Below is my column in The Hill newspaper on a significant potential barrier to the release of the Special Counsel report — once it is given by Robert Mueller to Attorney General Bill Barr. There is a striking contrast between the level of cooperation shown in relation to the Special Counsel investigation versus congressional investigation. In the latter context, the White House instructed witnesses not to answer questions on the basis that privilege might be claimed (an improper practice in my view). This would seem to suggest that the Trump team is treating communications with the Special Counsel as internal Executive Branch disclosures — and thus not a waiver of privilege. If that is the case, Barr could be heading into a world of difficulty. If the White House invokes, the Justice Department has traditionally defended those claims of executive privilege in court. That could mean a report that is heavily redacted. Unlike classified material which can be given to Congress under seal, grand jury information or executive privileged information cannot be given to Congress absent a court order or waiver, respectively.
This weekend Trump said that he supported the vote of Congress to demand the public release of the report. He told his followers that he told members to vote for the resolution and “Play along with the game!” It is not clear what that game is given the blocking of vote in the Senate by Lindsey Graham. Moreover, it does not state that Trump will waive all executive privilege as discussed in this earlier column.
Here is the column:
President Donald Trump again wrote in all-caps this week, lashing out at special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation as “illegal & conflicted” and declaring “there should be no Mueller Report.” Of course, Mueller’s investigation is entirely legal. Moreover, as reflected in the 420-0 House vote this week, there is overwhelming, bipartisan support for making the report public.
Indeed, everyone seems to want the report released: Democrats, Republicans, even Attorney General Bill Barr. The one person who may not be on board is Trump — and that could prove a very serious problem for Barr.
Trump appears, again, to be dangerously taking his own counsel. While he seems genuinely infuriated about the investigation, he played the largest part in bringing it about.
At the start of his administration, some of us opposed the appointment of a special counsel as unnecessary and unsupported by hard evidence. That changed with the firing of former FBI Director James Comey in the midst of the Russia investigation and Trump’s public attacks on the investigation. Trump’s advisers reportedly warned him this was a bone-headed, self-destructive act; the only holdout reportedly was son-in-law Jared Kushner, who thought it would shorten the investigation. The result was catastrophic and plunged the administration into the current quagmire.
Trump could, once more, prolong this controversy by continuing to “counterpunch” himself into a deeper and deeper hole. There still is no compelling evidence of collusion. Moreover, everyone is telling him to release the report as fully and quickly as possible.
This brings us to William Barr’s problem.
During his confirmation hearing, Democrats repeatedly pressed him to guarantee that the report would be released. As I testified at his confirmation, Barr could not ethically give that guarantee; various laws governing classified evidence, grand jury information and privacy information require redactions.
The biggest issue, however, could be executive privilege. The power to assert executive privilege rests primarily with the White House. It is the president’s privilege to assert, and the Justice Department’s obligation to defend such assertions.
Two types of privilege can arise in this context. First, there is deliberative-process privilege governing the executive branch’s decision-making. This privilege, however, is routinely trumped in cases involving government abuse or misconduct.
The more difficult privilege is “presidential communications.” Recognized in 1974 in United States v. Nixon, the Supreme Court noted that “the presidential communications privilege is more difficult to surmount.” Unlike the deliberative-process privilege that “disappears altogether when there is any reason to believe government misconduct occurred,” the presidential communications privilege is harder to overcome, “even when there are allegations of misconduct by high-level officials.”
The assumption of many is that executive privilege has been waived largely since the Trump administration allowed many current and former White House staff to speak with Mueller. To the extent that such information was shared with Congress, such a waiver may have occurred. However, the White House can argue that speaking with Mueller is not a waiver. Unlike earlier independent counsels like Kenneth Starr, Mueller is a special counsel — and, as such, he’s part of the Justice Department, which is part of the executive branch.
In other words, having the White House counsel speak with the special counsel is basically the executive branch speaking to itself.
Notably, while Trump allowed White House officials to speak freely with Mueller, the White House was far less free with Congress — including, inappropriately, having officials refuse to answer questions on the possibility of a later privilege assertion.
Trump therefore could assert executive privilege over information derived from presidential communications. And that would put Barr in a very difficult spot. Indeed, a report without presidential communications could leave little more than a husk of the original. More importantly, it could leave Barr with little choice in the matter.
With sketchy past opinions on the scope of these privileges, executive assertions can be difficult questions. Historically, the Justice Department has left such questions to the courts absent a compromise with Congress. The Obama administration made some very dubious privilege claims but the Justice Department defended those assertions in Congress and the courts. Absent a clear waiver, it would be a sharp departure from past practice for Barr to override a White House privilege assertion.
If Trump asserts executive privilege to all communications with Mueller that were not also made to Congress, Barr likely will feel duty-bound to defend those assertions. Barr is no Sally Yates, who, as acting attorney general, refused to defend Trump’s first immigration order. It was a highly improper order and warranted her firing by Trump. Barr will defend a properly asserted presidential privilege, and he will comply with any order of a court on the merits of such an assertion.
So where does that leave us?
Option 1: Under federal law, Barr could confine his disclosure to a short summary. Thus, if no criminal acts by the president or his campaign were uncovered, Barr could describe the scope of the investigation and give the ultimate findings. After all, members of Congress widely condemned Comey for his public discussion of Hillary Clinton’s “grossly negligent” actions after he decided not to charge her. Barr could say he will not repeat Comey’s grandstanding.
But Barr would be wrong in taking such a position. A special counsel investigation is not a criminal investigation; it has fact-finding and reporting components that are supposed to force transparency. Mueller was mandated to find the truth, not just chargeable offenses. The public has a right to see that evidence, since these allegations go to the very heart of our democratic process.
Option 2: The most likely option will be to write a summary and attach the redacted report, or rewrite the report into a unified report from Barr to Congress that removes statutorily and constitutionally protected information. Barr also could give Congress a sealed version of the report containing classified information. However, he cannot give Congress a report with grand jury information (called Rule 6e material) without a court order. More importantly, he cannot disclose privileged information to Congress.
The preference would be a redacted copy with blacked-out sections to show how much of the original report has been withheld. The only logistical question is whether Barr will issue a summary while the report is being scrubbed, or issue a summary pending the release of such a public report. There also is the question of whether Barr will allow the White House to submit a response with his submission to Congress — an accommodation (and possible delay) that would be best to avoid.
The second option is the more likely for Barr, but much depends on Trump. Trump could move to higher ground by declaring that, while he still views the investigation as a “witch hunt,” he would waive all remaining privilege assertions for the purposes of this report so that the public can reach its own conclusions. If he did that, he could argue that, while he continually denounced the investigation and the investigators, he never actually took obstructive steps like firing Mueller, silencing witnesses or withholding the final report.
That is not the approach of a counterpuncher — but it is the approach of a president.
Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University. You can follow him on Twitter @JonathanTurley.
P Hill,
Everyone is laughing at your foolishness.
There’s mental help out there for you, take it!
Oky, what are you babbling about? No one should want to see the Mueller Report..?? Only fools..?? Smart folks would rather bury it..??
P Hill,
Try a few cans of spray paint 4 your graffiti on your down town LA overpass, screaming That GD Mueller, the FISA Warrant & the RENEWALS, John Roberts, WTPH was P Turley Thinking!!! LOL;)
P Hill,
It’s all fun till someone looses an eye. Dyin is easy, it’s living that hard. Suck it up & get on board with MP.HGA!
Gnite
POLL: 82% OF PUBLIC WANTS TO SEE MUELLER REPORT
The public wants to know what special counsel Robert Mueller has found out about Russian tampering with the 2016 election and possible links to the Trump campaign, a new poll suggests.
More than 82 percent of voters surveyed said it was very or somewhat important that Mueller’s report be released to the public, according to a Suffolk University/USA TODAY national poll.
The poll found that nearly 62 percent felt that public release of the report was very important while more than 20 percent felt it was somewhat important. Another 14 percent said it was not at all, or not particularly, important. Three percent were undecided.
The poll release comes after the US House last week voted 420-0 for a resolution calling for the report to be made available to the public and Congress. (The measure was blocked in the Senate by Republican Lindsey Graham of South Carolina.)
“Finally, the voting public and Congress agree on something,” David Paleologos, director of the Suffolk University Political Research Center in Boston, said in a statement. “With the investigation in its third year, people want to know what the investigation uncovered and whether President Trump colluded with the Russians or directed others to collude with the Russians.”
Edited from: “More Than 80% Of Voters Want To See Mueller Report, Poll Says”
Today’s BOSTON GLOBE
TRUMP SHOULD WANT REPORT RELEASED
If indeed Donald Trump is the victim of a ‘witch hunt’ then he should want the Mueller Report released as soon as possible.
Yet Trump wants to hold the Mueller Report hostage to his demands that a special counsel be appointed to investigate ‘the deep state conspiracy’ against him, Donald Trump’.
Such demands should be rebuffed as a perversion of justice. Trump calculates rejection. But he will use it as an excuse to sit on The Mueller Report; wagering supporters will stick with him on this.
PETER SHILL’S WORDS ARE MEANINGLESS
“Yet Trump wants to hold the Mueller Report hostage to his demands that a special counsel be appointed to investigate ‘the deep state conspiracy’ agaageeinst him, Donald Trump’.”
Where did Trump say that? I know Lindsay Graham said something like that and Trump might agree, but where did Trump actually say that he would “‘hold the Mueller Report hostage” for that. Is this another figment of your imagination? One can’t trust anything you say.
The Sole Proprietor Of His Own Noise demands to know why Trump didn’t say what P. Hill said. The presumption is that P. Hill is wrong, if P. Hill can’t show Trump saying the same thing that P. Hill said. The SPOHON doesn’t really understand free speech or much of anything else American.
Diane, apparently you disagree with P. Hill’s statement or you would have told us all that Peter was right. You didn’t. Peter often makes statements that aren’t true.
You’re right about the last thing Peter. I am with Trump on this. I could care less about the report.
MAGA
WHAT I WANT TO SEE ARE THE LAUREN SANCHEZ NUDE SELFIES. I cant find them on the internet, help!
Robert “Mike Nifong” Mueller should be thrown in prison for abuse of the power of government against the people or “malicious prosecution.”
Rod Rosenstein should be thrown in prison for abuse of power and maliciously appointing Robert Mueller as special counsel when there was no probable cause and no crime.
I asked our Mr Tom Cat, I think I heard him say when in doubt take ’em out & enjoy kebabs.
But he kills rats every night for a living, what does he know.
Russia,Russia,Russia! Maybe in Trumps 2nd term Meuller will find something.
HOUSE VOTES 420-0 TO RELEASE MUELLER REPORT
YET LINDSEY GRAHAM BLOCKS SENATE VOTE ON MATTER
The Senate blocked a measure that demanded special counsel Robert Mueller’s final report on Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election be made public — hours after the House unanimously voted in support of the measure.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer called for a vote on the measure but was blocked by Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., who asked that the resolution also include calling for the appointment of a new special counsel to investigate how the Justice Department conducted its investigation.
Earlier, the House passed a nonbinding resolution, with a vote of 420-0, urging for the public release of “any report” Mueller provides to Attorney General William Barr, except the portions “expressly prohibited by law.” And they insisted that Congress should receive the whole thing.
Graham pointed to controversies surrounding a surveillance warrant on Trump aide Carter Page and text messages by two FBI employees that were critical of President Donald Trump.
“We let Mueller look at all things Trump, related to collusion and otherwise,” Graham argued on the Senate floor. “Somebody needs to look at what happened on the other side and find out if the FBI and the DOJ had two systems.”
Schumer declined to include Graham’s proposed amendment and said he was “deeply disappointed” in Graham for “blocking this very simple, non-controversial resolution.”
He said he would bring the measure back before the Senate at a later time.
The votes came amid signs that Mueller’s inquiry could be drawing closer to its conclusion. Mueller’s office confirmed on Thursday that one of its top prosecutors, Andrew Weissmann, plans to leave for another job soon, the latest in a series of departures from the office.
Mueller: What happens after Robert Mueller delivers his report? Congress braces for legal and political battles.
Justice Department rules require Mueller to submit a final, confidential report to Barr outlining why he charged some people and not others. Barr has said he wants to release as much detail as possible about the results of the special counsel investigation, but has not committed to releasing all of the findings of an investigation that has been based in part on classified intelligence and secret grand jury information.
Edited from: “Senate Blocks Resolution Calling For Public Release Of Robert Mueller’s Report After House Voted 420-0”
U.S.A. TODAY, 3/14/19
……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
Almost every Republican member of The House voted for release of The Mueller Report. Yet Lindsey Graham was able to block a Senate vote on the matter. Presumably Graham did so on Donald Trump’s behalf. Therefore one has to ask ‘why’ Donald Trump doesn’t want the Mueller Report made public.
“YET LINDSEY GRAHAM BLOCKS SENATE VOTE ON MATTER”
That should read:
LINDSAY GRAHAM ASKED THAT THE RESOLUTION INCLUDE THE APPOINTMENT OF A NEW COUNSEL TO INVESTIGAGE HOW THE DOJ CONDUCTED ITS INVESTIGATIONS
Peter should be asking that as well, but take note how he leaves that out of his headlines demonstrating that Peter is less than honorable.. We should be investigating the investigators and *everyone* involved including Mueller based on his lack of impartiality and prior work that should have made him ineligible for the position of special counsel.
Once again, The Sole Proprietor Of His Own Noise demands that P. Hill should say the exact same thing that somebody else said. In this case, Lindsey Graham. The SPOHON had previously demanded that P. Hill should say the exact same thing that Trump said; which, according to The SPOHON, was not exactly the same thing that Lindsey Graham said. The SPOHON is beyond ridiculous, now.
Late4Dinner, did you notice Graham wants a Special Counsel to investigate the Mueller Probe! Trump’s demand, no doubt.
What a clever strategy: you just demand a Special Counsel to investigate the Special Counsel. Trump won’t get away with it. But it will give him an excuse to bury the Mueller Report. Trump will hold it hostage.
Yes. Turley mentioned it briefly. And I did read what you posted. I always do.
As for cleverness, it looks to me like more of the same old sorry song and dance routine from Trump. Probably the only recycling Trump has ever done. I think it may be all he has to offer in the way of a defense. That and suppressing whatever Mueller reports to Barr. I’m pretty sure Turley is exaggerating the strength of the presidential communications privilege. But it’s not my bailiwick. So I could be wrong. everything is still eeksie peeksie.
Here are just two out of a very great many links on the subject of Trump’s demands for investigations of everything under the Sun not named Trump:
https://www.americanoversight.org/investigation/trump-administrations-politicization-justice-department
Dec 24, 2018 … Records related to DOJ’s decision to reopen an investigation into Hillary … that DOJ is allowing itself to be pressured by Trump’s demands.
Trump Demands Inquiry Into Whether Justice Dept. ‘Infiltrated or …
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/20/us/politics/trump-mueller.html
May 20, 2018 … WASHINGTON — President Trump on Sunday demanded that the Justice Department investigate whether the department or the F.B.I. …
Here’s two more examples of the same old sorry songs and dance routine from Trump:
https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/trump-calls-justice-department-investigate-author-times-op/story?id=57673138
Sep 5, 2018 … President Donald Trump called today for the Justice Department to investigate the author of an anonymous op-ed in the New York Times that …
Trump Demands an Official Investigation of Obama White House – The …
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2018/05/donald-trump-has-all-the-power/560804/
May 21, 2018 … Sunday afternoon, President Trump tweeted an extraordinary … toward the Justice Department and federal investigations: “I hereby demand, …
Excerpted from the article linked above (by Benjamin Wittes):
Sunday afternoon, President Trump tweeted an extraordinary threat—extraordinary even by the standards of Donald Trump’s norm-busting use of Twitter and abusive conduct toward the Justice Department and federal investigations:
“I hereby demand, and will do so officially tomorrow, that the Department of Justice look into whether or not the FBI/DOJ infiltrated or surveilled the Trump Campaign for Political Purposes—and if any such demands or requests were made by people within the Obama Administration!”
[end excerpt]
That was last year. And I haven’t heard anything more about since last year. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that Trump dropped the idea, altogether. Even the most cursory glance at Res Ipsa Loquitur will reveal that Trump’s demand still lives in the hearts of his devoted disciples. They were promised the jailing of Hillary Clinton and by God they still want that woman behind bars along with every last deep state lifer that let Crooked H off the hook scot free.
How else can Trump run against Hillary again in 2020?
That’s all it is with Trump: threats, threats, threats.
It could be just a reversion to type: Trump is a juvenile delinquent street punk from Queens. You know?
But I really have to wonder sometimes whether there might be more to it than that. The Trumpa Lumpas on this blawg may have distorted my read on Trump. He is, in addition to being a juvenile delinquent street punk, a confidence artist of considerable skill and shrewd practice. To make matters worse, Trump seems to have roughly the same instincts as a wolf sizing up a herd of deer to cue in on the weakest Bambi available for the mauling.
I honestly don’t know whether to take Trump’s threats as seriously as they probably ought to be taken. Those threats could be building to a climax.
“What a clever strategy: you just demand a Special Counsel to investigate the Special Counsel. Trump won’t get away with it.”
Again Peter Shill is making things up. Peter thinks he can read minds when he can hardly read a news article. Lindsay Graham has a mind of his own so I don’t think his comment has much to do with Trump.
Diane, everyone can say what they want but you like to obscure the truth and both you and Peter Hill try to beat the truth to death but with freedom of speech one has the right to point that out. Sins of omission can be as bad as sins of commission. Both of you commit those sins all the time and show no embarassment.
Jon, Jon, Jon, you old spinmeister, you. You again try to put lipstick on that pig known as Trump by arguing that when he told current and former members of his administration not to cooperate with Congressional investigators, he was doing so to avoid the claim that he was waiving privilege: “This would seem to suggest that the Trump team is treating communications with the Special Counsel as internal Executive Branch disclosures — and thus not a waiver of privilege.” No, Jonny, that’s not the reason. Trump can’t control Congress. He has Barr to watch his back with Mueller, which is why Barr replaced Sessions. It’s as simple as that. Maybe you write this crap hoping for a job with the Administration, or to clue in Trump’s seemingly clueless attorneys on some arguments they could make to help him out of the mess he created for himself, but there are those of us who see it for what it is.
Also, why did you find it necessary to throw in the claim that there is no “compelling” evidence of collusion? For the Trumpsters’ need for daily affirmation? You don’t know what Mueller’s team has, but gratuitously throwing in such comments makes clear you are not objective.
+10
AS MUELLER PROBE WINDS DOWN..
ATTENTION TURNS TO DAY SPA MAGNATE CINDY YANG..
AND HER PAY-FOR-ACCESS COMPANY
A Chinese-American massage-parlor entrepreneur arranged for a group of Chinese business executives to attend a paid fundraiser for President Donald Trump in New York City at the end of 2017, according to a source who was present at the event.
Cindy Yang, whose family owns a chain of South Florida day spas where prostitution is said to have taken place, also runs a Florida-based consulting business called GY US Investments that promises to introduce Chinese investors into the president’s orbit.
Yang was present at the Dec. 2, 2017, fundraiser, held at Cipriani restaurant in Manhattan, according to a photograph that circulated in Chinese-language media at the time. The source, who asked for anonymity to discuss the private fundraiser, said Yang identified herself as an official at the National Committee of Asian American Republicans, a Washington, D.C.-based political action committee founded in the summer of 2016.
In the 11 days before the event, Yang gave $5,400 to Trump’s campaign and $23,500 to the Trump Victory political action committee, according to a Miami Herald analysis of federal political contributions. The 45-year-old, a naturalized American citizen, also claimed to have arranged the presence of a large group of business people from mainland China.
“They’re all my guests,” she told the source.
Foreign visitors may attend fundraisers as long as they don’t pay their own entry. But only citizens and permanent residents are allowed to donate to U.S. political campaigns. It would be illegal for foreign nationals to reimburse a U.S. citizen for paying their way into a fundraiser. Special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation has been examining whether money from abroad influenced the 2016 election. There is no evidence that Yang or her businesses are part of that investigation.
Yang is also noteworthy because she once owned what is now Orchids of Asia, the day spa in Jupiter where New England Patriots owner and billionaire Robert Kraft was charged with soliciting prostitution last month. Kraft’s bust is part of a wider law enforcement investigation into human trafficking at Asian-themed massage parlors in Florida. Yang says she sold that spa, which then operated under a different name, several years ago. She and the spas that remain registered to her family members have not been charged in that investigation.
She dominated the news Friday after the Herald published photos of her with Trump, as well as top Florida Republican politicians including Gov. Ron DeSantis and Sen. Rick Scott and conservative celebrities. She even snapped a selfie with Trump during a Super Bowl party at the president’s West Palm Beach golf club. Kraft’s Patriots won the game. (Shortly after the story was published, Yang took down the Facebook page where she had posted many of the photos and also the GY US Investments website.)
The photos raised questions about who can gain access to the president at his resorts and other private businesses, as well as at official venues like fundraisers. A report by Mother Jones Saturday laid out in detail how Yang promised Chinese business people access to Trump.
Reports in Chinese-language media said nearly 100 Chinese people attended the New York fundraiser in December 2017, out of roughly 400 total guests. The event was hosted by the Republican National Committee. Officials at Trump Victory and the RNC did not immediately respond to requests for comment Saturday, although on Monday the RNC released the following statement:
The Washington Post reported last year that members of the Chinese contingent were “guests” of an unnamed U.S. citizen donor. Yang and her family members have contributed tens of thousands of dollars to the president’s campaign and a Trump political action committee, with the donations starting in November 2017. Her husband, Zubin Gong, was also present at the New York fundraiser, according to the photograph.
The Chinese guests had “minimal exposure to President Trump,” a Republican Party official told the Post at the time.
“They attended an event with hundreds of individuals and took a photo from a photo line,” said the official, adding that all guests must be vetted at RNC events where the president is present.
The source who attended the party said the president joked that the Chinese guests got all the good seats and would be omnipresent at future events if his American friends in real estate didn’t start donating more. The source said admission started at $2,700, and photos with the president were offered for $10,000.
Since the New York event, Yang has advertised her ability to introduce Chinese investors to the president, his family and his advisers.
On the Chinese-language website for GY US Investments, Yang claimed to be hosting a “conference for international leadership” at Mar-a-Lago, the president’s private resort in Palm Beach, on March 30. The guest speaker is advertised as Elizabeth Trump Grau, the president’s sister. Trump Grau could not be reached.
“It is the first time for Chinese to play the leading role [at] Mar-a-Lago,” the website claimed.
The company was formally registered in Florida on Dec. 12, 2017, 10 days after the Trump fundraiser in New York. It describes its services as helping Chinese investors acquire businesses in the United States, file for patents and securing “Nobel Prize winners” to participate in their projects. It also says clients can take photos with President Trump, take part in “VIP activities” at Mar-a-Lago and have dinner at the White House. Yang has attended several events held by the White House’s Asian American and Pacific Islander Initiative in Washington, D.C.
Edited from: “Massage Parlor Magnate Helped Steer Chinese To Trump’s NYC Fundraiser, Attendee Says”
THE MIAMI HERALD, 3/9/19
………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
The intrigues surrounding Cindy Yang have been largely under-reported so far. But on the surface they appear to warrant examination.
Here we have a Chinese-American immigrant who acquired some degree of wealth from a chain of so-called ‘Day Spas’. Yet more recently Yang formed a company that is quite possibly a pay-for-access scheme. Yang’s company promotes itself as a service to ‘help Chinese investors’. But ‘what help’ Yang is offering remains a serious question.
TOP DEMOCRATS SEEK PROBE OF CINDY YANG ACCESS TO TRUMP
Key Democrats have sent a letter to the Justice Department asking that the FBI probe Cindy’s Yang’s pay-for-access scheme.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/congressional-democrats-want-counterintelligence-probe-of-chinese-american-massage-parlor-founder-connected-to-trump/2019/03/18/55022b60-4989-11e9-9663-00ac73f49662_story.html?utm_term=.73206489b355
TOP DEMOCRATS SEEK TO PROBE CINDY YANG
Democrats always have their heads in the dirt.
https://www.nationalreview.com/2017/07/chinese-illegally-donated-bill-clinton-reelection-campaign-media-downplayed/
Two decades ago, the media weren’t obsessed with Chinese interference in a presidential election.
This summer we mark the 20th anniversary of a major investigation by Congress of attempts by a hostile foreign power to influence an American presidential election.
I’m glad the news media is pursuing the Trump–Russia scandal, but let’s not forget the differences between how they are covering Russia compared with how they reported a similar story — this one involving Communist China — that developed during Bill Clinton’s 1996 reelection campaign. The Washington Post reported in 1998 that “evidence gathered in federal surveillance intercepts has indicated that the Chinese government planned to increase China’s influence in the U.S. political process in 1996.”
Many people still believe that a major cover-up of that scandal worked — in part because the media expressed skepticism and devoted only a fraction of resources they are spending on the Trump–Russia story. Network reporters expressed outright skepticism of the story, with many openly criticizing the late senator Fred Thompson, the chair of the Senate investigating committee, for wasting time and money. On June 17, 1997, Katie Couric, then the Today co-anchor, asked the Washington Post’s Bob Woodward about the story: “Are members of the media, do you think, Bob, too scandal-obsessed, looking for something at every corner?”
According to an analysis by the Media Research Center, the news coverage of the congressional hearings on the China scandal in the summer of 1997 were dwarfed by reports on the murder of fashion designer Gianni Versace and the death of Princess Diana.
The Chinese fundraising scandal involving DNC finance vice chairman John Huang first came to light in the final weeks of the 1996 presidential campaign. A former Commerce Department official, Huang was a top fundraiser who scooped up suspect foreign cash for Team Clinton.
A 1998 Senate Government Affairs Committee report on the scandal found “strong circumstantial evidence” that a great deal of foreign money had illegally entered the country in an attempt to influence the 1996 election. The DNC was forced to give back more than $2.8 million in illegal or improper donations from foreign nationals.
The most suspect funds were brought in by Johnny Chung, a bagman for the Asian billionaire Riady family. Chung confessed that at least $35,000 of his donations to the Clinton campaign and the DNC had come from a Chinese aerospace executive — a lieutenant colonel in the Chinese military. Chung said the executive had helped him meet three times with General Ji Shengde, the head of Chinese military intelligence. According to Chung’s testimony, General Shengde had told him: “We really like your president. We hope he will be reelected. I will give you $300,000 U.S. dollars. You can give it to . . . your president and the Democratic party.”
The sprawling fundraising scandal ultimately led to 22 guilty pleas on various violations of election laws.
The sprawling fundraising scandal ultimately led to 22 guilty pleas on various violations of election laws. Among the Clinton fundraisers and friends who pleaded guilty were John Huang, Charlie Trie, James Riady, and Michael Brown, son of the late Clinton Commerce secretary Ron Brown. But many questions went unanswered, even after the revelations that Clinton had personally authorized offering donors Oval Office meetings and use of the Lincoln bedroom. A total of 120 participants in the fundraising scandal either fled the country, asserted their Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination, or otherwise avoided questioning. The stonewalling worked — and probably encouraged Hillary Clinton in her own cover-up of her private e-mail server and her ties with the Clinton Foundation.
Indeed, much of the media basically gave the Clintons a pass on evidence that special-interest donors to the Clinton Foundation frequently managed to score favors from the State Department. Journalist Peter Schweitzer revealed in his book Clinton Cash that State had helped move along an infamous deal that granted the Russians control of more than 20 percent of the uranium production here in the United States. The company involved in acquiring the American uranium was a very large donor to — you guessed it — the Clinton Foundation.
None of this history should dissuade the media from questioning the White House’s often shifting and blatantly inaccurate accounts of what happened and who was involved and when. Either the president’s team is infected with a self-destructive gene or they really do have something to hide.
But a little humility and honesty on the part of the media would be appropriate. Much of the breathless and constant coverage of the Russia scandal is motivated by the media’s hatred of Donald Trump, which is of course reciprocated.
When it came to the Clintons, the media tended to downplay or even trivialize many of their scandals.
When it came to the Clintons, the media tended to downplay or even trivialize many of their scandals. But, to be fair, a little bit of self-awareness is beginning to show up in the Russia coverage. Last Thursday, Mika Brzezinski of MSNBC noted that when it came to “opening the door” to lowering the standards of conduct by a modern president, Bill Clinton led the way with his lying and scandalous behavior. She was referring, of course, to the Lewinsky scandal, but her comments are equally appropriate to the many other Clinton scandals that didn’t receive wall-to-wall coverage.
asians dump dems
https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/commentary/ct-perspec-switch-political-parties-asian-americans-republicans-0627-story.html
by John Yoo 2018
For all their smarts, Asian-Americans can be pretty dumb.
They support Democrats in droves, and Democrats support race-based affirmative action. Now a lawsuit has revealed just how discriminatory that kind of decision-making can be. At Harvard, racial balancing — in the guise of a personality score for applicants — appears to be systematically reducing the admission of Asian-American students to the university.
The Harvard scandal contains a lot of takeaways, but here’s the one I hope sticks with my fellow Asian-Americans: It’s time for us to end our blind loyalty to the Democratic Party and support instead politicians who will promote our interests.
Asian-Americans are the most dynamic minority group in the U.S. Between the 2000 and 2010 censuses, the Asian population in the U.S. grew by nearly 50 percent. According to social science surveys and the census, they are the wealthiest and best-educated Americans. They are more likely to run a small business than any other racial group. They are deeply religious, with strong family values and a low divorce rate. Asian families push their children hard to score at the top of standardized tests and to achieve sterling grade-point averages.
In recent presidential elections, Asian-Americans have consistently voted Democratic. In 2012, exit polling shows that 73 percent of Asian voters turned out for Barack Obama, second only, among racial/ethnic groups, to African-Americans. In 2016, two-thirds of Asian voters supported Hillary Clinton, again second to black Americans and this time tied with Latinos. Asian-Americans last voted for a Republican for president way back in 1996, when they went for Bob Dole (about the only voters who did, it seems).
The Democratic Party has rewarded this unwavering support with an unyielding defense of race-based school admissions and government programs such as the one that’s been working against Asian-Americans at Harvard.
Every U.S. Supreme Court justice appointed by a Democratic president has upheld race-based school admissions programs in the name of diversity. Democratic administrations have aggressively supported these same programs in court. In California, Democrats have sought repeatedly to overturn Proposition 209, the law that prevents University of California at Berkeley and UCLA from resurrecting the use of race as a factor in their admission process. In New York City today, Democratic Mayor Bill de Blasio proposes to end the standardized single-test admission system used by magnet schools — because too many Asians do too well on the tests.
Harvard, and the Democratic Party, favor “holistic” admissions policies that yield what is considered to be the “right” balance of racial and ethnic groups on campus. Under pressure of a lawsuit filed by Students for Fair Admission, the university disclosed that Asians would make up 43 percent of the student body if academic scores alone dictated admissions. But Harvard ranks applicants on their strengths in five categories. Even though Asians score highest on academics and extracurricular activities, Harvard gave them the lowest possible score on personal traits such as humor, sensitivity, creativity, grit and leadership.
The personal rating kept Asians to 26 percent of admissions in 2013. Harvard then made “demographic” adjustments that further reduced the class to 19 percent Asian, which magically appears to be the same percentage of Asians that’s been admitted to Harvard for years. Ivy League schools used similar criteria and methods early in the last century to avoid admitting Jewish students.
University admission is not the only thing over which Asian-Americans and Democrats should disagree. Democrats have led the resistance to the Republican Congress’ tax cuts and to the Trump administration’s deregulation platform; Asians, meanwhile, run the mom-and-pop stores and small businesses that suffer the most from growing government. As court cases about wedding cakes and health care coverage have shown, Democrats have waged federal and state war on the right of some religious people to refuse to obey laws supporting abortion rights or gay marriage; Asians are among the most fervent of evangelical Christians.
Why Asian-Americans refuse to vote their interests remains a deep puzzle. Part of the problem rests at the feet of Republicans. Like past immigrants, many Asians first land in America’s great cities, but the Republican Party no longer seriously contests elections in the inner cities. Asian-Americans who rely on municipal government for business licenses and good schools may never meet a serious GOP politician. It would come as no surprise that these immigrants, especially those who have fled authoritarian nations, would join the Democratic Party, simply to get a fair shake.
More insidiously, Asian-Americans may also be brainwashed by their respect for higher education. As the Harvard situation shows, some of the nation’s best schools are willing to corrupt merit and achievement in the service of a politically correct racial balance. Asians may come to think that ideology is as “true” as the scientific research produced by Nobel Prize-winning universities. Asians are fighting for admission to the very institutions that discount their talents and achievements.
Asian-Americans can change their self-defeating politics simply by questioning their loyalty to the Democratic Party. The smartest voters keep themselves in play, choosing candidates who truly represent their self-interest, election by election. I believe politicians who support fair competition in the markets and in our schools — most likely Republicans — best represent Asian-Americans. And Asian voters would benefit not only themselves but the American people as a whole by rejecting anyone who supports the use of race rather than merit to pick winners, losers and even Harvard students.
As if the internet was reading my super insightful posts here, another one comes up
https://washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/april-may-june-2018/the-untapped-potential-of-the-asian-voter/
Republicans can turn on a dime on this, easily. Low hanging fruit
PETER’S DREAM. A MASSAGE AT YANG’S SPA
Peter, you couldn’t find anything wrong with the email. Are you now tense and looking for a handout so you can get a massage?
Here’s what this is all about. Democrats want to get a lock on Asians the way they have a lock on blacks. That will never work out the same for them, be assured.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/obama-asian-americans-voted-republican-gop-wants-bring-them-back-n873401
The real person to “probe” for nefarious influence of the foreign governments, is what influence does the People Republic of China have on AOC from Queens?
Why Queens? Because of Flushing that’s why. A fine place, fastest growing Chinatown in America, but, sadly, also a hotbed of agents of influence of the Chinese government.
So I just ask a few questions. Just using my imagination, I Have no information about such things, pure speculation.
Has she received a briefcase full of cash from a Chinese communist government agent down the street in Flushing? Did she or any of her sketchy campaign officials meet any PLA influence officers, lets, say, at a casino in New York city, and maybe get handful of the purple, orange or grey chips? $500, $1000, $5000 denominations! Easy to redeem, no paperwork!
Forget about going all the way to New Jersey. I would start at this one
Resorts World Casino New York City Casino
JFK-airport-area casino featuring slots & table games, food court & bars.
Address: 110-00 Rockaway Blvd, Jamaica, NY 11420
Probably the FBI is not stupid and if they have counterintelligence operations along these lines, it might include going there to develop some informants. Recruit a good baccarat dealers there, would be an easy starting place to get to know the regulars versus who is on a “junket” from China.
Pure speculation on my part, no personal knowledge of any such thing.
I’m not making it up. the Chicoms are busy in Flushing, going after the Falun Gong, the Christian and Hui Min asylees, going after the Taiwanese government supporters.
https://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/03/07/a-battle-for-chinese-hearts-and-minds-in-flushing/?mtrref=www.google.com&gwh=4D8C39F8937D95EE69DA742B9C2785F2&gwt=pay
Use your imagination. An enterprising PLA influence officer undercover in America, looking to get some “kompromat” on Democrats and emplace some agents like the chauffeur that was working for Di Feinstein, and what better way that to drop some major campaign donations off at Ocasio Cortez’ operation.
Yes, let’s look into Ms Yang if you like, Maybe you will find she promised a lot and did not deliver much. But then under the carpet you may find the PLA has delivered a lot in the meantime— to Democrats…. For Di Fi like Bill Clinton before her, the “guanxi” was very favorable! Hong bao na li!
hong bao na li!
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/aoc-group-pushing-left-wing-candidates-raked-in-soft-money-she-wants-to-ban
a) licensed massage facilities are legal. the services they offer are legal. the illegal things that the police love to justify their budgets by alleging against ‘massage parlors” could happen just as easily down at the mall at Massage Envy as they could at some Chinese place.
oh wait actually they DO alleged Massage Envy is facilitating commiting sexual assault! Except it’s a somewhat different typical scenario…
https://www.foxnews.com/us/massage-envy-faces-new-lawsuit-alleging-it-enabled-employees-sexual-misconduct-report
Even the “Wal Mart of Massages” the odious Massage Envy, deserves a presumption of innocence and due process before it’s considered guilty. So does Robert Kraft and the “massage parlor” down the street from you offering pain relief to paying customers.
b) Cindy Yang. I don’t know her. But so what if she owned massage shops? Good for her. And she sold them. And she was paid to introduce Chinese businessmen to Americans. So what? Is there a statute there or are the Democrats just trying to punish a Chinese person that has DARED to offer donations to the WRONG TEAM?
DEMOCRATS WANT TO CORNER THE MARKET ON CHINESE AMERICAN VOTES AND DONATIONS. THEY HAVE GROWN FAT ON CODDLING THE PRC CHICOM AGENTS EVER SINCE CLINTON WAS TAKING DONATIONS FROM PLA OFFICERS WHEN HE WAS IN THE WHITE HOUSE
REPUBLICANS SHOULD NOT LET DEMOCRATS THINK THEY ARE THE ONLY ONES WHO CAN REPRESENT AMERICANS!
Under Clinton the Chicoms stole nuclear warhead designs, while Bill Clinton was taking PLA donations. Fact!
http://www.cnn.com/US/9905/25/cox.report.02/
Clinton learned of allegations in ’98
Among the material stolen cited by the report:
Classified information on seven U.S. thermonuclear warheads, including every currently deployed thermonuclear warhead in the U.S. ballistic missile arsenal. That includes the W-88, a miniaturized warhead that is the most sophisticated weapon the United States has ever built.
Classified design information for an enhanced neutron bomb that has never been deployed by any country, including the United States.
U.S. developmental technology that if successfully completed could be used to attack U.S. satellites and submarines.
“(Chinese) penetration of our national weapons laboratories spans at least the past several decades and almost certainly continues today,” the report says.
Beijing primarily focused on Los Alamos, Lawrence Livermore, Oak Ridge and Sandia national laboratories.
The Clinton administration first learned of the extent of the alleged espionage in 1995 when a Chinese citizen gave the CIA a classified document from Beijing that demonstrated China had obtained information on the W-88 and half a dozen other U.S. nuclear warheads.
graphic
cox
AIFF or WAV
(498 K/30 sec. audio)
Cox explains the possible implications of the loss of U.S. nuclear information
The report claims that President Clinton was made aware of the allegations in early 1998.
Although the administration has taken steps to boost security at nuclear labs, the report says, security will “not be satisfactory until at least sometime in the year 2000.”
“Despite repeated (Chinese) thefts of the most sophisticated U.S. nuclear weapons technology, security at our national nuclear weapons laboratories does not meet even minimal standards,” it says.
##################################################
Whatever this Yang lady supposedly said or did was nothing illegal it appears, and not even embarrassing. But what happened under BIll Clinton was a real travesty!
Guys, let’s probe this deep dark hole fiercely, if you like! Just don’t say you didn’t ask for it.
Once again, I see the perversion of statements made by the president intended to infer guilt. I know we are smart enough to avoid those traps but yet the Press persists. When he says something like “there should never have been a Mueller report”, he obviously knows it exists but that without collusion by the Obama administration and the Democrat Party to create a fake “dossier” paid for by DNC to spin lies AND the active participation by FBI/DOJ political partisans NONE of this would happen. It is lies and conspiracy by the Dems/Obama administration/ and political partisans who created this fake Mueller investigation.
so far there is nothing to gut. Is he ever going to get started? not a nothing burger it’s s bichi burger
he played the largest part in bringing it about.
This is a lie.
Oh, is it?
The question of investigating Trump relies on very thin and likely illegal reports that have no truth in them. Here is another “dossier” likely to have soft spots needing to be cut out but certainly more true than anything claimed against Trump to the present. (from an anonymous email)
—
Follow the marriage of Lisa and Rod, conspiracy and treason.
From 2001 to 2005 there was an ongoing investigation into the Clinton Foundation. Guess who took over this investigation in 2002?
None other than James Comey.
Guess who was transferred in to the Internal Revenue Service to run the Tax Exemption Branch of the IRS?
Your friend and mine, Lois “Be on The Look Out” (BOLO) Lerner.
Guess who ran the Tax Division inside the Department of Injustice from 2001 to 2005?
No other than the Assistant Attorney General of the United States, Rod Rosenstein.
Guess who was the Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation during this time frame?
I know, it’s a miracle, just a coincidence, just an anomaly in statistics and chances, but it was Robert Mueller.
What do all four casting characters have in common?
They all were briefed and/or were front line investigators into the Clinton Foundation Investigation.
Now that’s just a coincidence, right?
Ok, lets chalk the last one up to mere chance.
Let’s fast forward to 2009……
James Comey leaves the Justice Department to go and cash-in at Lockheed Martin.
Hillary Clinton is running the State Department, on her own personal email server, by the way.
The Uranium One “issue” comes to the attention of Hillary.
Like all good public servants do, you know – looking out for America’s best interest, she decides to support the decision and approve the sale of 20% of US Uranium to no other than, the Russians.
Now, you would think that this is a fairly straight-up deal, except that it wasn’t: The People got absolutely nothing out of it.
However, prior to the sales approval, no other than Bill Clinton goes to Moscow, gets paid 500K for a one hour speech, then meets with Vladimir Putin at his home for a few hours.
Ok, no big deal right?
Well, not so fast: the FBI had a mole inside the money laundering and bribery scheme.
Guess who was the FBI Director during this time?
Yep, Robert Mueller.
He even delivered a Uranium Sample to Moscow in 2009.
Guess who was handling that case within the Justice Department out of the US Attorney’s Office in Maryland?
No other than, Rod Rosenstein.
Guess what happened to the informant?
The Department of Justice placed a GAG order on him and threatened to lock him up if he spoke out about it.
How does 20% of the most strategic asset of the United States of America end up in Russian hands when the FBI has an informant, a mole, providing inside information to the FBI on the criminal enterprise?
Guess what happened soon after the sale was approved?
~145 million dollars in “donations” made their way into the Clinton Foundation from entities directly connected to the Uranium One deal.
Guess who was still at the Internal Revenue Service working the Charitable Division?
No other than, Lois Lerner.
Ok, that’s all just another series of coincidences. Nothing to see here, right?
Let’s fast forward to 2015.
Due to a series of tragic events in Benghazi and after the 9 “investigations” the House, Senate and at State Department, Trey Gowdy who was running the 10th investigation as Chairman of the Select Committee on Benghazi discovers that The Hillary ran the State Department on an unclassified, unauthorized, outlaw personal email server.
He also discovered that none of those emails had been turned over when she departed her “Public Service” as Secretary of State which was required by law.
He also discovered that there was Top Secret information contained within her personally archived email. ( Let’s not forget – at least 10 CIA spies in china were killed by the Chinese because of the leaks, and god knows what else occurred )
Sparing you the State Departments cover up, the nostrums they floated, the delay tactics that were employed and the outright lies that were spewed forth from the necks of the Kerry State Department, we shall leave it with this…… they did everything humanly possible to cover for Hillary.
Now this is amazing: guess who became FBI Director in 2013?
Guess who secured 17 no-bid contracts for his employer (Lockheed Martin) with the State Department and was rewarded with a six million dollar thank you present when he departed his employer?
No other than James Comey.
Amazing how all those no-bids just went right through at State, huh?
Now he is the FBI Director in charge of the “Clinton Email Investigation” after of course his FBI Investigates the Lois Lerner “Matter” at the Internal Revenue Service and exonerates her.
Nope…. couldn’t find any crimes there.
Can you guess what happened next?
In April 2016, James Comey drafts an exoneration letter of Hillary Rodham Clinton, meanwhile the DOJ is handing out immunity deals like candy.
They didn’t even convene a Grand Jury.
Like a lightning bolt of statistical impossibility, like a miracle from God himself, like the true “Gangsta” Comey is, James steps out into the cameras of an awaiting press conference on July the 5th of 2016, and exonerates The Hillary from any wrongdoing.
Can you see the pattern?
It goes on and on, Rosenstein becomes Asst. Attorney General, Comey gets fired based upon a letter by Rosenstein, Comey leaks government information to the press, Mueller is assigned to the Russian Investigation sham by Rosenstein to provide cover for decades of malfeasance within the FBI and DOJ and the story continues.
FISA Abuse, political espionage…. pick a crime, any crime, chances are….. this group and a few others did it.
All the same players.
All compromised and conflicted.
All working fervently to NOT go to jail themselves.
All connected in one way or another to the Clintons.
They are like battery acid, they corrode and corrupt everything they touch.
How many lives have these two destroyed?
As of this writing, the Clinton Foundation, in its 20+ years of operation of being the largest International Charity Fraud in the history of mankind, has never been audited by the Internal Revenue Service.
Let us not forget that Comey’s brother works for DLA Piper, the law firm that does the Clinton Foundation’s taxes.
And see, the person that is the common denominator to all the crimes above and still doing her evil escape legal maneuvers at the top of the 3 Letter USA Agencies? Yep, that would be Hillary R. Clinton!
WHO IS LISA BARSOOMIAN?
Let’s learn a little about Mrs. Lisa H. Barsoomian’s background.
Lisa H. Barsoomian, a US Attorney that graduated from Georgetown Law, is a protege of James Comey and Robert Mueller.
Barsoomian, with her boss R. Craig Lawrence, represented Bill Clinton in 1998.
Lawrence also represented:
Robert Mueller three times;
James Comey five times;
Barack Obama 45 times;
Kathleen Sebelius 56 times;
Bill Clinton 40 times; and
Hillary Clinton 17 times.
Between 1998 and 2017, Barsoomian herself represented the FBI at least five times.
You may be saying to yourself, OK, who cares? Who cares about the work history of this Barsoomian woman?
Apparently someone does, because someone out there cares so much that they’ve “purged” all Barsoomian court documents for her Clinton representation in Hamburg vs. Clinton in 1998 and its appeal in 1999 from the DC District and Appeals Court dockets (?).
Someone out there cares so much that the internet has been “purged” of all information pertaining to Barsoomian.
Historically, this indicates that the individual is a protected CIA operative Additionally, Lisa Barsoomian has specialized in opposing Freedom of Information Act requests on behalf of the intelligence community. And, although Barsoomian has been involved in hundreds of cases representing the DC Office of the US Attorney, her email address is Lisa Barsoomian at NIH gov. The NIH stands for National Institutes of Health.
This is a tactic routinely used by the CIA to protect an operative by using another government organization to shield their activities.
It’s a cover, so big deal, right? I mean what does one more attorney with ties to the US intelligence community really matter?
It deals with Trump and his recent tariffs on Chinese steel and aluminum imports, the border wall, DACA, everything coming out of California, the Uni-party unrelenting opposition to President Trump, the Clapper leaks, the Comey leaks, Attorney General Jeff Sessions recusal and subsequent 14 month nap with occasional forays into the marijuana legalization mix …. and last but not least Mueller’s never-ending investigation into collusion between the Trump team and the Russians.
Why does Barsoomian, CIA operative, merit any mention?
BECAUSE….
She is Assistant Attorney General Rod Rosenstein’s WIFE….That’s why!!
Alan, it looks like this whole ‘comment’ was copied from some right-wing media source. Why can’t you tell the name of that source?
“Why can’t you tell the name of that source?”
Peter, I made mention of where it came from right at the beginning. “from an anonymous email”
It certainly didn’t come from the left as important news frequently is ommitted from left wing sites creating ignorance among those that rely exclusively on the main stream media.
However, I think your point is validation of the material that was written. I believe all of the substantitive facts are correct based on what I read. One might argue with the implications though even the implications appear to be substantially correct.
If you believe anything written is not true why not copy that sentence or two and put forth a more accurate explanation. I am open to knowledge from both sides so I am thanking you in advance.
Alan, if all these points add up to anything of significance, Trump and his lawyers could have shot down the entire investigation months ago. Professor Turely and every legal scholar would have dismissed the Mueller Probe. Obviously that didn’t happen.
And obviously good legal cases aren’t made with ‘anonymous emails’.
I would bet the real source on this is Alex Jones’ INFO-WARS.
“Alan, if all these points add up to anything of significance, Trump and his lawyers could have shot down the entire investigation months ago.”
Peter, you don’t seem to understand the division of powers. Trump could have ended the investigation without any of those things existing. That demonstrates you don’t recognize what has actually occurred and are unable to state and show why those comments in the email weren’t true. Most if not all are true. Quote the comments you have difficulty with along with your explanation. If you can’t they you really should consider learning more about what has happened.
I have researched a good number of the points in the past and those particular points I am sure are accurate.
Supply your research and prove those points that are “accurate.”
Anonymous, what a cruel joke has been played on you by the MSM and those with power on the left. You have been left in a state of ignorance so you can’t asses what is written. Quote which sentences are wrong and tell us why. Then we can talk.
The Perry Mason impersonator has been reduced to posting works of fiction on the Turley blawg in defense of Trump who, oddly enough, is yet another work of fiction in progress.
Diane, you too have the same chance to quote what that email said and then explain why it is wrong. I don’t think the essential data is wrong at all but I await for your proof.
“… I await for your proof.”
Please feel free to hold your breath while waiting, Allan. (You brought the information to the forum. The burden is on you, IMO, to provide “the proof.” Anyone who has been around here very long understands that it’s not a productive use of time to get involved in a back-and-forth with you.)
“Please feel free ”
Anonymous, If you think there is something wrong with what was said in that email that is fine. That you can’t say what it is wrong tells us that there is nothing there to disprove at least where you are concerned. The email points are in writing.
Take note. Nothing even jumps out of you that looks wrong. That tells us something. The email is pointing in the right direction and you simply don’t want to accept where it leads. That is your problem.
The Sole Proprietor Of His Own Noise said, “I await for your proof.”
The burden of proof is on the accuser, SPOHON. And you know it. And you don’t care about knowingly shifting the burden of proof onto the accused, who are supposed to prove their innocence to the satisfaction of a third-rate Perry Mason Impersonator on a blawg full of Trumpa Lumpas dedicated to denial in defense of Trump.
“The burden of proof is on the accuser”
Diane, in other words what was said in that email was essentially correct and you know it. You might have different opinions but Lisa and Ron are married and all those individuals seem to have held specific jobs at specific times that make things fishy.
Of course when you accuse Trump of an act you never provide proof. We see gobs of unrelated stuff from Wikipedia but no proof.
I think most if not all of those things stated in the email are factually correct and the images in your mind that cause you to draw back in horror might actually be the correct images of corruption and malfeance in the DOJ and elsewhere.
Funny, Allan. You don’t know anything about me. You just think you do.
“Funny, Allan. You don’t know anything about me. You just think you do.”
Your writings tell a lot about you. You may have been schooled, but you weren’t educated.
nah, but it’s been supposedly “Debunked” The High Priest of the PC Inquisition, aka “snopes,” which pops up in like first place on google under her name, because Google has anointed this snopes dude, one guy with a few computers, their blessed fact-checker of primary repute.
his wife used to be in an honest trade, sex work!
now she’s a fake news fact checker that is to say involved in misinformation operations
And I don’t know if it’s creditable or not, but, when you read what snopes has to say, it’s hardly fact checking, just a bunch of ad hominem criticism of some guy named Hamburg who is dead now and supposedly “spread the rumour” etc etc
“but it’s been supposedly “Debunked””
What has supposedly been debunked? Nothing!
Kurtz, all we see here is Paint-By-Number Name-Dropping.
Alan’s anonymous email simply presumes that every named actor is part of a deep state plot. Therefore loyal consumers of right-wing media recognize all those names and connections from countless right-wing media stories. It’s essentially a medley of Greatest Hits geared for Trump loyalists.
here is the snopes thing that refers to what he refers to.
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/lisa-barsoomian-rod-rosenstein/
Alan, Peter, I am too busy to fact check the supposed fact checking done by the Designed Expert “Snopes.”…. HOWEVER … I have fact checked snopes before and found him wanting.
I have some modest experience in this in terms of reviewing print publications for whether or not they could be the basis for defamation claims. I can tell you it’s very hard to make a defamation claim out based on any newsworthy item because of NYT V Sullivan.
But, news items often reprint innuendo and falsehood, in a way that skirts liability, by saying “so and so says such and such” So newspapers are generally less reliable than people think they are.
They also make mistakes, especially about technical subjects, especially legal things and lawsuits, that they presume to report upon authoritatively all the time. And are often wrong. Lawyers are often ignoring them and too busy to correct media errors. And observe Snopes is digging into some lawsuit with repsect to this story.
Yes, that snopes…… Sometimes he fact checks things properly….BUt many times NOT. Many times HE BECOMES THE PROPAGANDIST.
Now read what he wrote about this:
” In 1998, a Wyoming military veteran named Al Hamburg — an eccentric “perennial candidate” and letter-writer who once attempted to register his dog as a presidential candidate — filed a civil rights case against Clinton in his capacity as Commander-in-Chief. Hamburg alleged anti-white discrimination by Clinton and claimed that the president was part of a conspiracy to bring about an “alien invasion” by Mexican-American military members. He demanded an upgrade to his Vietnam-era “undesirable discharge” from the Army, along with three months’ pay allegedly due to him since 1967, and “at least ten thousand dollars.””
THAT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH BARSOOMIAN DOES IT? THAT IS JUST AD HOMINEM ARGUMENT AGAINST THE DECEASED FELLOW HAMBURG THAT WAS THE SUBJECT OF A LAWSUIT ABOUT THIS WHOLE WHATEVER STORY.
Argument ad hominem is a fallacy when it is used to prove or disprove truthfulness in a strict logical sense. but of course in the wider sense, bias is always worth considering when it comes to a source. Ok, well Hamburg was biased, but guess what, so is Snopes!
I have no information to offer about Barsoomian. I do not affirm nor deny that she is Rosenstein’s wife or a lobbyist or whatever. I am making a point that the “fact checkers” themselves are often not fact checkers at all. I think a lot of liberals ought to wake up and smell the coffee about that.
What Snopes does is eliminate parts that are true and comments on the perifery or opinion so that it can say false. Neither Snopes nor the other left wing fact checkers are honest brokers. But isn’t that exactly what Peter is looking for?
Excerpted from the Snopes article to which The Fictional Character linked:
Nobody has “purged all Barsoomian court documents” relating to her role in the 1998 case Hamburg vs. Clinton. This is false. It took us only a few minutes to find that case on a court records database and locate a document written and signed by Barsoomian.
In 1998, a Wyoming military veteran named Al Hamburg — an eccentric “perennial candidate” and letter-writer who once attempted to register his dog as a presidential candidate — filed a civil rights case against Clinton in his capacity as Commander-in-Chief. Hamburg alleged anti-white discrimination by Clinton and claimed that the president was part of a conspiracy to bring about an “alien invasion” by Mexican-American military members. He demanded an upgrade to his Vietnam-era “undesirable discharge” from the Army, along with three months’ pay allegedly due to him since 1967, and “at least ten thousand dollars.”
Clinton’s response to Hamburg’s claims is signed by several Justice department officials — including Barsoomian, who was acting in her capacity as an Assistant U.S. Attorney. The case was quickly dismissed by a judge.
[end excerpt]
Now pay attention. The second paragraph in the text cited above is the legal document signed by Barsoomian in the court case Hamburg vs. Clinton. Snopes published that legal document to refute the claim that Barsoomian’s record as an Assistant U. S. Attorney had been “purged” to cover-up an alleged role as a covert CIA operative. But The Fictional Character claims that Snopes produced that document as an ad hominem attack on Al Hamburg. And that, therefore, Snopes is a propagandist rather than fact checker. The Fictional Character is beyond ridiculous, now. Just. Like The SPOHON.
In my opinion recent happenings confirm that we need to rethink the powers allocated to the President in view of current and future abuses by Trump and future office holders. We have not had a person like this in the Presidency but we now unfortunately see that such a person can be elected
“the powers allocated to the President in view of current and future abuses ”
If you believe what you say don’t you think your claim was warranted under the Obama administration, ‘I have a phone and a pen’? So far the Trump administrations seems to have remained within in the law. I don’t think we can say the same for the Obama administration which weaponized the IRS and DOJ.
Somewhat divided opinions on roughly the same topic from the same source at two different times:
https://www.lawfareblog.com/jaworskis-road-map-may-not-guide-mueller
Nov 8, 2018 … Special Prosecutor Leon Jaworski’s road map report to the House of … 1, 1974, Jaworski’s prosecutors gave Judge John Sirica a briefcase …
https://www.lawfareblog.com/watergate-road-map-and-coming-mueller-report
Sep 14, 2018 … It is time for Jaworski’s Road Map to see the light of day. … Judge Sirica later wrote that the evidence and the Road Map saved the House …
Excerpted from the second article linked above Leon Jaworski’s Road Map:
As Philip Lacovara, who served as counsel to Jaworski and argued U.S. v. Nixon before the Supreme Court, described the history in a declaration filed with our petition:
we were aware that the House Judiciary Committee, which has jurisdiction over possible impeachments, was conducting an inquiry into whether President Nixon had committed “high crimes and misdemeanors” and thus was liable to impeachment. Accordingly, the Special Prosecutor concluded that … the salient information about the President’s own conduct would be transmitted, in an organized form, to the House Judiciary Committee, if that could be done lawfully. I concluded that this course was permissible under Rule 6(e) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. The Watergate Task Force team then prepared the Road Map.
It was understood that it would be prudent to seek judicial approval for this course before actually releasing the Road Map to the House Judiciary Committee. Accordingly, we sought approval from Chief Judge John J. Sirica, who was supervising all grand jury matters at the time. I presented the arguments supporting release of the material, which both Chief Judge Sirica and the en banc D.C. Circuit approved (one judge dissenting). See In re Report & Recommendation of June 5, 1972 Grand Jury Concerning Transmission of Evidence to House of Representatives, 370 F. Supp. 1219 (D.D.C. 1974), aff’d sub nom. Haldeman v. Sirica, 501 F.2d 714 (D.C. Cir. 1974). The Road Map was then transmitted to the House Judiciary Committee. I understand that House members and staff used the Road Map in determining whether to prepare Articles of Impeachment, which the Committee eventually did.
How can JT say that the Comey firing triggered the Special Counsel when Comey acknowledged that Trump could fire him for any reason or for no reason at all. And didn’t Comey say that he leaked documents to his law professor buddy to trigger the appointment of a Special Counsel?
RSA, it seems that Turley has been emotionally incentivized to direct his attentions of our civil liberties and governmental powers almost exclusively to Trump. Broadening his scope to include things mentioned in my earlier posting might lead to a leftist attack on him that can interfere with his ability to earn money. This may have already been done to Jeanne Pirro as she has been off the air and has presently developed into an all out attack on Tucker Carlson.
The left wants exclusivity of all types of media something far more dangerous and needs discussion more than the continual braying over and over again about every action made by Trump.
Turley wrote, “If Trump asserts executive privilege to all communications with Mueller that were not also made to Congress, Barr likely will feel duty-bound to defend those assertions.”
Turley also wrote, “However, he cannot give Congress a report with grand jury information (called Rule 6e material) without a court order. More importantly, he cannot disclose privileged information to Congress.”
I could be wrong, but I think I see what Turley is doing with those sentences. The phrase “all communications with Mueller” could, in theory, included “testimony before Mueller’s grand jury.” Of course, it could also include witnesses whom the special counsel’s office had interviewed but who didn’t testify to the grand jury. Turley did not specifically limit his argument about “presidential communications executive privilege” only to witnesses whom the special counsel’s office had interviewed but who did not testify to the grand jury. As such, Turley has given us no indication that Trump’s “presidential communications executive privilege” would NOT include the testimony of witnesses before Mueller’s grand jury in Turley’s chosen phrase “all communications with Mueller.”
Something tells me that Turley might be wrong about that. How could any POTUS assert “presidential communications executive privilege” over the testimony of witnesses before a grand jury that is convened and overseen by The Judicial Branch of the federal government of the United States of America? Did We The People of the United States of America become The Russian Federation on January 20th, 2017? Or did that happen on Tuesday November 8th, 2017? There’s no way to tell from Turley’s account.
O! Bother! Tuesday November 8th, 2016. Not 2017.
Grand Jury Rule 6 (E) The court may authorize disclosure—at a time, in a manner, and subject to any other conditions that it directs—of a grand-jury matter:
(i) preliminarily to or in connection with a judicial proceeding;
(ii) at the request of a defendant who shows that a ground may exist to dismiss the indictment because of a matter that occurred before the grand jury;
(iii) at the request of the government, when sought by a foreign court or prosecutor for use in an official criminal investigation;
(iv) at the request of the government if it shows that the matter may disclose a violation of State, Indian tribal, or foreign criminal law, as long as the disclosure is to an appropriate state, state-subdivision, Indian tribal, or foreign government official for the purpose of enforcing that law; or
(v) at the request of the government if it shows that the matter may disclose a violation of military criminal law under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, as long as the disclosure is to an appropriate military official for the purpose of enforcing that law
Repeated for emphasis:
Grand Jury Rule 6 (E) The court may authorize disclosure—at a time, in a manner, and subject to any other conditions that it directs—of a grand-jury matter:
(i) preliminarily to or in connection with a judicial proceeding;
[edit]
(iv) at the request of the government if it shows that the matter may disclose a violation of State, Indian tribal, or foreign criminal law, as long as the disclosure is to an appropriate state, state-subdivision, Indian tribal, or foreign government official for the purpose of enforcing that law;
[end excerpt]
Given that DoJ regulations claim that a president cannot be indicted while holding the Office of The POTUS, the only remaining sort of judicial proceeding that could be initiated against a sitting president would be (i) an impeachment hearing in The House or (iv) an indictment by a State for State offenses. Sirica allowed Jaworski to transmit grand jury information to the House Judiciary Committee in a non-accusatory and non-conclusive manner described as a road map–just the facts and the evidentiary exhibits; no legal analysis nor any legal arguments; no allegations nor any moral judgments. However, The SCOTUS had already overruled Nixon’s assertion of executive privilege over the White House tapes before Sirica enabled Jaworski to transmit the road map to Congress. Because of that, Nixon declined to challenge the transmission of the road map to Congress before the same Supreme Court that had already overruled his privilege over the tapes.
This may become one of the ways in which Trump might distinguish himself from Nixon to the benefit of Nixon’s reputation in comparison to Trump’s. OTOH, had it not been for those tapes, Nixon might have challenged Jaworski’s road map all the way to the Supreme Court the way many expect Trump to do for more or less the same reason. No tapes.
Turley wrote, “The more difficult privilege is “presidential communications.” Recognized in 1974 in United States v. Nixon, the Supreme Court noted that “the presidential communications privilege is more difficult to surmount.” Unlike the deliberative-process privilege that “disappears altogether when there is any reason to believe government misconduct occurred,” the presidential communications privilege is harder to overcome, “even when there are allegations of misconduct by high-level officials.”
Supposing Lt. Gen Michael T. Flynn was a high-ranking official (for 29 days before Trump fired him) who had had communications with the president (also for 29 days before Trump fired him) one supposes that Trump could assert executive privilege over his communications with Flynn during those 29 days when Trump was president and Flynn was a high-ranking official whom Trump had not yet fired. The presidential communications privilege ought not to cover-up communications between the president-elect and his designated national security adviser-to-be before the president has taken the oath of office, let alone The Senate reconfirm that Three-Star General’s rank.
But how would any executive privilege be asserted over presidential communications with Donald Trump Jr., Paul Manafort, Michael D. Cohen, Roger Stone, Dr. Jerome Corsi, Ted Malloch, George Papadopoulos and who knows who all else who had never been hired to work in Trump’s White House let alone fired from the same? Well, if they were all members of a Joint Defense Agreement with the one and only person who holds the pardon power, The POTUS, Trump, then . . . wait a second . . . can any member of Trump’s JDA testify before a grand jury without waiving the attorney-client privilege that Trump’s JDA had afforded them? Can Trump assert attorney-client privilege over any “presidential communication” that Trump had had with any clients and their attorneys who were part of Trump’s JDA?
Why not also assert presidential communications privilege over anything that Trump and Putin talked about? Or is that State secret privilege, instead? And if so, which State? The United States of America or The Russian Federation?
P.S. Doesn’t the grand jury information literally belong to The Judicial Branch that convenes and oversees the grand jury? If Mueller asks for, and Judge Beryl Howell grants, the sharing of grand jury information with Congress (as Judge Sirica did 1974), how would either executive privilege over presidential communications or attorney-client privilege over “codefendant communication” prevent the sharing of that grand jury information with Congress? Well, there’s still Rule 6(e) to lean on. Except that Trump adamantly refused to testify before Mueller’s grand jury. Didn’t he? What did Bush Jr. do? What did Bill Clinton do? What makes Trump so damned special around here?
the real question is WHY ISNT A GENIUS LIKE YOU WORKING FOR MEULLER?
Wait– don’t ask that question. It’s ok, I am sure that Meuller checks in here all the time to get new fancy ideas from “Late4Dinner”
“the real question is WHY ISNT A GENIUS LIKE YOU WORKING FOR MEULLER?”
Kurtz, didn’t you ever think that Diane (Late4Dinner) is Mueller’s batsh!t crazy mother?
Unless she’s about 100 years old, she isn’t. Batsh!t crazy sister is more like it.
DSS, there is a wide window of time for that to have happened. Mueller isn’t yet 75.
Excerpted from the first Lawfare article linked far upstream:
To aid the House Judiciary Committee’s impeachment effort, Jaworski’s prosecutors assembled evidence and summarized it in a report that they called the road map. On Mar. 1, 1974, Jaworski’s prosecutors gave Judge John Sirica a briefcase containing evidence and the road map. In a cover note, the grand jurors asked that the material be turned over to the House. H. R. Haldeman, John Ehrlichman, and others then tried to stop transmittal of the briefcase, on the ground that the publicity would prejudice their upcoming trials. Judge Sirica rejected the argument, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit declined to intervene. On Mar. 26, Judge Sirica gave the briefcase to the senior staff of the House Committee on the Judiciary. The staff, in turn, used the road map and evidence to help develop impeachment articles against President Nixon.
Mr Kurtz says: March 18, 2019 at 2:17 PM
“the real question is WHY ISNT A GENIUS LIKE YOU WORKING FOR MEULLER?”
Don’t ask me. Ask The Secret Service [“???”].
P.S. I’ve never kept successfully a secret in my life so far. I’m pretty sure that disqualifies me from the special counsel’s office.
Mr Trump is far too mentally dysfunctional to “collude” with Russians or anyone else. Evidence of Israeli collusion with Congress, on the other hand, is ubiquitous. Where is the Special Counsel to investigate Israeli collusion?
You want a special counsel to investigate Congress? Do you know what’s wrong with that, Sambiguity? Well, do you?
Samantha, all nations have relationships with our government but you seem to call it “Israeli collusion” when Israel has the same or similar relationship. What type of person are you that makes such connections yet is unable to point out significant evidence that what you think exists, does?
This is based on false Clinton opposition research. It’s insulting that taxpayers time and money went into this exercise. We learned some interesting things about the FISA courts and how corrupt appointed officials can be. Yet to pearl grasp about it being gutted is comical at best I’ll never vote Democrat again. I never thought I would say this, but I’m voting Trump 2020. I’m old enough to remember every time a Democrat has lost in the last 35 years. This time the petulant fit got way out of hand.
The Clinton opposition research at issue had nothing specific to say about Trump pursuing a Trump Tower Moscow deal while running for president. It did, however, say that Russia had been cultivating Trump with real-estate deals for years. I wouldn’t call that claim false.
Likewise, the Clinton opposition research at issue had nothing whatsoever to say about the June 9th, 2016, Trump Tower meeting between Don Jr., Jared Kushner, Paul Manafort and four Russians. It did, however, say that Putin and Russia supported Trump’s candidacy for president and the four Russians who attended the June 9th Trump Tower meeting as well as Rob Goldstone and The Agalarovs said the same thing about Russia’s support for Trump. So I wouldn’t call that claim false, either.
One more thing, the Clinton opposition research at issue made no specific claim that Paul Manafort had given $767,000 worth of detailed specific in-house Trump polling data produced by Tony Fabrizio to a Russian intelligence operative to give to a Russian oligarch who is a close friend to Putin. But it did say that Paul Manafort was at the center of managing a conspiracy of cooperation between Russia and Trump. So, once again, I wouldn’t call that claim false, either.
Twist the facts and play pretend
Change the story
Start over again….
We knew FISA courts were a rubber stamp process years before Trump, because intelligence whistle blowers told us so. If we were listening.
Aside from right winger “conspiracy theorists” that was also a lot of the socalled “left” aka Jill Stein and Bernie voters, who were not Hillary-sycophants, was never impressed by the lies about Trump and the Russkies in the first place.
I mean they hate Trump of course, because, well, other stuff; but they never believed the whole nutty Red Baiting hogwash.
That’s mostly a problem for the Democrats to sort out, however. Good luck!
Pull down your pants and show your stuff!