Friday, April 19, 2019

Loose Lips Overseas and More Mueller Madness


Joe Biden recently stood before an audience in Germany and blatantly criticized the President of the United States.  Joe Biden is an ex-Senator, ex-Vice-President who has previously run for President 3 times (‘84. ‘88, ’08) and is a likely 2020 Democratic Presidential Candidate.  He has absolutely no business standing on foreign soil in today’s mixed up world and sowing confusion among foreign leaders about who the legitimate leader of America is and what is America’s policy.  Biden’s claim to fame is that among the 20 plus potential Democratic candidates for president, he appears to be the most moderate.  Whhhaaaat??  That’s like being the sharpest knife in a drawer full of dull blades.  To me, the definition of a moderate is one who will compromise on practice but adhere to a rigid set of clearly defined principles.  History has shown us, repeatedly, that Joe Biden has no principles.  He is a shallow, rudderless, old school politician that is frantically grasping for one last moment of glory. 

Nancy Pelosi recently addressed audiences in England and openly disagreed with a trade policy that had been publicly supported by the President of the United States.  President Trump defeated Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election that was held nationwide across our country.  Every eligible voter in America had the opportunity to participate in that election.  Nancy Pelosi was elected by a portion of a single county in California and is one of 435 Representatives in the House.  If you are not a resident of that portion of San Francisco City and County in California identified as District 12, you can’t even vote for Nancy Pelosi.  She bizarrely considers her position as House Majority Leader to be co-equal to the Presidency.  This deluded attitude has emboldened House Democrats to openly and stubbornly resist every single Trump initiative since the mid-term elections.  Nancy Pelosi is living in a fantasy land of pure spite and partisanship and should not be openly contradicting our President’s policies on foreign soil.   Nancy Pelosi is much better suited to be mayor of San Francisco rather than the House Majority Leader. 

Now…to the Mueller Report.  As with many who bloviate about such things, I would like to think that this will be my final remarks about Robert and his Merry Band of Democrat Lawyers.  Time will tell.  Mueller’s Report is basically split in two parts; the first part dealing with the issue of collusion between the Trump Campaign and Russia and the second part dealing with possible obstruction of justice regarding the investigation into the first part.  The fundamental question that occurs to any rational being is how can there be possible obstruction in the second part when the first part clearly states that there was no collusion?  Tell me once again…What exactly are we obstructing here?  The President could, and did not, fire Mueller.  The President could, and did not, utilize Executive Privilege to shield information from Mueller.  The President could, and did not, refuse to accommodate all of Mueller’s requests for documents and interviews.  Heck…the President even allowed his White House Counsel Don McGahn to be interviewed.  The only time the President dug his heels in is when he refused to sit for an interview himself; instead submitting written answers to questions received from Mueller.  And, as Mueller himself stated in the Report, the Trump interview was unnecessary because he already had all of the information he needed to close the matter.  Now ask yourself: Does any of that sound like obstruction to you?

Part one of the Report repeatedly makes it crystal clear that even though Russia attempted to meddle in American elections; they did so without the complicit cooperation of any American, much less one associated with the Trump Campaign.  Like every other sentient human being on planet earth, the Russians had absolutely no doubt that Trump would lose the election to Hillary Clinton.  They were just trying to stir up ish; that is what they do.  Consider that their meddling also featured some anti-Trump and anti-Sanders initiatives. 

Part two reads like an op-ed out of the New York Times or Washington Post…or perhaps a panel discussion from CNN or MSNBC.  It seems to me abundantly clear that Mueller allowed his partisan band of Democrat lawyers to author part two and it is a disgrace to any person who holds any respect for the rule of law and fairness of self-defense.  It reads like a tabloid piece on juicy, one-sided details from inside a President’s inner circle which should properly be considered privileged and private.  That is not even considering the fact that the Report is presented with no provision for a defense or alternative version from those accused in the Report.  Let’s impanel a dozen heavyweight lawyers that vehemently disagree with you and your political ideals.  Let’s give them $25-$30 million to operate on.  Let’s give them complete freedom with no oversight and no accountability.  Let’s give them the services of the U.S. intelligence agencies and allow them to wiretap your friends and business associates…present and past.  And let’s give them two years to dwell on this exercise.  You gonna come out of this without a blemish?  You think you might have an embarrassing moment or two in the report?  You think Trump had a legitimate reason to be frustrated and angry that he had to deal with this bogus investigation for the first two years of his Presidency?  Read this again … http://centerlineright.blogspot.com/2018/07/

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Can there be any doubt that the Mueller Report Part Two is nothing more than a sop to the House Democrats to be used as fodder for their continuing investigations into all things Trump?  Robert Mueller started this sad episode as a WDC fixture that apparently had some gravitas on both sides of the political aisle.  Immediately prior to becoming Special Counsel, President Trump had interviewed him for the position of FBI Chief.  He has now been exposed as a tool of the partisan lawyers on his team and will serve out the balance of his public career with this monstrous stain on his record.  If Democrats want to make their 2020 Presidential Campaign centerpiece the impeachment of Donald Trump for this hot mess, I believe they are making a serious mistake. 

To close out this sad, pathetic, embarrassing chapter in American politics, let us consider three items.


What, exactly, does the Mueller Report say? https://www.scribd.com/document/406725805/Mueller-Report#from_embed

What, exactly, did the Mueller Report involve and cost


Time: 22 months (or 675 days). The Justice Department appointed Mueller on May 17, 2017. The investigation ended on March 22, 2019.
Length: 448 (redacted) pages
Indictments: Mueller ultimately indicted, convicted or got guilty pleas from 34 people and three companies.
Team: Mueller employed 19 lawyers, who were assisted by a team of about 40 FBI agents, intelligence analysts, forensic accountants and other professional staff.
The investigation: The Mueller team issued more than 2,800 subpoenas and executed close to 500 search warrants.  The team also obtained more than 230 orders for communication records, issued 50 orders authorizing use of pen registers to monitor electronic communications, and made 13 requests to foreign governments for evidence. The special counsel interviewed approximately 500 witnesses, according to a letter sent to Congress by Barr.
Cost: The total cost of the investigation is still unknown.  But so far, Mueller’s office has released three expenditures statements. Direct and indirect costs totaled $25.2 million through Sept. 30, 2018, from the start of the investigation (May 17, 2017). Although Mueller turned in a proposed budget to the Department of Justice in July 2017, officials declined to make it public, instead committing to releasing reports of the team’s expenditures every six months.




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