637

I’ve noted this regarding the chapter on the Supreme Court fights as well-find chapter Mike. The GOP has a lower opinion of the Court then Dems despite Citizens United,  gutting the Voting Rights Act, and most notably, Bush v. Gore where the Court handed the WH to the GOP in violation of the rules-the recount was not complete and had been temporarily paused because of the Brooks Brothers Riots-that Roger Stone has argued was thanks to him-chapter A for more. Then the GOP Court permanently paused the legal recount.

FN:  Stone wanted attention so much and finally he’s got it. 

Cleary the prosecution doesn’t agree that there was no collusion-no the Mueller team prosecutor believes it was yes collusion and that Stone was a major conduit for the Trump campaign’s collusion. 

“The evidence in this case will show that Roger Stone lied to the House Intelligence Committee because the truth looked bad,” lead prosecutor Aaron Zelinsky said in his opening statement on Wednesday. “The truth looked bad for the Trump campaign and the truth looked bad for Donald Trump.”

So Stone-like Manafort, like Cohen, like Bannon, like Jerome Corsi, lied to protect Trump.

Speaking of Bannon the word is he’s going to testify against Stone in this trial-that’s something I’d love to see. I’ve actually wondered why Bannon himself wasn’t charged-presumbably because he’s cooperated while publicly pretending to be Trump’s most loyal advocate and foot soldier.

End of FN

 

Yet the Dems continue to say nice things about the Court in recent polling. Maybe Kavanaugh will change this. Similarly Dems continue to say nice things about the FBI. Meanwhile the GOP claims the FBI is terribly biased against Trump. The candidate who the FBI knew was under investigation for  collusion with Russia yet still intervened 11 days before the election, thereby handing it to him, yet his party still claims it’s biased against them.

By the way, it’s not terribly controversial for me to say the FBI handed ‘President Trump’ the election-even the former FBI Director, Andy McCabe, says it.

What this demonstrates if nothing else is the Dems are much more forgiving than the GOP. In part, I think it’s because as liberals, we are congenital institutionalists-we want to believe that at least some of our major institutions are functioning properly. But the fact is that the SJC and FBI elected the last two Republican ‘Presidents’ and yet we have a much more rosy view of these two institutions than the GOP itself who is the beneficiary.

As I’ve documented elsewhere in this book, regarding Comey it’s a little complicated. He’s kind of like the Democrats’ best frenemy. Yes, he rigged the election for Trump-whatever his intent. But after Trump moved into the Russia House-thanks to Comey-we Democrats came to feel that he was the only person we could halfway trust to keep an eye on Trump and provide adult supervision- particularly, after Comey finally admitted the existence of the Russia probe in March, 2017, a full nine months after it had started, we felt he alone could protect the Russia investigation.

FN: Even though in truth Comey pulled his punches in the Russia investigation and was much slower and less aggressive than he probably should have been-but again the FBI only finds a high gear if the subject is a Democrat.

Again, kind of ironic as Trump was only there in the first place because of Comey-who knew about the Russia investigation when he handed the election to Trump. Then after Comey was fired, he became in the minds of many liberals and Democrats a great ally of ours-the irony just gets thicker and thicker, I know.

Trump claimed to fire Comey because he rigged the election for Trump. Irony got ever thicker.

FN: Of course, Trump did the same thing with Comey’s then Deputy Director, Andy McCabe-firing him with 26 hours until he received his pension for the sin of leaking word of the FBI’s terribly unpredicated Clinton Foundation investigation-based on Clinton Cash. Certainly McCabe deserves condemnation for that though it hardly hurt the Trump campaign-quite the opposite-in truth it simply kicked Hillary while Comey had already knocked her down-and basically out for the count-three days prior with his completely outrageous and indefensible letter.

End of FN.

Many Democrats then came to feel that Comey with his memo, and eye witness account of Trump’s attempt to obstruct the Russia probe was an ally we had to protect at all costs. And Trump began a campaign of disinformation and slander against him as he is such an important witness in the Mueller probe. Indeed, Trump has gone after all the potential witnesses of his-obstructionist-firing of Comey-McCabe, Peter Strozk, Jim Baker,. et. al.

This has led many Democrats to feel that we should cool even our own legitimate criticism of how Comey-mishandled the Emailgate investigation with, ahem, extreme carelessness-as any criticism of Comey would now play into Trump’s hands and his obstructionist designs.

The entire tone and tenor of this book makes it pretty clear I’m not persuaded by this premise. The trouble is that as outrageous as it is that Russia interfered in our election with the express purpose of hurting Clinton and helping Trump, it’s just as outrageous that the there were many rogue FBI agents who wanted to do the exact same thing-and clearly from Nate Silver’s analysis, they were successful as if not for the FBI’s hamhanded interventions into the election, Clinton would be President today and we wouldn’t face a constitutional crisis as we speak.

And that the Trump campaign colluded with rogue FBI agent interference just as they colluded with Russian interference-as noted elsewhere in this book start in any number of directions: Jerome Corsi and Roger Stone; Erik Prince, Steven, Bannon and Rudy Giuliani; Chuck Johnson’s payments to Sydney Leathers and the underage girl that Weiner would end up sexting with.

From the point of view of average Americans the fact of FBI Rogue Agent Collusion is just as outrageous and harmful to our confidence in the system as is Russian Collusion.

We have a crisis in legitimacy as Americans can no longer have faith in our democratic system being on the level. This legitimacy deficit is due not to just to Russiagate but also Comeygate. So until we have closure on exactly what happened and all those guilty parties are suitably punished we can’t begin the process of closure and healing.

In any case, the FBI has done it again-their fake ‘investigation’ of Kavanaugh gave the GOP just enough cover to ram him onto the Supreme Court. Of course, Dems are immediately rushing in to exempt the FBI from any blame-presuming that the FBI didn’t want to perpetuate a sham, it’s just that the Trump Russia House wouldn’t let them do a real investigation. And don’t get me wrong-I suspect this assumption likely has a lot of truth to it.

 

According to recent NY Times reporting, Trump actually considered doing a real investigation under the concern that otherwise they’d get killed. But Don McGahn nixed that idea. 

“An exasperated President Trump picked up the phone to call the White House counsel, Donald F. McGahn II, last Sunday. Tell the F.B.I. they can investigate anything, he told Mr. McGahn, because we need the critics to stop.”

“Not so fast, Mr. McGahn said.”

“Mr. McGahn, according to people familiar with the conversation, told the president that even though the White House was facing a storm of condemnation for limiting the F.B.I. background check into sexual misconduct allegations against Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh, a wide-ranging inquiry like some Democrats were demanding — and Mr. Trump was suggesting — would be potentially disastrous for Judge Kavanaugh’s chances of confirmation to the Supreme Cour

This is pretty damning-a legitimate investigation would have been disastrous for Kavanaugh. In other words, he knew that Kavanaugh was guilty of significant wrongdoing-note the quote says ‘would be disastrous’ not ‘could be’ and he concealed it in order to ram him through. This reminds you of Mitch McConnell knowing about Russia interference but choosing to hide it from the public for partisan reasons.

FN: Its since become clear the extent to which the FBI slow walked the investigation into the charges against  Kavanaugh. Again they only get out of first gear if the subject is a Democrat.

Yes Trump and McGahn may have put unacceptable limits on the investigation but the FBI has latitude to push back-had they been so inclined as they weren’t as the subject was a Republican. Listen to Matt Miller, Obama’s former DOJ spokesman.

End of FN

But while a major portion of the blame goes to McGahn and friends, Obama’s former DOJ spokesman, Matthew Miller, argues that the FBI does have some latitude to push back against the Russia House’s unreasonable limits if it so chooses.

“It’s Time for Democrats to Play Hardball With the FBI.”

“As the FBI prepares to conclude its review of the sexual assault allegations against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, it seems clear that its investigation has been cursory at best. According to NBC News, more than 40 potential sources have yet to be contacted by the FBI, including Kavanaugh’s original accuser, Christine Blasey Ford. A number of people with information relevant to the investigation have complained that even after calling the bureau’s field offices or national tip line in good faith, the bureau has not followed up with them.”

“Absent any pressure from Democrats, the FBI is likely to simply follow its orders from the White House. So what should Democrats do? Treat the FBI like the GOP does.”

In other words, according to Miller-a pretty good authority on the FBI-the FBI is unlikely to so choose without the Dems pushing them. Despite the loss on Kavanaugh, I’m not arguing the Dems did everything wrong-they did do a number of things correctly-the sociopathic GOP was determined to use its partisan power to plow the accused sexual assaulter through regardless of the facts. In the campaign, Trump (in)famously declared he could shoot someone on 5th ave and get away with it. This is likely true-if the jury is the GOP Congress.

Similarly, if Kavanaugh shot someone on 5th the GOP would still confirm him and get pretty indignant that this should in any way call his confirmation into question.

FN: Although I’ve come to feel less charitable to Chuck Schumer and Friends after a major book on the Kavanaugh confirmation fight came out-it seems Schumer pulled his punches out of political expediency.

 

More from Miller:

“Democrats have responded by accusing the White House of inappropriately restricting the bureau’s probe—a claim based on the fact the White House has authority to set the scope of follow-up background investigations—and a charge that the White House denies. But just as during the 2016 Clinton email investigation and the ongoing Russia probe, Democrats have largely failed to criticize the FBI for its role in the investigation, and have at times gone out of their way to praise its professionalism.”

Miller argues the Dems should have-at the time he wrote the investigation was still on-called out the Bureau itself rather than giving it the benefit of the doubt and presuming it was not at all culpable.

“This strategy is both a political and substantive mistake, one that stems from the asymmetric way America’s two political parties deal with the administration of justice. Over the past several years, Republicans have repeatedly assaulted the Justice Department with hyper-politicized demands, while Democrats—for reasons that fall somewhere between tactics and timidity—have ceded the playing field to the loudest and most irresponsible actors on the right. The inevitable result has been a Justice Department that constantly scurries to respond to Republican criticism, making concessions that would have once been unimaginable, in a fruitless attempt to appease people who have no respect for the department’s obligation to enforce the law fairly.”

Exactly. In 2016, the FBI was so anxious to reassure the GOP it wasn’t biased in Clinton’s favor it literally handed the election to Trump. Ironically, even this, wasn’t enough to reassure the GOP who to this day claims there was-still-is anti Trump bias at the FBI. Meanwhile the Dems, after the FBI robbed them, continue to always presume the best and sing the Bureau’s praises, a Bureau which to this day has yet to have a single Democratic FBI Director in 100 years. Here’s what I’d like to here from Kamala Harris-or Eric Swalwell who’s apparently going to run.

I don’t know that this is advice Congressman Swalwell will take-it is a great video though. However, both he and Kamala and all the Dem candidates ought to pledge that one of their first acts will be to appoint a Democratic FBI Director-I know it’s partisan of me to argue that after 100 years it’s time…

FN:  Swalwell certainly didn’t tae my advice in his aborted run nor has Kamala-and at this point she needs something to juice her numbers.

But if the Democrats are true to form-presuming they win they will simply let Trump’s Director, Chris Wray-who successfully helped Chris Christie get away with Bridgegate and tried to get Andy McCabe to resign in January, 2018 to resign-no doubt at Trump’s instigation-serve another seven years. I mean if you’re Wray you can certainly sleep well at night knowing how timid and chicken-sh*t the Democrats are.

Just imagine if the shoe was on the other foot-speaking of Wray:

“Consider who is in charge of the FBI’s investigation: Director Chris Wray, who attended Yale Law School with Kavanaugh (he was two years behind him) and, like Kavanaugh, joined the conservative Federalist Society while there. During the George W. Bush administration, Wray worked as a political appointee in the deputy attorney general’s office while Kavanaugh served as a deputy white House counsel—positions in which they would have regularly dealt with each other.”

“Wray himself is supervised by another former Federalist Society member, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein. Rosenstein’s ties to Kavanaugh run even deeper—they worked together on Ken Starr’s investigation of Bill Clinton in the 1990s, and Rosenstein attended the first day of Kavanaugh’s confirmation hearings.”

“Of course, that doesn’t mean that Wray and Rosenstein can’t fairly oversee an investigation into Kavanaugh. But one has to consider only that Republicans have spent years accusing former FBI director and lifelong Republican James Comey of orchestrating a cover-up for Hillary Clinton to understand how the GOP would react if, say, an FBI investigation into a Democratic Supreme Court nominee was being overseen by a graduate of the nominee’s law school and a former colleague.”

Exactly, even career Republicans like Comey, McCabe-and Mueller-get accused of being Clinton loyalists. What would the GOP do with these kinds of optics-where everyone involved in supervising the Kavanaugh investigation really does have close connections to Kavanaugh and Ken Starr? 

Again, while the Russia House has handcuffed the FBI they do have some scope to resist-if they are incentivized.

“While it is true that the White House determines the scope of a background investigation, the FBI possesses a number of tools to shape its outcome if it feels it is being unfairly restricted. For example, the bureau could formally notify the White House in writing that it believes further witness interviews are necessary to obtain a complete picture—an act of bureaucratic pressure that would be difficult to ignore, especially if Wray shared that conclusion with key senators. It could compile every allegation and lead it has obtained through its tip line and field offices in its final report, even those the bureau has been blocked from investigating. Finally, it could do what it does best when it feels unfairly jammed by other government agencies: leak aggressively to the media.”

The Dems failed to provide any such incentives. In any case, that was prior to the conclusion of the fake ‘investigation’-they didn’t even try to manage the optics, they ended it two days early so as to accommodate McConnells’ desire to get it done before the end of the week.

UPDATE: It’s over now but Miller’s recommendations still apply.

“First, the ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, Rep. Jerry Nadler, could make clear that, should he become a subpoena-wielding chairman in January, he will aggressively investigate the FBI’s conduct in the Kavanaugh investigation. Notifying the FBI and DOJ that he will subpoena documents, demand interviews with officials at every level, and ultimately hold a hearing will have a dramatic impact on an agency that rightly worries about its public standing—and where key officials worry about their personal reputations—after several years of GOP attack.”

UPDATE 2.0: Asked and answered as Nadler has vowed to investigate the FBI”s investigation into Kavanaugh. 

This link is from October 5, 2018 but Nadler has reiterated his desire post November 6. However I haven’t heard him discuss it lately.

“Democrats could demand that Wray and Rosenstein recuse themselves from the Kavanaugh probe, given their longstanding ties to the nominee, and insist the investigation be overseen by the FBI Deputy Director David Bowdich, a career agent with no ties to either political party.”

“Finally, they could insist that the FBI interview notes (known as 302s) be released publicly before Kavanaugh’s confirmation vote, slated for later this week. This would be an unprecedented move for a background investigation, but again, the Republican playbook here is worth noting. In September 2016—two months before the presidential election—the FBI took the highly unusual step of publicly releasing 302s from the Clinton email investigation, a move it claimed was warranted due to unusual public interest, but was in fact a response to pressure from Republicans on the Hill.”

“Democrats don’t actually have to be successful in achieving any of these specific outcomes to achieve their overall goal of obtaining a full and fair investigation into the allegations against Kavanaugh. Republicans haven’t achieved most of their demands of DOJ during either the Clinton or Russia investigations, but their relentless pressure on the department has led it to take steps it wouldn’t otherwise take at several key moments. That same outcome should be Democrats’ goal here.”

While the Dems haven’t heeded this yet, they can do so going forward. In any case the Kavanaugh fight isn’t over, it’s just beginning. 

It won’t end until the entire process is investigated from top to bottom-including the initial Trump pact with Anthony Kennedy

and Kavanaugh is impeached. If that’s where the facts lead.

 

FN: Its since become clear the extent to which the FBI slow walked the investigation into the charges against  Kavanaugh. Again they only get out of first gear if the subject is a Democrat.

Yes Trump and McGahn may have put unacceptable limits on the investigation but as Obama’s former DOJ spokesman argues above the FBI has latitude to push back-had they been so inclined as they weren’t as the subject was a Republican.

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October 28, 2016: a Day That Will Live in Infamy Copyright © by . All Rights Reserved.

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