The Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI) released the fifth and final volume of their multipart report on Russia’s Active Measures Campaign and Interference in the 2016 presidential election yesterday. You can find the first four volumes at this link. This fifth volume is entitled Counterintelligence Threats and Vulnerabilities and despite that title it really ties together all the pieces from the previous four reports. … Read More
Trump Admits He Hasn’t Talked To Putin About Russian Bounties On U.S. Soldiers
President Trump just admitted in a new interview that during his recent conversation with Vladimir Putin, he didn’t ask the Russian leader about the news that Russia might have paid bounties to Taliban-linked militias for the killing of U.S. troops. Because Trump is often so unabashedly shameless about his corrupt motives and his prioritizing of his own interests above all else, his … Read More
Mueller Condemns Trump And Reminds US That Stone Is A Felon
Washington Post: Robert S. Mueller III served as special counsel for the Justice Department from 2017 to 2019. The work of the special counsel’s office — its report, indictments, guilty pleas and convictions — should speak for itself. But I feel compelled to respond both to broad claims that our investigation was illegitimate and our motives were improper, and to specific … Read More
Breaking: Trump Commutes Stone’s Sentence
The man found guilty on all counts, of perjury, witness tampering, and other acts covering up for the President is set free on a Friday night news dump: NYT: President Trump commuted the sentence of his longtime friend Roger J. Stone Jr. on seven felony crimes on Friday, using the power of his office to help a former campaign adviser … Read More
Trump Endears Himself To White Supremacists… And Putin, Again… While America Gets Sicker
The nation is full of racial strife, although on the whole, the BLM movement is peaceful and making rapid progress. A couple pointed guns at protesters in St. Louis as a group marched toward the mayor’s home to demand her resignation. https://t.co/5EqDd43QCd pic.twitter.com/KWNaif77ch — ABC News (@ABC) June 29, 2020 Trump retweet shows supporter yelling "white power" White House spokesman: … Read More
Stone Was Handled With Velvet Gloves [UPDATE: And Flynn Walks!]
And then Barr got rid of the US Attorney for DC and replaced him with a former staffer and put heavy pressure on his former staffer then acting US attorney for DC to go easy on Stone sentencing because of Stone’s relationship with the president, Zelinsky is saying. — Laura Rozen (@lrozen) June 23, 2020 &then Barr clumsily tried to … Read More
Document Dump: Judge Gleeson On Why Flynn’s Charges Should Not Be Dropped
The short version, however, is this. Gleeson argues there are two bases for denying a motion to dismiss a prosecution: the prosecutor’s reasons for doing so, or clear evidence of gross prosecutorial abuse. Guided by Rule 48(a)’s text and history, as well as separation of powers principles, there are two grounds for denying leave of court. First, “the requirement of … Read More
Document Dump: Judge Sullivan Files His Brief In Flynn’s Mandamus Request
So here's the most important bits of Judge Sullivan's response to Flynn's request for mandamus. First (as I have written), he argues the request is premature since Sullivan hasn't even ruled on the gov't motion to dismiss yet. pic.twitter.com/ZlaH4RouCE — Gabriel Malor (@gabrielmalor) June 1, 2020 Third, argues that the "presumption of regularity" attached to prosecutorial discretion is not irrebuttable … Read More
Declassified Flynn Transcripts Show Him Discussing Sanctions Despite Denials
Newly declassified transcripts, released by the incoming Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe, show that President-Elect Donald Trump’s designated National Security Advisor, Michael Flynn, did, in fact, discuss Obama administration sanctions with the Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak. During those conversations, Flynn at several points urged Kislyak to tamp down or limit to “reciprocal” any official Russian response to the newly-emplaced sanctions the Obama White House … Read More
Obamagate and the Unmasking “Scandal”
The buzzword of the week is “Obamagate”. Trump has tweeted that word several times this week. OBAMAGATE! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 14, 2020 What IS Obamagate? Well, Trump was asked that himself. .@PhilipRucker: You appeared to accuse Obama of a crime yesterday. What did he do? TRUMP: "Obamagate." RUCKER: What is the crime? TRUMP: "You know what the … Read More
Emoluments Case Revived
The concurrence starting at page 22 is very good.
If Nothing Bad Was Said, Why Haven’t We Seen Transcripts Of The Flynn-Kislysk Conversation?
There’s a giant hole in Bill Barr’s motion to dismiss the Mike Flynn prosecution: the call transcripts of the General’s calls with Sergey Kislyak. The Timothy Shea-signed motion claimed that the transcripts showed “arms-length communications” which provided no suggestion that Flynn might be “directed and controlled” by Russia. Nor was anything said on the calls themselves to indicate an inappropriate relationship between … Read More
COVID-19: Not An April Fool’s Joke
World: U.S. [UPDATE – 2:30 pm — US has 203,608 cases and 4,476 deaths North Carolina has 1,584 cases and nine deaths [UPDATE: 2:30 pm — 1,627 cases and 14 deaths]. Forsyth County has 57 cases and 1 death. Still dire. The top government scientists battling the coronavirus estimated Tuesday that the deadly pathogen could kill between 100,000 and 240,000 Americans, in … Read More
COVID-19: Day 5
As of 12:30 pm: US cases are 14,322 (with 210 deaths). That’s quite a leap over yesterday’s 9,000 or so, but we are testing more. NC has 123 cases, zero deaths. Five cases in my county. Dow is down 200 points. Again, seems to be veering from huge changes. The biggest development — GOP scandal: Senator Richard M. Burr sold … Read More
Stone Sentencing: Live
latest updateRoger Stone: 3.5 yrs (pending pardon)Gates: jail, 3 yrs probationCohen: 3 yrs prison Manafort: 4 yrs prisonFlynn: awaiting sentencingIndividual-1: FUCKING IMPEACHED FOR LIFE Hillary: having a nice walk in the woods me: laughing at all you “lock her up” morons — Jeff Tiedrich (@itsJeffTiedrich) February 20, 2020 Roger Stone was found guilty of lying to Congress and threatening a … Read More