but Walks on Water, and will also be a saint for suburban “swing” women, once they absorb the magnitude of her victory for Flynn.
    Tho I can’t find her birthdate, I presume her age to be a non-issue.

  22. millions of Deplorables will conclude that, as a practical matter, they should expect only faux justice from this system.

    The people paying attention will conclude that. Most people aren’t paying attention. The horrid behavior of the Democratic Party during the Kavanaugh imbroglio appears to have not injured them at all. Their constituency likes that sort of thing or pretends it did not happen. Swing voters are motivated by odd and idiosyncratic factors.

  23. Isn’t Mifsud the guy who fell down an elevator shaft on Cyprus? Cyprus does have elevator shafts?

  24. This is what Judge Maximum John Sirica told the Watergate defendants and it is why they claimed you can’t get a fair trial in the DC courts. Nothing has changed.
    “I recommend your full cooperation with the grand jury and the senate select committee. You must understand that I hold out no promise or hope of any kind to you in this matter, but I do say that should you decide to speak freely, I would have to weight that factor in appraising what sentences will finally be imposed in each case. Other facts will, of course, be considered, but I mention this because it is one over which you have control.”

  25. I thought Mifsud was the guy everyone figured was dead and then resurfaced. Nothing suspicious there …

  26. He may have fallen down an elevator shaft in Cyprus… but then it seems he fell up one in Italy.

    (Since then, those who know, or think they do, claim he takes the stairs….)

  27. Richard Grenell has declassified a new batch of Russia probe documents on his way out as acting director of national intelligence, leaving the decision on whether to make those files public up to newly sworn-in Director John Ratcliffe. The documents include transcripts of phone calls that then-incoming National Security Adviser Michael Flynn and then-Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak had in December 2016, during the presidential transition period. Grenell said publicly last week that he was in the process of declassifying those files, after House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., asked that he do so.

  28. Trump has described first Grenell, and now now Ratcliffe, as “superstars”.

    I agree on Grenell – he’s been surprisingly great. I have long wondered why Trump himself doesn’t declassify more of the semi-secret documents allowing the illegal spying. I’m so glad Grenell did do a lot of declassifying.

    If Ratcliffe continues, he’ll be a superstar. If not, not.
    (What would neo say here ? we …)

  29. I have long wondered why Trump himself doesn’t declassify more of the semi-secret documents allowing the illegal spying.

    Its a power that the president has, but i think he is holding it in reserve
    as much as he seems to be a hot gun and all that, i think its calculated to seem that way… especially when you look at the options he has power to act on and how he doesnt and how he waits through things others would not..

  30. [The Flynn case is] actually quite simple: Flynn was framed, and those who framed him seem determined to make it stick.

    I love plain-talkin’ neo!

  31. Neo has noted that the Flynn case of entrapment and framing is like George Popadopolos and like K T McFarlain’s. To these we should add former Acting AG Matt Whitaker.

    “I was AG, and they tried to set up even me” a 5 minute interview segment from a 36 minute interview with Sebastian Gorka
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XXUFLdBZKCM

    The club is growing. Can they sue as a group?

    And we still do not know when Obama’s out of control security state surveillance began.

    PS who is Whitakera? He was Deputy AG under Jeff Sessions, and Matt is hawking his new book on the Giacomo. His facts are good. However, he frames thing too much like Sessions, ie, as a GOP man, dedicated to preserving institutions – heedless that the rot is the institutional corruption itself and therefore endemic evil.

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