From the report:
We suggested investigators look into the bank records of Deutsche Bank and others that were funding Mr. Trump’s businesses. Congress appears uninterested in that tip: Reportedly, ours are the only bank records the House Intelligence Committee has subpoenaed.
If the Committee will not release the testimony, its time for a ‘Daniel Ellsberg’ moment from one of the Democratic members. Trump’s bank records are important. Does anyone really know where he keeps his money?
As long as the Emolument Clause isn’t enforced, and/or Trump continues to get a pass on boosting his business interests using his office, he has everything under control that really matters to him and his family. Mueller could perp walk him out of the White House in cuffs and when the dust settles he won’t suffer jail or serious sanctions for his crimes. Former Presidents get a pass. He’ll just go back to putting his name on Eastern bloc resorts and condos and be no worse for the wear.
It’s an excellent and powerful column. Just the lead’s worth checking out:
A generation ago, Republicans sought to protect President Richard Nixon by urging the Senate Watergate committee to look at supposed wrongdoing by Democrats in previous elections. The committee chairman, Sam Ervin, a Democrat, said that would be “as foolish as the man who went bear hunting and stopped to chase rabbits.”
Clowns like Nunes (and for that matter Grassley and Trump himself) are so outclassed against formidable professionals like Steele, Simpson, and Schiff. And of course Mueller. They have no idea who they’re dealing with.
C’mon GOPpers…put up or shut up…NUNES? We’re looking at you…
I have a someone different take. The central irony is that it really doesn’t matter if the dossier is highly credible or not. The key point is whether the Trump campaign did in fact collude with the Russians. Also, the dossier is hardly a sidetrack. It was assembled by a highly regarded ex MI6 agent, and former intelligence officials like Malcolm Vance say the the Mueller investigation is likely using the document as a key guide. It might be politically advantageous to play down its significance, but the final impact on the investigation is likely to be huge.
Old… Exactly. This fact has to be elucidated as much…or more than the dossier subterfuge…
Much of the dossier would need independent corroboration by various citizens of Russia and USSR satellite nations to pass muster in a criminal complaint. I don’t see Mueller deposing them there, nor compelling them to come here to do it. Unfortunately regardless the truth of much of it Trump probably retains deniability on the allegations that would do the most harm.
The shit we read in the papers is just that, call it Trounce shit.
Mueller et all are using the dossier as it pertains and where it leads for what its worth. The dossier is important, not vitally but important. It corroborates and guides but as the GPS peeps say, it merely confirmed what was already known for the most part.
Its the popular distraction of the day but something to keep in mind is, if Trounce and Co are distracting, they are worried about the bigger bombs set to go off.
They wouldn’t distract from nothing, that doesn’t make sense even for these wack jobs.
I can see that to a point, but considering what we all believe has happened, it will leave a mark. He is literally forcing the country to address his lawlessness by proclaiming someone’s guilt and sentence. To restore faith in our systems, we may not be able to let him walk quietly away. I believe that he and many people associated with him are guilty of crimes against the people of this country. Let him experience due process and courts of law since he seems so intent on locking people up. If the system lets him quietly slink away, then at least it was done fairly.
And there is this little thing that “we the tax payers” paid for this investigation, so where’s our information?
[quote=“adabsurdum, post:15, topic:66873”]
The important message from this letter is hardly about the dossier but rather about Republicans covering up and derailing the investigation.
[/quote]And the Republicans’ refusing to release the testimony is an additional part of the cover-up and conspiracy to obstruct justice.
Worked for an Aussie for years. Can confirm.
That most interesting bit for me was that the Fusion guys assert that the Steele dossier is “but a chapter” of the Fusion findings. They have a lot more, on Trump’s money-laundering business. And they “walked the [Congressional] investigators through” the details of that. No wonder the testimony took such a long time, and no wonder the GOP is refusing to release the transcript.
I agree with you that independent corroboration will be necessary, but I’m not as pessimistic about Mueller getting it. For example, if Deutsche Bank’s private lending facility - the so-called private bank - sold its Trump loans to private Russian “investors”, Mueller will be able to find out and to whom. It is a lead pipe cinch that these private investors were Russian oligarchs, many of whom - we are discovering - have been piling their money into safe US and European investments and - even more importantly - have been sending wives and children to the west, most especially London and the US. I think someone along this distribution line will crack. And that crack will widen until the flood waters of money laundering and tax evaision can’t be stemmed. I think there’s a similar story out there about the Bank of Cypress.
Watch Maddow. She has been all over this. These Republicans are treasonous. Vote them out.
One wonders how far they will go to protect their insane, criminal fraud of a potus. The truth will come out sooner or later, and they will be exposed as the liars and frauds they are. So much greed!
The most interesting fact of this is timing. Fusion are absolute professionals and have been incredibly restrained - much like Mueller himself. So the question has to be asked: Why now?
The two ideas I have is that either a) Mueller is close to wrapping so it doesn’t matter that the word is out or b) that they are beating the bushes to try to set the game in motion. Both assume that Mueller has given them the OK which means he either doesn’t care anymore or it serves his purposes.
I feel like I am missing something. This op-ed seems huge to me for many reasons and yet the coverage has been pretty minimal. I get that everyone is apoplectic about Trump’s ‘big red button’, but if ever there was a time that a Trump tweet was used as a distraction, this could have been it.
Comment deleted
Yes, the question is collusion. The thing is that the dossier will always be a convenient focus for (frequently dishonest) Republican attacks. Why concentrate, then, on an easy target for them?