WHY WAS BARR THE DECIDER? Legal Experts Puzzled
If these “legal experts” really are “puzzled,” a few years back in kindergarten should clear things up.
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Who among us really understands anything?
But as for your question, I bet you have a pretty good guess!
I think that most of us at this site have known all along that Both Barr and Cavanaugh were Trump’s “get-out-of-jail-free” cards, so there should be no big surprise at what Barr did (Hasn’t he done something like this before during Iran-Contra?) .The scary part is that these decisions will empower Trump to resume his march toward a government even more autocratic than the one we currently have . The Republicans are certainly on board for that. Nadler, Schiff, Cummings, and their colleagues have a near-overwhelming task, given the powers lined up against them.
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Has there been any speculation that Barr shut down the investigation prematurely, particularly since there were loose ends, more possible indictments and an extension of Grand Jury a few days ago?
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Yes! What Democrats need to do at this crucial moment is to have a roaring inner-party war! Always thinking, go2, you’re good at your job.
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- The Special Counsel did not find that any U.S. person or Trump campaign official or associate conspired or knowingly coordinated with the IRA in its efforts
…Good news for Trump. And a relief for the country. But, like Carter Page in 2013 (who also was not charged), was there evidence he was a tool, a useful idiot, a polezni durak, for Russian entities attacking the United States? That was not Mueller’s job. Its reassuring that he’s not CLARK on ‘THE AMERICANS’, only MARTHA HANSEN.
- The Special Counsel did not find that the Trump campaign, or anyone associated with it, conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in [its] efforts … to gather and disseminate information to influence the election.
…But Roger Stone was in contact with a GRU instrument, Guccifer 2 and Wikileaks, both of which were conduits for Russian interference and intel. And he was in contact on a frequent basis with Trump. As well as being part of the original campaign.
- "this report does not conclude that the President committed a crime, it also does not exonerate him.”
No. Bill Barr exonerated him from a legal charge of obstruction. “In making this determination, we noted that the Special Counsel recognized that “the evidence does not establish that the President was involved in an underlying crime related to Russian election interference,” and that, while not determinative, the absence of such evidence bears upon the President’s intent with respect to obstruction. Generally speaking, to obtain and sustain an obstruction conviction, the government would need to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that a person, acting with corrupt intent, engaged in obstructive conduct with a sufficient nexus to a pending or contemplated proceeding.”
But what if the nexus to ‘a pending or contemplated proceeding’ was NOT a quid pro quo with Putin. What if it was some other investigation into his connections to Russia? Like legal investigation into the financial ties between Trump and campaign/administration associates to Russian oligarchs?
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4 pages? I had to submit longer term papers!
It’s all there in the position paper Barr published to audition for this post. The RNC had to get their guy in there to help Trump but only to a point. They were never going to let Donald release ALL the Muller report even if it was highly redacted.
Someone big inside the Republican establishment got the party platform changed to lift the sanctions on Russia for the taking of Crimea and invasion of Ukraine. It wasn’t a smuck like Manafort, Gates or Flynn.
It was either Pence at Donald’s direction or Trump himself. This is what Barr is covering up: Collusion at the convention that the media still doesn’t recognize. It’s conveniently being buried by Barr.with a blanket statement that Muller found no obstruction. He didn’t need to because it’s been there in plain sight all along. .
Dems should not stand for it and demand that Nunes and McConnell tell us which one is responsible. Who in this White House did the heavy lifting at their convention for Putin?
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Why are otherwise intelligent and serious people even considering the premise that Barr wasn’t 100% appointed to protect Trump from the Mueller report and other legal repercussions of his criminal behavior? I’m increasingly baffled to discover that people gave Barr any benefit of the doubt at all.
He wouldn’t have gotten the job unless this conclusion was guaranteed. Trump wouldn’t have nominated him, Senate Republicans wouldn’t have confirmed him.
So long as we continue to entertain the idea that Republicans may be acting in good faith in any way, shape or form, we will continue to lose.
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The lack of conclusion tells me that there is sufficient evidence that Trump obstructed justice. If not, Mueller would have put that in the report.
Why did Mueller not decide? 1) He did it on his own because of the question about whether you can indict a sitting president. 2) Barr told him not to.
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Well, you can’t expect the Democrats to say, “Great!” and that’s the end of it, can you? If hammering Trump on his crowing of “no collusion,” and “evil Democrats” wins the 2020 election, that’s fine with me. I don’t care how someone wins it - just fucking win it! And ignoring this, “moving on” isn’t going to cut it, however one might personally feel about it.
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No Matter What The Mueller Report Says, Trump Will Claim Vindication
…oh yeah and his attorney general will say that too…
And something I read pointed out that even Barr’s summary said it didn’t find evidence of collusion with the govenment of russia, not necessarily all Russians.
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The most depressing part to me was how the media took Barr’s obviously self-serving summary of the report and ran with it word-for-word with no qualifiers. The headlines did not specify that “Barr says Mueller report found no evidence of collusion,” just that the report found no evidence of collusion.
The media established the Republican narrative word-for-word in stone in the eye of the public. That is disastrous.
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Mueller is a Republican, still, in 2019. Like all current Republicans he looks the other way when racism and hatred are used to effect political ends he desires. But I’m sure he is an amazing human being who would never look the other way for anything else to effect political ends he desires.
He may have done an amazing job taking down a crime family, but he wasn’t in that crime family when he did the work.
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Barr is part of the obstruction and cover-up.
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I was with you until your last paragraph.
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They’ve basically finally succeeded in a Saturday Night Masacre strategy…i.e., in general, once we take over the administration, we can do whatever we want and insulate ourselves from any criminal liability…something they’ve wanted to do since at least 1964. We now no longer have a justice system and live in a fascist state.
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Two very good pieces in Slate do close analyses of Barr’s language.
And this third one takes on Barr’s attempt to exonerate Trump, making the excellent point that the Watergate Special Counsel did not make recommendations for charging Nixon, but merely laid out a blueprint of the facts for Congress to investigate in making a case for impeachment.
To those of you preaching doom and gloom, take a chill pill and watch what happens.
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I said much the same thing in jest yesterday and was told in a fucking patronizing manner to calm down. What nerve…I like many here have followed this stuff incessantly. So fuck that. As someone who cares about this country, I got skin in the game. This illegitimate presidency has been a nightmare for the cuntry.
I’m so sick of the kind of namby-pamby attitude to just wait and see what happens next. We know that while we wait, tRump’s horrendous political agenda in moving full-steam ahead, fund-raising off this bullshit and using this weekend as an excuse to claim vindication…which by all measure has been a sham, intentionally falsifying facts as they’ve arisen and a propaganda effort throughout this entire investigation.
We may know Barr’s personal appraisal should be seen as a political document made in haste on purpose to satisfy Hair Furor, but every headline in every major news media last night and this morning was in the business of making a dispositive statement in their headline claiming in big bold letters in one form or another NO COLLUSION AND NO OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE. May I just say…THAT’S JUST MORE BULLSHIT! Every network reported Barr’s 4-page conclusion last night on their evening news, as did my local news this morning, and even my iphone managed to put out a news alert like a fucking Amber Alert concluding that tRump did not collude with Russia. So if Barr is able to put his thumb on the scale of justice and whitewash this entire investigation, which most of America that doesn’t follow this stuff like we do here, this was probably the most politically motivated thing I’ve seen done to date. Barr was seen at the White House days before the end of this investigation as well. I wanna know what that was about too.
Many people were left thinking this whole thing is over even if the House continues to pursue it by demanding the full report. Yes, we need to see the full report. It’s also up to Barr if he wants to make that happen. Anyone taking bets on how much he’s willing to provide to Congress after he scours and slow-walks its release? It won’t just be grand jury information and counter-intelligence stuff he’ll block with reasonable redactions. I’m willing to bet he’ll try to block a lot more than that when the time comes.
Barr was a political hack from the beginning. Mueller…I still want to believe tried to do the right thing, but one thing I can’t understand…why did he never bother to directly interview tRump except with a bunch of pretty-please requests? What was up with that? How the fuck can anyone conclude anything about tRump without his deposition? If he’s the subject of an investigation…how do you not interview that person? I mean, we’re not talking about a fucking blowjob…we’re talking about conspiring, being compromised or in a quid pro quo to enrich himself with a foreign power, Russia, an adversary that had stolen information and poll data to carry out its attack on this country.
Calm down, my ass. Yeah, not gonna happen. Not while this maniac continues to destroy every rule, norm and law, and while his criminal family enterprise sells out the country for personal profit and enrichment. The foundation of the rule of law should apply equally to tRump as anyone else…otherwise, why wouldn’t he commit murder on 5th Avenue and believe he could get away with it?
Here’s a funny thing I saw last night elsewhere…
They’ve have lowered the Barr, and spared the Rod.
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WOW! Soooooo much projection!
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The MSM declared Clinton the winner from the beginning of the race. They reported early primary and caucus results with extra-added Super Delegate totals to make it appear that the race between Clinton and Sanders was closer than it really was in order to not look foolish for botching their prewritten Bush vs. Clinton General Election storyline. EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM declared Trump a joke and his campaign effectively dead on a weekly basis until Trump was the Last Republican’t Standing. Even then they wrote plenty of stories about Mythical Centrist Republican’ts defecting to Clinton. I even remember stories about how Clinton was going to win Arizona, Georgia and Texas. And they’ll do it again if Beto O’Rourke is the nominee for sure.
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The MSM was going to make money no matter who was going to be president. You can bet your ass that they would have spent the past two years reporting “Walls Closing In On” scandal du jour stories had Clinton, Bush, Sanders or anyone else won the election. What’s the difference between BENGHAZI! and Russiagate? One was something that was non-stop-flogged on Fox and made Republican’ts look foolish, the other was non-stop-flogged on MSDNC and made “Democrats” look foolish. The MSM made tons of cash off of both.
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Ugh! The “3 million votes” thing. Obama won TWO Electoral College landslides. If Clinton didn’t know how the system worked in 2016, then shame on her. Besides, the MSM had already declared her the victor before a single vote was cast, so who needed to actually campaign in Wisconsin, Michigan and Ohio, amirite?
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WATCH OUT! RUSSIANS ARE HIDING IN YOU CLOSET, UNDER YOUR BED AND AROUND EVERY CORNER!!! (Meanwhile Fox “News” and Reich Ring Hate Radio blankets the nation and Republican’t governors are busy suppressing the vote. unanswered. Orders of magnitude more impact.) Russia is the new Q-Anon.
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That “Left Wing” you bitch about actually voted for Clinton in greater numbers in 2016 than Clinton primary supporters in 2008 voted for Obama. According to one study, fully 25% of Clinton 2008 supporters (the so-called PUMAs) turned around and voted for Sarah Fucking Palin in the General Election. Projection at it worst!
You’re wrong about the magnitude of the Gig Economy (still a tiny fraction of employment) and robots and AI (automation has been with us since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution). You’re right about Fascism, though, but that was cemented into place by Bill Clinton in the 90’s, handing the economy and political power to Wall Street on a silver platter.
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