The Robert Mueller Investigation

[David Dennison 18561]

8 minutes ago, deech said:

McConnell already said it's never going to make it to the floor.

And who's going to sign it anyway?

[SuingToGetAMessageBoard? 3861]

47 minutes ago, Hugo Stiglitz said:

 

Lulz.  “The thing is amateurish, so we all know who the likely suspect is.”  What a world. 

[burntorangebongos 10681]

27 minutes ago, F250 said:

The Freedom Caucus has been the only part of the Republican party that has actively disrupted the Trump agenda in Congress.

 

The chair of the caucus, Meadows seems to be helping him now. 

[F250 28646]

9 minutes ago, burntorangebongos said:

The chair of the caucus, Meadows seems to be helping him now. 

Might have something to do with Jordan's bid for house speaker.

[Pods 7521]

Meadows and Jordan are both highly reliable Trump allies. 

[shnsajax 3589]

54 minutes ago, deech said:

McConnell already said it's never going to make it to the floor.

Shouldn’t stop you from pushing it on him and actually making him block it. Then make a public spectacle out of him. And if Trump is ever found guilty you have that to hang on him till he retires. 

[TwiceHorn 31169]

10 minutes ago, shnsajax said:

Shouldn’t stop you from pushing it on him and actually making him block it. Then make a public spectacle out of him. And if Trump is ever found guilty you have that to hang on him till he retires. 

I tend to agree.  Make him eat that shit sandwich.  And there probably needs to be a special prosecutor LAW again.

[Pods 7521]

I agree that you have to make McConnell block it officially and then hang that on him and the GOP in the primaries if Trump fires Rosenstein to get to Mueller. 

[ShaggyBevo RIP 3867]

2 hours ago, jimmyjazz said:

Can somebody translate that into English?

Before this latest leak the public info on the investigation made it look like Russia was the contactor and the campaign the contactee. This leak seems to indicate Manafort is being investigated as the contactor and not the contactee.  Manafort worked in concert with Russia.

Edited May 1, 2018 by ShaggyBevo RIP

[ShaggyBevo RIP 3867]

2 hours ago, jimmyjazz said:

dp

Edited May 1, 2018 by ShaggyBevo RIP
double post

[TwiceHorn 31169]

2 hours ago, jimmyjazz said:

Can somebody translate that into English?

Actually, the way I read it is that he is protesting leaks of grand jury information and intimating that it violates his right to a grand jury (5th amendment) in some obscure way (presumably confidentiality), and his right to an impartial jury (6th amendment) because the leaks taint the jury pool.

Someone got excited about 5th amendment right not to self-incriminate, which is not presented by that motion, I don't believe.  

[Tuco 5076]

2 hours ago, TwiceHorn said:

Someone in the room has to be a professional and dignified.  My money is on Mueller.

 

The immunity from prosecution stems almost solely from deference to the office of the President.  And although investigation and civil suits are permissible, they are right on the edge of separation of powers, so one might think that a professional government lawyer like Mueller would be respectful of those notions.  And, if it is recorded or transcribed, taking the high road is almost always to one's benefit.  As Professor Jack Ratliff counseled, "Never get in the mud and wrestle with a pig.  You'll both get dirty and the pig will like it."

 

Also, will Mueller do the questioning?  Heretofore, it seems to be others doing the questioning of the more "minor" witnesses.

I disagree with the bolded section.  I think the immunity from prosecution is a logical protection against an internal overthrow.  It makes sense that the removal of the highest elected official should require the consent of 2/3 of the next highest elected officials.  It should not be subject to the judgment of a few appointed officials. 

So that makes sense.  That's a logical safeguard of our system, that the president just happens to benefit from. It seems shitty on first pass, until you recognize how many coups start with the arresting of the head executive. Treating the president gently during a questioning does nothing to safeguard our political system. It's a question of manners and etiquette, and tradition I suppose.  Given a choice between the best avenue to determine the truth and tradition, I'll pick the first.  Mueller and his group will certainly act as professionals while doing so; to do otherwise would jeopardize the perception of the investigation, and potentially the investigations itself.  But they should not allow a deference for the office to interfere with their best attempt to determine the truth. 

Edited May 1, 2018 by Tuco

[Pods 7521]

13 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

Actually, the way I read it is that he is protesting leaks of grand jury information and intimating that it violates his right to a grand jury (5th amendment) in some obscure way (presumably confidentiality), and his right to an impartial jury (6th amendment) because the leaks taint the jury pool.

Someone got excited about 5th amendment right not to self-incriminate, which is not presented by that motion, I don't believe.  

 

I agree with you Twice. When it comes down to it though, Manafort is a dead man walking. After the two search warrants are allowed to stand, Mueller has him dead to rights. The files seized from the storage unit are literally in labelled folders that basically read "Russia and Ukraine Crimes" and "Money Laundering, Muhahahaha". 

If he testifies on his own behalf, he's going to have to lie his ass off. He'll be convicted and he'll spend his life in jail.

If he flips, Putin will drop him and some of his family. It won't be immediately, but it will happen and it will be visible.

Putin's style seems to be full-throated denial, evidence be damned. I wonder what the reaction would be to pleading the 5th? Would Putin view that as a guilty plea and partial cooperation, because Manafort didn't deny it?  

Edited May 1, 2018 by Pods

[Hugo Stiglitz 23356]

I don’t think they need Manafort to flip.

Gates is basically shadow Manafort and Manafort likely had as many FISA warrants on him as Carter Page (two that I know of going back to 2014).

Also, Manafort seemed to keep pretty good records of everything given what they found in the shed.

Even if Manafort flipped, I doubt he’d get a good deal.

His only hope is a pardon, flee the country, and disappear.

Edited May 1, 2018 by Hugo Stiglitz

[SuingToGetAMessageBoard? 3861]

Manafort’s crimes are too serious (the most serious of anyone involved) to be a target for flipping.  If they tried to get him to flip then the investigation would be about the people and not the crimes. Which it isn’t and it shouldn’t be.  

[Hugo Stiglitz 23356]

5 minutes ago, SuingToGetAMessageBoard? said:

Manafort’s crimes are too serious (the most serious of anyone involved) to be a target for flipping.  If they tried to get him to flip then the investigation would be about the people and not the crimes. Which it isn’t and it shouldn’t be.  

He may still be a target for flipping and he was certainly a target for flipping given that Gates and Manafort were charged together.

[TwiceHorn 31169]

1 hour ago, Tuco said:

I disagree with the bolded section.  I think the immunity from prosecution is a logical protection against an internal overthrow.  It makes sense that the removal of the highest elected official should require the consent of 2/3 of the next highest elected officials.  It should not be subject to the judgment of a few appointed officials. 

So that makes sense.  That's a logical safeguard of our system, that the president just happens to benefit from. It seems shitty on first pass, until you recognize how many coups start with the arresting of the head executive. Treating the president gently during a questioning does nothing to safeguard our political system. It's a question of manners and etiquette, and tradition I suppose.  Given a choice between the best avenue to determine the truth and tradition, I'll pick the first.  Mueller and his group will certainly act as professionals while doing so; to do otherwise would jeopardize the perception of the investigation, and potentially the investigations itself.  But they should not allow a deference for the office to interfere with their best attempt to determine the truth. 

Well, I'm just talking about immunity from prosecution while sitting, not removal.  There are a variety of ways that a sitting President could be criminally charged, tried, and convicted without removing him from office (immunity from punishment, postponement of punishment, postponement of trial etc. etc.).  You are somewhat conflating this immunity with impeachment.  While the two are related, they are not intertwined.  To quote from Nixon v. Fitzgerald, which established a President's absolute immunity from suits for civil damages arising from actions in office:

 

Quote

Applying the principles of our cases to claims of this kind, we hold that petitioner, as a former President of the United States, is entitled to absolute immunity from damages liability predicated on his official acts. We consider this immunity a functionally mandated incident of the President's unique office, rooted in the constitutional tradition of the separation of powers and supported by our history. Justice Story's analysis remains persuasive:

There are . . . incidental powers belonging to the executive department which are necessarily implied from the nature of the functions which are confided to it. Among these must necessarily be included the power to perform them. . . . The president cannot, therefore, be liable to arrest, imprisonment, or detention, while he is in the discharge of the duties of his office, and, for this purpose, his person must be deemed, in civil cases at least, to possess an official inviolability

Impeachment provides the alternative remedy, but its existence as an alternative does not particularly inform the immunity.  The President is subject to a legislative coup, just not a judicial one.  So I think there's some deference built into it. 

 

Also, it is worth noting that a full-court press investigation and interrogation is not really necessary with the process of impeachment, as it might be in a criminal trial, because there is no burden of proof to satisfy.

Edited May 1, 2018 by TwiceHorn

[Tuco 5076]

18 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

Well, I'm just talking about immunity from prosecution while sitting, not removal. 

 

The prosecution of the President, without the possibility of arrest, imprisonment, or detention, is pointless.  Detention and imprisonment would have the de facto effect of removal, as it would completely limit the president's ability to execute his duties - particularly pre-phone/pre-internet, etc..  I don't consider that to be merely "deference to the office", although maybe it's a question of semantics.  I see it is a legitimate safeguard. 

 

 

[Hugo Stiglitz 23356]

[Hugo Stiglitz 23356]

 

[Hugo Stiglitz 23356]

 

[Brisketexan 104425]

3 minutes ago, Hugo Stiglitz said:

 

I WANT to believe that this is the modern version of UT legend Bill Bradley, when asked if he wanted heads or tails in the coin toss in the 1968 game against Texas A&M:

It don’t make a shit.

I really want to believe that.

 

[jimmyjazz 45494]

Mike Flynn has so much information for Mueller that it's gonna take more time to complete the flip.  Hey Donald, DO SOMETHING.

[yaqdum 182]

4 hours ago, shnsajax said:

Shouldn’t stop you from pushing it on him and actually making him block it. Then make a public spectacle out of him. And if Trump is ever found guilty you have that to hang on him till he retires. 

dies.

[triplehorn 2664]

Not exactly a punt, imo:

 

 

[SuingToGetAMessageBoard? 3861]

55 minutes ago, Hugo Stiglitz said:

 

That’s pretty bad ass 

[Hugo Stiglitz 23356]

this bitch

[David Dennison 18561]

The walls are closing in. 

[Shinesintx 53]

Well, I see the circle jerk is still going on. Thanks for the amusement.

[Biff Tannen 45470]

Can a lawyer explain to me the idea that the questions involving obstruction of justice in the release are "too broad" for the investigation?  This was said by some guy on NPR as well as Dershowitz.  

If I recall correctly, the president himself said on national television that the reason he fired Comey was because of Russia.  Almost word for word.  How on god's green earth then would a question about what he was thinking when he fired Comey be "too broad"?

 

[burntorangebongos 10681]

He reviewed the filings that Hugo posted earlier  today from SpicyFiles on Manafort. Maybe the lawyers can break it down more? I don't really understand it all  but he seems sure this is smoking gun stuff.

[Hugo Stiglitz 23356]

SpicyFiles is an over exuberant tweeter.

I pretty sure SpicyFiles is a woman too.

She often makes mountains out of molehills but she’s good at keeping up the enthusiasm.

Edited May 2, 2018 by Hugo Stiglitz

[JimmyJames 12271]

3 hours ago, David Dennison said:

The walls are closing in. 

Yep. The rats have become both nervous and desperate. They think the sheep they constantly lie to are going to rise up and somehow save them. They misunderstand their audience and its true capabilities. 

[Hugo Stiglitz 23356]

If you want to feel good about something, watch the entirety of this Rosenstein answer.

[TwiceHorn 31169]

1 hour ago, Biff Tannen said:

Can a lawyer explain to me the idea that the questions involving obstruction of justice in the release are "too broad" for the investigation?  This was said by some guy on NPR as well as Dershowitz.  

If I recall correctly, the president himself said on national television that the reason he fired Comey was because of Russia.  Almost word for word.  How on god's green earth then would a question about what he was thinking when he fired Comey be "too broad"?

 

The questions, as written, are very broad and, most likely, nothing like the actual questions that will be asked.  As written, they are very unlawyerlike.  With one caveat.  With this particular witness, there may be advantage to broad, open ended questions inviting the witness to narrate and hoist himself on his own petard.

 

That said, to prove obstruction of justice, the unlawful motive or intention to obstruct must be the single most reasonable inference from the evidence, usually circumstantial.  So, typically, in a criminal prosecution with the burden of proof being beyond reasonable doubt, this is tough to prove and would likely require some pointed questions and some ludicrous, non-credible answers to convince a fact-finder (jury) that the intention to obstruct is there.  Trump has said a bunch of shit about why he fired Comey.  Rosenstein evidently wrote a memo justifying the firing.  There is a bunch of circumstantial evidence.  A good criminal lawyer could muck up the intent scenario to a fare the well, so that a jury has a really tough time finding that single most reasonable inference.

 

In the usual case, an open ended question like "what were you thinking?" would be an invitation to "well there was this Russia investigation, and what Rosenstein said, and he refused to pledge loyalty, and this, and that, and the other thing, and when you put em all together, I decided he had to go."  Which is an invitation to a jury to acquit unless you have something else.

I doubt Trump has much trouble backing off whatever he said in public inasmuch as he runs his mouth like diarrhea on a daily basis.  Further, even if a fact-finder were to accept that the Russia investigation was the primary or sole reason for firing Comey, Trump and his counsel could contend that that is not to keep himself out of trouble or anyone else (corrupt motive or intent), but just that he thought it was a waste of time and imprudent.

 

Edited May 2, 2018 by TwiceHorn

[Biff Tannen 45470]

1 hour ago, TwiceHorn said:

The questions, as written, are very broad and, most likely, nothing like the actual questions that will be asked.  As written, they are very unlawyerlike.  With one caveat.  With this particular witness, there may be advantage to broad, open ended questions inviting the witness to narrate and hoist himself on his own petard.

 

That said, to prove obstruction of justice, the unlawful motive or intention to obstruct must be the single most reasonable inference from the evidence, usually circumstantial.  So, typically, in a criminal prosecution with the burden of proof being beyond reasonable doubt, this is tough to prove and would likely require some pointed questions and some ludicrous, non-credible answers to convince a fact-finder (jury) that the intention to obstruct is there.  Trump has said a bunch of shit about why he fired Comey.  Rosenstein evidently wrote a memo justifying the firing.  There is a bunch of circumstantial evidence.  A good criminal lawyer could muck up the intent scenario to a fare the well, so that a jury has a really tough time finding that single most reasonable inference.

 

In the usual case, an open ended question like "what were you thinking?" would be an invitation to "well there was this Russia investigation, and what Rosenstein said, and he refused to pledge loyalty, and this, and that, and the other thing, and when you put em all together, I decided he had to go."  Which is an invitation to a jury to acquit unless you have something else.

I doubt Trump has much trouble backing off whatever he said in public inasmuch as he runs his mouth like diarrhea on a daily basis.

 

Thanks.  Maybe I misunderstood the intent of the "too broad" analysis from the beginning.  To me it came across as, "the question is too broad for the scope of the investigation and isn't fair."

[TwiceHorn 31169]

Just now, Biff Tannen said:

Thanks.  Maybe I misunderstood the intent of the "too broad" analysis from the beginning.  To me it came across as, "the question is too broad for the scope of the investigation and isn't fair."

No, I think they were saying they were insufficiently pointed.  I thought the same thing when I read them.  They read more like topics of inquiry than actual interrogation/questioning questions.

[TwiceHorn 31169]

1 hour ago, Hugo Stiglitz said:

SpicyFiles is an over exuberant tweeter.

I pretty sure SpicyFiles is a woman too.

She often makes mountains out of molehills but she’s good at keeping up the enthusiasm.

No comment on the woman part, but the rest seems to be true.  Spends a lot of time looking at the docs and draws some really fevered inferences and conclusions and often wrong.

[ndawg 1242]

1 hour ago, Hugo Stiglitz said:

If you want to feel good about something, watch the entirety of this Rosenstein answer.

That's good shit, man. Good shit right there.

[Biff Tannen 45470]

7 minutes ago, ndawg said:

That's good shit, man. Good shit right there.

He spoke in complete sentences.  I'm not really used to that anymore.

[JohnnyRage 1617]

1 hour ago, TwiceHorn said:

No, I think they were saying they were insufficiently pointed.  I thought the same thing when I read them.  They read more like topics of inquiry than actual interrogation/questioning questions.

But some of the questions clearly will need to be settled against constitutional executive authority. That could also be a part of the too broad argument, the asking the president about his thoughts and thinking behind privileged actions. No?

[atomheartbevo 89348]

13 hours ago, deech said:

McConnell already said it's never going to make it to the floor.

If he let it hit the floor, Trump would fire his wife  or have Kelly fire his wife. 

That’s 200,000 reasons why Mitch will keep it off the floor. 

[triplehorn 2664]

Anyone believe Trump privately takes solace today in 'not being a target' ?  

The water he's in has been getting warmer for over a year.  It's boiling now.  Wonder if he noticed.

[Hugo Stiglitz 23356]

 

Edited May 2, 2018 by Hugo Stiglitz

[bolverk 29355]

NYTimes analysis of the questions Mueller sent to Trump:

Why Answering Mueller’s Questions Could Be a Minefield for Trump

WASHINGTON — President Trump has insisted he is eager to make the case to the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, that he has done nothing wrong. But the questions that Mr. Mueller wants to ask show why the president’s lawyers have countered that an interview would be a minefield for Mr. Trump.

It is not just that the president has a history of telling demonstrable falsehoods, while the special counsel has already won four guilty pleas for the crime of lying to investigators. The questions would pose additional challenges for Mr. Trump, legal experts said.

Many of Mr. Mueller’s questions, obtained and published by The New York Times, are so broad that Mr. Trump would need a detailed command of a range of issues. And, complicating efforts to try to adequately prepare him for such an encounter, the president’s lawyers do not know everything that the special counsel has learned.

“This list reinforces the notion that the president should not go in for an interview with Mueller,” said Sol Wisenberg, a white-collar defense lawyer who was a deputy independent counsel in the Whitewater investigation. “Mueller knows all kinds of things — we don’t know exactly what he knows — and these are both broad and detailed questions, making real land mines.”

On Tuesday, Mr. Trump denounced the publication of the questions in a pair of Twitter posts. He called it “disgraceful” and again pronounced Mr. Mueller’s investigation a “witch hunt.” He also incorrectly declared both that none of the questions were about “collusion” — in fact, many centered on his campaign’s ties to Russia — and that it would be “hard to obstruct justice for a crime that never happened.” (Efforts to obstruct an investigation can be prosecuted even if no underlying crime is found.)

Most of the dozens of questions are about now well-known events, like the June 2016 meeting at Trump Tower between top Trump campaign officials and Russians promising damaging information about Hillary Clinton. While a few touch on Mr. Trump’s business dealings — in particular, campaign-era talks about a proposed real estate project in Moscow — they do not signal that Mr. Mueller is examining Trump Organization finances more broadly or contain other major surprises.

In many instances, Mr. Mueller wants Mr. Trump to explain his knowledge of, reactions to or communications about private events where there were other witnesses, such as his campaign’s internal discussions of Russia-related matters and his conversations as president with and about James B. Comey, whom he fired as F.B.I. director.

The questions were drawn up in March and reflect no events since then, leaving open the possibility that they may have changed as the president’s lawyers and the special counsel continued to negotiate over an interview.

The handover to the president’s lawyers grew out of a tense moment early that month between Mr. Mueller and Mr. Trump’s lead lawyer at the time, John Dowd. Mr. Dowd had argued that Mr. Trump was too busy running the country to sit for an interview, especially if he was not a target of the investigation, according to a person briefed on the encounter.

Mr. Mueller replied that he had to question Mr. Trump to determine whether he had criminal intent when he took actions like firing Mr. Comey and raised the possibility of subpoenaing Mr. Trump to appear before a grand jury, the person said. News of Mr. Mueller mentioning the subpoena was first reported by The Washington Post.

A few days later, a lawyer working for Mr. Mueller called Mr. Dowd to arrange a second meeting, in the hopes of persuading Mr. Dowd to allow Mr. Trump to sit for an interview. At that meeting, investigators for Mr. Mueller provided Mr. Dowd with the list of questions they had for the president. After reviewing the list, Mr. Dowd become even more convinced, the person said, that allowing the president to be interviewed would be a problem.

One major threat to Mr. Trump posed by such open-ended questions is that, as his Twitter diatribe showed, he has a history of saying things that are not true — especially when he rambles off the cuff. It is a felony to lie to law enforcement officials or to conceal a material fact during a proceeding like a formal interview.

Mr. Dowd quit in March after he advised Mr. Trump that sitting down with investigators would put him in too much jeopardy, but Mr. Trump signaled that he was prepared to ignore Mr. Dowd’s advice.

Moreover, the list of questions is most likely a starting point for follow-ups as investigators try to iron out ambiguities. Paul Rosenzweig, another former Whitewater prosecutor and a senior fellow at the R Street Institute, a conservative and libertarian research organization, said they could be seeking such details as: What was the source of your knowledge? When did you find out? Who told you and what exactly did they say?

“You don’t just ask, ‘What did you know about the Trump Tower meeting?’ and he tells you the answer,” Mr. Rosenzweig said. “With 48 questions like that, that’s honestly a two-day interview. That’s 12 hours of questioning.”

And in part because former Trump associates who have pleaded guilty are cooperating with the inquiry, the White House does not know what evidence the special counsel has obtained that could contradict Mr. Trump, Mr. Wisenberg said. Because of that, he said, the president’s lawyers were in a worse position to prepare their client for an interview than President Bill Clinton’s team was in the Whitewater investigation.

“It’s totally different than when President Clinton came into the grand jury room to talk to us,” he said. “He pretty much knew everything we knew. It was far less risky.”

Even so, Mr. Clinton perjured himself by falsely denying that he had had a sexual affair with Monica Lewinsky. That became part of the referral to Congress by Kenneth W. Starr, the independent counsel, that led to Mr. Clinton’s impeachment.

As part of those proceedings, the videotape of Mr. Clinton’s false testimony became public, taking its place in his legacy. It is far from clear, however, that any transcript or recording of Mr. Trump’s interview — if he gives one — would similarly become public. Mr. Rosenzweig said the interview would be covered by investigative secrecy rules, and there was no clear mechanism for it to be disclosed under Mr. Mueller, who has less power than Mr. Starr enjoyed.

Mr. Mueller’s authorities remain uncertain; it is not clear that he could charge Mr. Trump with a crime or send an impeachment referral report directly to Congress. That has left his potential endgame unclear if he does conclude the president committed some kind of wrongdoing.

But the list of questions indicates that the investigation remains a significant threat to Mr. Trump even if he were to be honest about everything in any interview.

The questions zero in on Mr. Trump’s possible liability — and little else, noted Samuel W. Buell, a Duke University criminal law professor and a former federal prosecutor who helped lead the Enron investigation.

“‘What did you know and think?’ and ‘When did you know it and think it?’ are not questions you ask someone to determine whether they have information about someone else’s commission of a crime,” Mr. Buell said. “They are questions you ask to determine whether the person you are questioning had the guilty mind required to break the law.”

Mr. Wisenberg said he was struck by Mr. Mueller’s focus on establishing the president’s mind-set when he weighed whether to fire Mr. Comey, and potential steps like whether to oust Attorney General Jeff Sessions, pardon people charged by Mr. Mueller or force the Justice Department to dismiss the special counsel.

No Supreme Court precedent exists to guide Mr. Mueller on whether obstruction of justice can occur if a president exercises a constitutional power with a bad motive, like firing a subordinate to cover up a crime; Mr. Wisenberg counted himself among those who do not think it can. But Mr. Mueller’s questions, he said, suggest the special counsel has adopted a broader interpretation of the law.

Some of the questions may present an opportunity for Mr. Trump, however. Asking him to explain what he meant when he told NBC News that he was thinking about the Russia investigation when he decided to fire Mr. Comey, for example, would permit Mr. Trump to backpedal on the remark or explain it away, perhaps by saying he did not really mean it.

Alan M. Dershowitz, a Harvard Law School criminal law professor who has frequently defended Mr. Trump on television and is informally consulting with him, told CNN  on Monday that he thought Mr. Trump could invoke executive privilege to refuse to answer questions about his thinking when he decided to exercise constitutional powers.

But the problem for Mr. Trump is that those questions, Mr. Dershowitz said, were the “easy” ones. By contrast, Mr. Trump could not invoke the privilege about events that took place before he became president, like his business dealings.

Several legal experts said it was unusual for prosecutors to give Mr. Trump a preview of the questions, speculating that Mr. Mueller was bending over backward to defang any accusations of overreach. Mr. Buell said the move might also be aimed at uncovering any disputes over executive privilege now so they do not disrupt an interview.

But he predicted that despite all the “posturing,” Mr. Trump would allow his lawyers to talk him out of sitting down with Mr. Mueller.

“The game,” he said, “is to appear to be interested and cooperating without doing so.”

[Tuco 5076]

16 hours ago, jimmyjazz said:

Mike Flynn has so much information for Mueller that it's gonna take more time to complete the flip.  Hey Donald, DO SOMETHING.

My guess is that they there is an action he needs to complete - like testifying - before he gets the lighter sentence.  Which leads into the next question: in what venue could he testify in during the next two months? He and Manafort don't seem that closely connected, but it's possibly if they were both on the Russian dole that they were aware of each other's efforts.  Maybe Congress, when Mueller delivers his report.  Or maybe it will just be a continuing 2 month extension until he is needed. Or maybe my guess is wrong.

[jimmyjazz 45494]

9 hours ago, Biff Tannen said:

He spoke in complete sentences.  I'm not really used to that anymore.

It really is quite amazing how numb we've become.  

[Pig Bellmont 8678]

9 hours ago, JohnnyRage said:

But some of the questions clearly will need to be settled against constitutional executive authority. That could also be a part of the too broad argument, the asking the president about his thoughts and thinking behind privileged actions. No?

No. The Supreme Court decided 8-0 that the President must comply with a criminal subpoena even in the face of executive privilege claims. Richard Nixon had to turn over the watergate tapes. I don’t see any discernible difference here. The President can be compelled by subpoena in a criminal investigation. Assuming Gorsuch would recuse, I imagine another 8-0 decision 

[DDD Dad 14146]

1 minute ago, Pig Bellmont said:

No. The Supreme Court decided 8-0 that the President must comply with a criminal subpoena even in the face of executive privilege claims. Richard Nixon had to turn over the watergate tapes. I don’t see any discernible difference here. The President can be compelled by subpoena in a criminal investigation. Assuming Gorsuch would recuse, I imagine another 8-0 decision 

If it weren't 8-0 the Republic would be finished.

[Chad Fuck 17501]

That Rosenstein vid is pretty inspiring.  I'll bet he recites his oath to himself everyday while shaving.

Can you imagine the hoot it would be to video the Dotard while he tried to recall his oath of office?