Trump 20: Sauron Doesn't Seem So Bad After All

[CTRLZero]

11 minutes ago, GreyhoundFan said:

Trump’s labeling of the House bill as “mean” was a significant shift of tone that followed months of private and public negotiations, during which he called the bill “great” and urged GOP lawmakers to vote for it.

I was surprised to read this.  Maybe someone is whispering in his ear that a certain amount of compromise is needed to push it through the legislature.  I'm sure he didn't figure this out on his own.  It would be "great" to have a health care system that actually, you know, covered people who needed health care.

[Flossie]

Where do we go to discuss the shooting this morning of House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.), and four others?

http://www.cnn.com/2017/06/14/politics/alexandria-virginia-shooting/

[GreyhoundFan]

Just now, Flossie said:

Where do we go to discuss the shooting this morning of House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.), and four others?

It's been discussed in the Congress thread.

[GrumpyGran]

Ugh, bad day here. And to add another layer to the insanity, it is the toddler's birthday. I'm guessing they are all still behind closed doors trying to explain to him why his cake-and-two-scoops birthday party with the whole staff presenting presents and praise is no longer appropriate.

And just a note to all in this country(USA), the comments from the right on Yahoo(lol) regarding this shooting are terrifying. Many are calling this a start to a civil war and they believe this justifies them protecting their president and lawmakers. I'm not leaving my house for a few days until this dies down. And I live in a very red area. But they are foaming at the mouth! Their logic would be hilarious if they didn't all have multiple guns.

Sorry, was posting when @GreyhoundFan post came through.

[GreyhoundFan]

So, in addition to the state of Maryland and the District of Columbia suing the TT, there's another big lawsuit coming: "Congressional Democrats to file emoluments lawsuit against Trump"

Spoiler

Nearly 200 Democratic members of Congress agreed to file a lawsuit Wednesday against President Trump alleging that by retaining interests in a global business empire he has violated constitutional restrictions on taking gifts and benefits from foreign leaders.

The lead senator filing the complaint in federal district court, Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), said Tuesday that the lawsuit has already drawn more congressional plaintiffs — 196 — than any legal action previously taken against a president. No Republicans had joined in the lawsuit so far, although they will be invited to do so, Blumenthal said.

An advance copy of the legal complaint reviewed by The Washington Post argues that those in Congress have special standing because the Constitution’s “foreign emoluments clause” requires the president to obtain “the consent of Congress” before accepting any gifts.

The legal effort, led in the House by Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.), is likely to escalate tensions between the White House and Capitol Hill, where at least five committees are investigating various issues related to the Trump administration.

News of the lawsuit emerged less than 24 hours after attorneys general in the District and Maryland, both Democrats, filed suit alleging that payments to Trump violated the Constitution’s anti-corruption clauses. In another lawsuit filed against Trump by business competitors, the Justice Department recently defended Trump’s actions, arguing that he violated no restrictions by accepting fair-market payments for services.

Legal scholars consulted by the congressional plaintiffs said their complaint is distinctive because of the special standing granted to Congress.

“The Framers of our Constitution gave members of Congress the responsibility to protect our democracy from foreign corruption by determining which benefits the president can and cannot receive from a foreign state,” said Erwin Chemerinsky, the incoming dean of the law school at the University of California at Berkeley.

“When the president refuses to reveal which benefits he is receiving — much less obtain congressional consent before accepting them — he robs these members of their ability to perform their constitutional role,” Chemerinsky said. “Congressional lawmakers . . . have a duty to preserve the constitutional order in the only way they can: by asking the courts to make the President obey the law.”

Other legal scholars were skeptical, particularly since the lawsuit was filed only by Democrats, the minority party in both houses of Congress.

“Just because they can’t convince their peers doesn’t mean you can go to court to get what you want,” said Andy Grewal, a law professor at the University of Iowa.

Generally, a lawmaker can sue if he or she has suffered individual injury, Grewal said. In addition, Congress can sue as a body, as has happened in the past, such as with the lawsuit challenging President Barack Obama’s health-care overhaul.

But a case like this is problematic, he said,

“Because this is individual legislators who don’t have any individual injuries, it will be hard for them to get standing,” he said.

However, Norman Eisen who served as a co-counsel in the other two emoluments-clause lawsuits, said he thought “the congressional plaintiffs in this case do have proper” standing to sue. He pointed out that in the lawsuit filed on behalf of Trump competitors, the Justice Department argued that Congress had special capacity to deal with questions related to emoluments.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment Tuesday night, but on Monday, press secretary Sean Spicer dismissed the lawsuit filed by the two state attorneys general, saying it’s “not hard to conclude that partisan politics may be one of the motivations.”

The 37-page congressional complaint contends that the nation’s founders were concerned that foreign powers could interfere with American affairs. The suit says that the founders were particularly worried that “foreign states would give benefits and rewards to the nation’s chief executive to subvert his loyalty.”

As a result, they wrote the emoluments clause of the Constitution with language “both sweeping and unqualified,” the lawmakers’ lawsuit says.

The obscure clause in Article I of the Constitution says: “[N]o Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under [the United States], shall, without the Consent of the Congress, accept of any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State.” The language is interpreted as prohibiting any officeholder — including the president — from accepting a gift, payment or other benefit from a foreign state without the consent of Congress.

A memo prepared by the Senate plaintiff states that “these benefits include any compensation for services rendered in a private capacity such as when a foreign government throws a party at a hotel owned by a federal official.”

Although the emoluments clause has a complex history, the request by the lawmakers is rather simple. It asks the court to enjoin the president from “accepting any benefits from foreign states without first obtaining Congressional consent.”

I'm guessing there will be a huge tweetstorm tomorrow morning, between today's shooting, the Sessions testimony, and the lawsuits.

[GreyhoundFan]

Jennifer Rubin wrote another good one today: "Trump predictably abandons the AHCA — and Democrats’ 2018 gift comes early"

Spoiler

The  Associated Press reports:

President Donald Trump told Republican senators Tuesday that the House-passed health care bill he helped revive is “mean” and urged them to craft a version that is “more generous,” congressional sources said.

Trump’s remarks were a surprising slap at a Republican-written House measure that was shepherded by Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., and whose passage the president lobbied for and praised. At a Rose Garden ceremony minutes after the bill’s narrow House passage on May 4, Trump called it “a great plan.”

The president’s criticism, at a White House lunch with 15 GOP senators, also came as Senate Republican leaders’ attempts to write their own health care package have been slowed by disagreements between their party’s conservatives and moderates.

The Senate was unlikely to come up with its own bill before this episode; now, that possibility becomes even more remote. Trump cannot be trusted to support what Republicans put out, so why go out on a limb for extremely unpopular legislation? If they pass Trump’s tax cuts, they run the risk that Trump will call it a giveaway to the rich, or if they pass repeal of Dodd-Frank, they might get labeled Wall Street pawns by the president. He’s loyal to no one and believes in nothing, so whenever their actions draw criticism, Trump will be among the first to cut and run, decrying the very action he demanded his party take.

Ironically, as Republicans refuse to distance themselves from Trump’s egregious behavior, scandals and ethical shortcomings, he repays them — by creating the perfect soundbite for Democratic ads in 2018.

The House GOP threw the American Health Care Act together with little regard to its impact on ordinary Americans and was willing to slash health care for the poor and middle class while shoveling tax cuts into the coffers of the richest Americans. Trump insisted they pass something and then threw a celebration in the Rose Garden. So much for that.

Trump, of course, cares not even a tiny bit about substance — and we have yet to see him demonstrate even a rudimentary knowledge of what is in the bill. Having made a bargain with a policy know-nothing who lacks any interest in anything but his own winning, Republicans now find themselves excoriated for the very same reason Democrats lambasted the bill.

We have observed frequently that Trump’s rotten character and flightiness makes legislation nearly impossible. Ryan made precisely the opposite bet, namely that Trump’s character and intellectual deficits hardly mattered because he could help Republicans get what they wanted. In fact, Trump’s defects make it nearly impossible for Ryan to achieve his aims. Republicans now wind up with the worst of all worlds. They are getting virtually none of their big-ticket legislative items through. Republicans who voted for the AHCA dud will get clobbered for passing a “mean bill.” They are shackled to a president whose disapproval in the Gallup poll hit 60 percent on Tuesday. And to top it off, Republicans’ slavish loyalty to Trump will be cited as evidence they are unserious about acting as a check on the president and fulfilling their constitutional oversight responsibilities.

Those in the #NeverTrump camp saw exactly this situation as the inevitable outcome of the GOP’s Faustian bargain with Trump. If they lose the House in 2018 and then the White House in 2020, perhaps some soul searching and creative destruction on the right can lead to a functional, respectable center-right party that demands experienced leaders with a moral core.

I hope it does lead to the Dems taking back the House and White House.

[Howl]

Any form of unregulated health insurance in a for-profit context will be mean cruel, because share holders don't get big dividends when sick people get the best possible treatment. 

Moving on: This is So. Damned. Priceless.  There must be so many Republican politicians living lives of quiet desperation. 

[Audrey2]

I just wonder who told Trump his new anti-healthcare bill would be mean. As you probably remember, he doesn't like to read, and he bragged about how he doesn't need as many briefings because he is smart.

The discussion after the House passed the bill probably went something like this.

Ryan "We fixed healthcare. We saved money. We gave a tax break."

Trump "Okay, cool. America is great again, now I can play golf." (End of thoughts on healthcare- until today.)

Today "Wait, someone doesn't love me for my healthcare fix? Someone said this plan is terrible?" "The House passed a mean healthcare plan."

[GreyhoundFan]

Because, you know, climate change isn't a thing, so people shouldn't worry (please note extreme sarcasm): "Trump calls mayor of shrinking Chesapeake island and tells him not to worry about it"

Spoiler

James “Ooker” Eskridge was crabbing off the coast of Virginia’s Tangier Island in the Chesapeake Bay on Monday when he noticed a boat approaching him. Behind it was another.

Eskridge, mayor on the island, steeled himself for the worst. After all, as his wife said to him, “The only thing that could make you come inside from crabbing on a Monday morning is a call from President Trump.”

But as it turned out, that’s exactly what it was.

As one of the boats finally reached him, a fellow waterman told him to return to the island stat, because the president of the United States was calling soon.

“I thought he was joking,” Eskridge told The Washington Post in a phone interview.

Soon, he realized this was no joke.

It began a week earlier, when CNN aired a story about Tangier, Va., which sits on Tangier Island, about 12 miles from both the Virginia and Maryland coasts in the middle of the Chesapeake Bay. The small island, now only 1.3 square miles, shrinks by 15 feet each year, according to the Army Corps of Engineers, which points to coastal erosion and rising sea levels as the cause.

The island’s 450 residents, many of whom are descendants of its first settlers in the 17th century, are desperate. Scientists predict they will have to abandon the island in 50 years if nothing is done.

“Donald Trump, if you see this, whatever you can do, we welcome any help you can give us,” Eskridge said in the CNN piece, later adding, “I love Trump as much as any family member I got.”

Trump caught wind of the piece, Eskridge told The Post, and wanted to call. So his administration reached out to the Tangier Oyster Co., seeking the mayor’s phone number. Word spread to Eskridge in the middle of the Chesapeake Bay. He rushed back and sat by the telephone, waiting.

Finally, it rang.

“I’m still coming to grips that I was talking to the president,” Eskridge said, before describing the call.

Trump thanked the mayor and the entire island of Tangier, where he received 87 percent of the votes, for their support. Then the conversation turned to the island’s plight.

“He said we shouldn’t worry about rising sea levels,” Eskridge said. “He said that ‘your island has been there for hundreds of years, and I believe your island will be there for hundreds more.’”

Eskridge wasn’t offended. In fact, he agreed that rising sea levels aren’t a problem for Tangier.

“Like the president, I’m not concerned about sea level rise,” he said. “I’m on the water daily, and I just don’t see it.”

Instead, Eskridge, along with many of Tangier’s residents, said he worries about the erosion caused by the Chesapeake’s water pounding on the island’s shores. He said he believes this is why his home is disappearing at an alarming rate.

Trump apparently agreed.

“He said that is a problem, and maybe when I’m up in Washington, I could come by and we can chat about it,” Eskridge said.

Currently, the Army Corps of Engineers is scheduled to begin building a jetty on the west channel of the island some time this year to protect it from the harsh currents. But Eskridge said they need a jetty, or perhaps even a sea wall, around the entire island.

He believes Trump will cut through red tape and get them that wall.

“He’s for cutting regulations and the time it takes to study a project,” Eskridge said. “Of course you need the studies, but we’ve been studied to death.”

“We’re running out of land to give up,” he added.

That said, Trump’s administration hasn’t been friendly to the Chesapeake Bay itself. Trump’s proposed budget included ending federal funding of the Chesapeake Bay Program, a federal-state collaboration coordinated by the Environmental Protection Agency.

Begun in 1983, the program aimed to help reduce pollution and restore the Chesapeake Bay’s ecosystem, the very one from which the watermen on Tangier Island make their livings.

As a compromise on the budget, Congress restored the $73 million Trump’s administration planned to cut, at least until September when the fiscal year expires.

Another delusional Branch Trumpvidian.

[GrumpyGran]

11 minutes ago, GreyhoundFan said:

Because, you know, climate change isn't a thing, so people shouldn't worry (please note extreme sarcasm): "Trump calls mayor of shrinking Chesapeake island and tells him not to worry about it"

  Reveal hidden contents

James “Ooker” Eskridge was crabbing off the coast of Virginia’s Tangier Island in the Chesapeake Bay on Monday when he noticed a boat approaching him. Behind it was another.

Eskridge, mayor on the island, steeled himself for the worst. After all, as his wife said to him, “The only thing that could make you come inside from crabbing on a Monday morning is a call from President Trump.”

But as it turned out, that’s exactly what it was.

As one of the boats finally reached him, a fellow waterman told him to return to the island stat, because the president of the United States was calling soon.

“I thought he was joking,” Eskridge told The Washington Post in a phone interview.

Soon, he realized this was no joke.

It began a week earlier, when CNN aired a story about Tangier, Va., which sits on Tangier Island, about 12 miles from both the Virginia and Maryland coasts in the middle of the Chesapeake Bay. The small island, now only 1.3 square miles, shrinks by 15 feet each year, according to the Army Corps of Engineers, which points to coastal erosion and rising sea levels as the cause.

The island’s 450 residents, many of whom are descendants of its first settlers in the 17th century, are desperate. Scientists predict they will have to abandon the island in 50 years if nothing is done.

“Donald Trump, if you see this, whatever you can do, we welcome any help you can give us,” Eskridge said in the CNN piece, later adding, “I love Trump as much as any family member I got.”

Trump caught wind of the piece, Eskridge told The Post, and wanted to call. So his administration reached out to the Tangier Oyster Co., seeking the mayor’s phone number. Word spread to Eskridge in the middle of the Chesapeake Bay. He rushed back and sat by the telephone, waiting.

Finally, it rang.

“I’m still coming to grips that I was talking to the president,” Eskridge said, before describing the call.

Trump thanked the mayor and the entire island of Tangier, where he received 87 percent of the votes, for their support. Then the conversation turned to the island’s plight.

“He said we shouldn’t worry about rising sea levels,” Eskridge said. “He said that ‘your island has been there for hundreds of years, and I believe your island will be there for hundreds more.’”

Eskridge wasn’t offended. In fact, he agreed that rising sea levels aren’t a problem for Tangier.

“Like the president, I’m not concerned about sea level rise,” he said. “I’m on the water daily, and I just don’t see it.”

Instead, Eskridge, along with many of Tangier’s residents, said he worries about the erosion caused by the Chesapeake’s water pounding on the island’s shores. He said he believes this is why his home is disappearing at an alarming rate.

Trump apparently agreed.

“He said that is a problem, and maybe when I’m up in Washington, I could come by and we can chat about it,” Eskridge said.

Currently, the Army Corps of Engineers is scheduled to begin building a jetty on the west channel of the island some time this year to protect it from the harsh currents. But Eskridge said they need a jetty, or perhaps even a sea wall, around the entire island.

He believes Trump will cut through red tape and get them that wall.

“He’s for cutting regulations and the time it takes to study a project,” Eskridge said. “Of course you need the studies, but we’ve been studied to death.”

“We’re running out of land to give up,” he added.

That said, Trump’s administration hasn’t been friendly to the Chesapeake Bay itself. Trump’s proposed budget included ending federal funding of the Chesapeake Bay Program, a federal-state collaboration coordinated by the Environmental Protection Agency.

Begun in 1983, the program aimed to help reduce pollution and restore the Chesapeake Bay’s ecosystem, the very one from which the watermen on Tangier Island make their livings.

As a compromise on the budget, Congress restored the $73 million Trump’s administration planned to cut, at least until September when the fiscal year expires.

Another delusional Branch Trumpvidian.

This is the funniest thing I've read in a few days! Absolute gold. This needs to be saved for history as a perfect example of Trump and his supporters. And a breath-taking example of stupidity.

[Cartmann99]

5 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

I agree with you, but can guarantee compulsory voting will never happen here. Too many Americans don't want the government telling them that they "have" to do something.

Maybe I'm just stupid, but I don't see how compulsory voting does anything to make people more informed voters, it just makes people who have no interest show up and vote so they don't get penalized. I can see how unscrupulous people could use such a system to achieve their goals, vote buying would make a huge comeback in the United States, but how does such a system go about turning voters who show up to avoid punishment, into informed voters champing at the bit for the opportunity to cast their vote?

If I didn't care about politics, under a compulsory voting system I probably would have voted for Trump . That's who most of the people here supported, and if you don't care about politics, it's easier to just go along with what everyone else is doing. 

I'm feeling rather nauseous now at the thought that there's an alternate time line where I'm a Trump supporter.  

 

 

[GreyhoundFan]

Another good one from JR: "The unpopular Trump is shrinking the GOP"

Spoiler

President Trump has two problems. First, public disapproval of the president and a lack of confidence in him are skyrocketing. Second, Republicans’ solace that “at least the GOP is with him” may be misguided.

As for the overall numbers, his disapproval rating hit a new high of 60 percent in the Gallup poll. In the latest Politico-Morning Consult poll, 53 percent of voters think former FBI director James B. Comey is very or somewhat honest. By a margin of 45 percent to 32 percent, voters pick Comey over Trump when it comes to honesty. A strong plurality of voters think Trump fired Comey over the Russia investigation, not due to concerns about his performance (47 percent to 36 percent).

By a large majority, voters disfavor his signature bill, the American Health Care Act (which now he concedes is “mean”!). Big tax cuts for the rich, the heart of his tax plan, are unpopular as well. In short, even if Trump could get back to his agenda, it is not going to find favor with the voters.

As for GOP support, let’s keep in mind a few things. First, he’s a minority president who got only 46.1 percent of the vote. He cannot afford to lose voters; he needs to gain support from independents and even Democrats. Second, the Virginia gubernatorial primary results and generic congressional polling show that Democrats have a decisive advantage when it comes to enthusiasm and engagement. Third, we have the Virginia gubernatorial primary results and in a week we will have the results of Georgia’s 6th Congressional District special election to test the proposition that as the GOP becomes the Party of Trump, it becomes less attractive to a mass of voters who have traditionally considered themselves to be Republicans. A shrunken GOP means losses in 2018, the potential for the House to flip to Democratic control and proceed to impeachment, and the emergence of either a primary challenger to Trump, a third-party movement or an enlarged Democratic Party with GOP defectors.

It is not illogical to conclude that Trump is losing the curious or skeptical voters who were willing to give him the chance given his Democratic opponent in 2016, the perception that he was a successful manager and his image as a less ideologically dogmatic kind of Republican.

Republicans would dearly love to keep running against Hillary Clinton, but she won’t be on the ballot in 2018 or 2020. Trump has proved himself thoroughly incapable of managing the executive branch, so much so that Republicans now try to defend his misconduct by saying he’s new to all this.

The lack of progress on major issues cements the argument that he is less capable than the “stupid” politicians he decried in the campaign. His stumbles on the world stage — getting into spats with allies, pulling out of the Paris climate agreement, inviting trade wars with key partners — reinforce the image of a blunderbuss who is making the United States less respected.

Finally, Trump has jettisoned his populist rhetoric and positions (promise of no tax cuts for the rich and no cuts in Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security) for a Scrooge-like agenda that would roll back Medicaid, make health insurance more expensive for many who voted for him, and deliver big tax cuts for the rich that would require big cuts in popular programs and would unleash a torrent of red ink.

Ironically, Trump offered the GOP the hope for an expanded GOP, one big enough to reach white, working-class voters. The GOP he now presides over is not only politically dysfunctional and unpopular, but also arguably smaller than the one he took over in 2016. Democrats have a tremendous opportunity if they keep their heads about them, make the case against not just Trump personally but also his Trumpian agenda, and offer their own agenda that is both positive and non-radical.

Along with many FJers, I would not shed a tear if the GOP was a casualty of Agent Orange's tenure.

[GreyhoundFan]

Things seem to be heating up: "Special counsel is investigating Trump for possible obstruction of justice, officials say"

Spoiler

The special counsel overseeing the investigation into Russia’s role in the 2016 election is interviewing senior intelligence officials as part of a widening probe that now includes an examination of whether President Trump attempted to obstruct justice, officials said.

The move by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III to investigate Trump’s conduct marks a major turning point in the nearly year-old FBI investigation, which until recently focused on Russian meddling during the presidential campaign and on whether there was any coordination between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin. Investigators have also been looking for any evidence of possible financial crimes among Trump associates, officials said.

Trump had received private assurances from then-FBI Director James B. Comey starting in January that he was not personally under investigation. Officials say that changed shortly after Comey’s firing.

Five people briefed on the requests, speaking on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly, said Daniel Coats, the current director of national intelligence, Mike Rogers, head of the National Security Agency, and Rogers’s recently departed deputy, Richard Ledgett, agreed to be interviewed by Mueller’s investigators as early as this week. The investigation has been cloaked in secrecy, and it is unclear how many others have been questioned by the FBI.

The NSA said in statement that it will “fully cooperate with the special counsel” and declined to comment further. The office of the director of national intelligence and Ledgett declined to comment.

The White House now refers all questions about the Russia investigation to Trump’s personal attorney, Marc Kasowitz. “The FBI leak of information regarding the president is outrageous, inexcusable and illegal,” said Mark Corallo, a spokesman for Kasowitz.

The officials said Coats, Rogers and Ledgett would appear voluntarily, though it remains unclear whether they will describe in full their conversations with Trump and other top officials or will be directed by the White House to invoke executive privilege. It is doubtful the White House could ultimately use executive privilege to try to block them from speaking to Mueller’s investigators. Experts point out that the Supreme Court ruled during the Watergate scandal that officials cannot use privilege to withhold evidence in criminal prosecutions.

The obstruction-of-justice investigation of the president began days after Comey was fired on May 9, according to people familiar with the matter. Mueller’s office has now taken up that work, and the preliminary interviews scheduled with intelligence officials indicate his team is actively pursuing potential witnesses inside and outside the government.

The interviews suggest Mueller sees the question of attempted obstruction of justice as more than just a “he said, he said” dispute between the president and the fired FBI director, an official said.

Probing Trump for possible crimes is a complicated affair, even if convincing evidence of a crime were found. The Justice Department has long held that it would not be appropriate to indict a sitting president. Instead, experts say, the onus would be on Congress to review any findings of criminal misconduct and then decide whether to initiate impeachment proceedings.

Comey confirmed publicly in congressional testimony on March 20 that the bureau was investigating possible coordination between the Trump campaign and the Russians.

Comey’s statement before the House Intelligence Committee upset Trump, who has repeatedly denied that any coordination with the Russians took place. Trump had wanted Comey to disclose publicly that he was not personally under investigation, but the FBI director refused to do so.

Soon after, Trump spoke to Coats and Rogers about the Russia investigation.

Officials said one of the exchanges of potential interest to Mueller took place on March 22, less than a week after Coats was confirmed by the Senate to serve as the nation’s top intelligence official.

Coats was attending a briefing at the White House with officials from several other government agencies. When the briefing ended, as The Washington Post previously reported, Trump asked everyone to leave the room except for Coats and CIA Director Mike Pompeo.

Coats told associates that Trump had asked him whether Coats could intervene with Comey to get the bureau to back off its focus on former national security adviser Michael Flynn in its Russia probe, according to officials. Coats later told lawmakers that he never felt pressured to intervene.

A day or two after the March 22 meeting, Trump telephoned Coats and Rogers to separately ask them to issue public statements denying the existence of any evidence of coordination between his campaign and the Russian government.

Coats and Rogers refused to comply with the president’s requests, officials said.

It is unclear whether Ledgett had direct contact with Trump or other top officials about the Russia probe, but he wrote an internal NSA memo documenting the president’s phone call with Rogers, according to officials.

As part of the probe, the special counsel has also gathered Comey’s written accounts of his conversations with Trump. The president has accused Comey of lying about those encounters.

Mueller is overseeing a host of investigations involving people who are or were in Trump’s orbit, people familiar with the probe said. The investigation is examining possible contacts with Russian operatives as well as any suspicious financial activity related to those individuals.

Last week, Comey told the Senate Intelligence Committee that he had informed Trump that there was no investigation of the president’s personal conduct, at least while he was leading the FBI.

Comey’s carefully worded comments, and those of Andrew McCabe, who took over as acting FBI director, suggested to some officials that a probe of Trump for attempted obstruction may have been launched after Comey’s departure, particularly in light of Trump’s alleged statements regarding Flynn.

“I took it as a very disturbing thing, very concerning, but that’s a conclusion I’m sure the special counsel will work towards, to try and understand what the intention was there, and whether that’s an offense,” Comey testified last week.

Mueller has not publicly discussed his work, and a spokesman for the special counsel declined to comment.

Accounts by Comey and other officials of their conversations with the president could become central pieces of evidence if Mueller decides to pursue an obstruction case.

Investigators will also look for any statements the president may have made publicly and privately to people outside the government about his reasons for firing Comey and his concerns about the Russia probe and other related investigations, people familiar with the matter said.

Comey testified before the Senate Intelligence Committee last week that he was certain his firing was due to the president’s concerns about the Russia probe, rather than over his handling of a now-closed FBI investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server as secretary of state, as the White House had initially asserted. “It’s my judgment that I was fired because of the Russia investigation,” Comey said. “I was fired, in some way, to change — or the endeavor was to change the way the Russia investigation was being conducted.”

The fired FBI director said ultimately it was up to Mueller to make a determination whether the president crossed a legal line.

In addition to describing his interactions with the president, Comey told the Intelligence Committee that while he was FBI director he told Trump on three occasions that he was not under investigation as part of a counterintelligence probe looking at Russian meddling in the election.

Republican lawmakers seized on Comey’s testimony to point out that Trump was not in the FBI’s crosshairs when Comey led the bureau.

After Comey’s testimony, in which he acknowledged telling Trump that he was not under investigation, Trump tweeted that he felt “total and complete vindication.” It is unclear whether McCabe, Comey’s successor, has informed Trump of the change in the scope of the probe.

 

[Howl]

And on a more humorous note from the New Yorker. 

Man Ravaged by Amnesia Somehow Able to Hold Down Demanding Legal Job

Spoiler

 

WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—An Alabama man whose brain was ravaged by severe amnesia is somehow able to function in an extremely demanding legal job, leading neurologists reported on Tuesday.

The man, whom neurologists are calling a “medical mystery,” has performed highly exacting tasks in one of the country’s top legal positions despite having virtually no short- or long-term memory.

Dr. Davis Logsdon, the chairman of the neurology department at the University of Minnesota Medical School, said that the Alabaman’s brain “defies explanation.”

“In all the medical literature, we have never seen an example of someone capable of holding down such a high-powered job while having no memory whatsoever of people he met, things he said, places he has been, or thoughts he has had,” Logsdon said. “It’s the stuff of science fiction."

Logsdon said that his team of neurologists was studying video of the man in the hopes of understanding the paradoxical functioning of his brain, but Logsdon acknowledged that such a task was challenging. “After listening to him talk for hours, your own brain starts to hurt,” he said.

 

 

[Cartmann99]

6 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

His stumbles on the world stage — getting into spats with allies, pulling out of the Paris climate agreement, inviting trade wars with key partners — reinforce the image of a blunderbuss who is making the United States less respected.

It's been a really long day. I read that as spats with aliens and was wondering how in the hell had I missed that Trump had not only made contact with an alien race, but was fighting with them? 

6 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

Along with many FJers, I would not shed a tear if the GOP was a casualty of Agent Orange's tenure.

I'm not a real big drinker, but I promise to go on a three day drunk if Trump takes down the GOP. 

[candygirl200413]

Today (technically flag day, so Wednesday) was Trump's birthday and it is the greatest gift that he is now being investigated for obstruction.

 

[fraurosena]

This is an interesting op-ed on the obstruction of justice investigation:

The WaPo Obstruction Blockbuster and the World of Hurt To Come

Spoiler

After marveling at the lede of this new Washington Post bombshell – Mueller investigating Trump for obstruction of justice – I went back and read the whole piece again. You would think that news would be enough for a single piece. But when you read it all the way through the picture it paints is actually considerably more dire.

One key point is that Mueller did not start this obstruction investigation. According to the Post, that probe began “days after Comey was fired on May 9…” Mueller was appointed on May 17th. Reading the Post piece closely, I do not think it explicitly says that the probe began prior to the 17th. But the wording and logic of the piece strongly suggests that is the case.

One key point I draw from this is that it was clear to people at the DOJ and FBI almost from the beginning that this was a potential case of obstruction of justice. That makes me consider who then was in place to make such a decision. Once James Comey was fired, the acting Director of the FBI was Andrew McCabe, who remains in that role. If my surmise about the chronology is correct, Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein remained in charge of the Russia probe. Thus I think he would have been acting in Attorney General Sessions’ stead to make the decision to authorize such a probe.

This last point isn’t crystal clear to me since this would not necessarily have been considered part of the Russia investigation. In any case, you do not begin such an investigation of a sitting President except at the very highest level. That decision apparently came quickly. We can note here that soon after Comey’s firing Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein made statements suggesting that he may have been a witness to something that could be construed as a crime. If my memory serves, McCabe did as well. They are the two logical people to have signed off on an investigation at that point.

What were they going on?

Remember, President Trump gave his interview to Lester Holt two days after the firing on May 11th. It was in that interview that Trump said this: “[Rosenstein] had made a recommendation. But regardless of recommendation, I was going to fire Comey knowing there was no good time to do it. And in fact, when I decided to just do it, I said to myself — I said, you know, this Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made-up story. It’s an excuse by the Democrats for having lost an election that they should’ve won.”

Reading through this article, contemplating that the President less than five months in office is already being investigated for obstruction of justice, what is so mind-boggling is that the case isn’t even really a he said, he said dispute. How do we know the President fired Comey because of the Russia investigation? He said so on national television! And he said something similar the day before, on May 10th, only this time in a private setting.

On May 19th, the Times reported a White House memorandum summarizing Sergei Lavrov’s meeting with President Trump in the Oval Office. In that meeting President Trump said “I just fired the head of the F.B.I. He was crazy, a real nut job. I faced great pressure because of Russia. That’s taken off.”

This meeting was on May 10th, the day after Comey’s dismissal. The memorandum was likely written later that day. In other words, almost immediately after firing Comey, within the following two days, President Trump made at least two statements in which he essentially admitted or more like boasted about firing Comey with the specific goal of impeding or ending the Russia probe. There are various and highly significant complexities tied to the unique role of the President. He is the only person in the country who can, arguably, obstruct an investigation by exercising his statutory right to fire a members of the executive branch. But on its face, this is essentially admitting to obstruction.

It will be interesting to see whether either or both of these admissions played into the decision to launch a probe and precisely who authorized it. In any case, Robert Mueller has now subsumed it into his broader mandate and purview.

The additional detail about this part of the Russia investigation writ large is that Mueller appears to see this potential obstruction of justice as either including Trump’s requests to DNI Coats and NSA chief Rodgers or in some way evidenced by what he asked these two men to do. The article also says preliminary interviews suggest Mueller’s team is “actively pursuing potential witnesses inside and outside the government.”

What does this mean?

Here’s one guess. We know that President Trump has a number of close friends who he calls frequently to shoot the shit, rant or just unwind. Newsmax owner Chris Ruddy seems to be one of these. There appear to be plenty more. We can see that Trump was far from discreet in sharing his thinking and motivation about firing Comey. He literally said it in a nationally televised TV interview and in a conversation with the Russian foreign minister. We also know that he spent the previous weekend at his Bedminster golf club stewing in his anger at Comey and finally deciding it was time to fire him. Given all this, it seems close to impossible that Trump didn’t stream of consciousness with many of his sundry associates and toadies about what he was planning to do and why.

Those people are all now witnesses.

The one additional part of the WaPo article is broad and vague but in its own way represents the most peril for the President and his entourage. At one point the article reads: “Mueller is overseeing a host of investigations involving people who are or were in Trump’s orbit, people familiar with the probe said. The investigation is examining possible contacts with Russian operatives as well as any suspicious financial activity related to those individuals.” Earlier in the piece, there’s this: “Investigators have also been looking for any evidence of possible financial crimes among Trump associates, officials said.”

The seeming multiplicity of investigations speaks for itself. But it is the repeated reference to “financial crimes” or “suspicious financial activity” that grabs my attention.

Experts will tell you that “financial crimes” can often mean technical infractions, ways of structuring or organizing movements of money, failures to disclose, certain actions that are prima facie evidence of efforts to conceal, etc. This doesn’t mean these are just ‘technicalities’ in the colloquial sense. They are rather infractions the nature of which may be hard for a layperson to understand but which often end up snaring defendants when other crimes are too difficult to prove. But here’s the thing about the Trump world. I don’t have subpoena power. And we’ve yet to assign a reporting crew to the Trump entourage beat full time. But even with my own limited reporting, it is quite clear to me that there are numerous people in Trump’s entourage (or ‘crew’, if you will) including Trump himself whose history and ways of doing business would not survive first contact with real legal scrutiny. It sounds like Mueller sees all of that within his purview, in all likelihood because the far-flung business deealings of Trump and his top associates are the membrane across which collusion and quid pro quos could have been conducted.

As I said, a basic perusal of business in the Trump world makes clear that serious legal scrutiny would turn up no end of problems. Just consider what was from a financial perspective, a tiny island in the Trump archipelago of mischief, The Trump Foundation which David Fahrenthold did so much with. Almost every rock Fahrenthold overturned exposed some self-dealing, at least legal violations and often real wrongdoing and as much as anything a wild level of sloppiness and indifference to doing business like even semi-honest people. From one perspective it’s hard to say Trump knowingly broke the law with the Foundation since the whole conduct of the Foundation seemed to be carried on as though none of the relevant laws even existed. Again, the Foundation was just a sideline for Trump. It’s not where he made his big money and ran off from his biggest obligations. That’s how they do business.

If Mueller is taking a serious prosecutor’s lens to Trump’s financial world and the financial worlds of Michael Cohen, Paul Manafort, Mike Flynn and numerous others, there’s going to be a world of hurt for a lot of people. And that is if no meaningful level of 2016 election collusion even happened.

And I don’t think that’s true.

There are just so many ways in which the TT can be taken down.
I just really hope that whichever way it will turn out to be, he will just be the first of the dominoes to fall. 

 

 

Aannnnnd, the tantrum tweets have begun:

 

 

So now he's calling Mueller et al "very bad and conflicted".  Would this be a set up to firing him? A part of me wouldn't mind if he attempted to, a la Nixon's Saturday Night Massacre. And then have the same results, naturally.

[GrumpyGran]

Yeah, well, that little spate of semi-presidential behavior lasted less than 24 hours. He really can't sustain it. His default is angry tweets.

[Howl]

Josh at Talking Points Memo does a close read of a WaPo article:  The WaPo Obstruction Blockbuster and the World of Hurt To Come

Main points:

Mueller is pursuing the obstruction of justice angle, but the original impetus likely came after Comey's firing but before Mueller's appointment (Rosenstein? McCabe?)

Big Mouth McTrump handily outed himself on firing Comey over the Russia investigations when he told Sergei Lavrov  “I just fired the head of the F.B.I. He was crazy, a real nut job. I faced great pressure because of Russia. That’s taken off.”.  I think Trump also confirmed this in his Lester Holt interview the following day.

There's a financial angle where some, much, all of this will play out.  Here's a tasty sentence for context: "It sounds like Mueller sees all of that within his purview, in all likelihood because the far-flung business dealings of Trump and his top associates are the membrane across which collusion and quid pro quos could have been conducted."

This part is a little harder to summarize, so here's how the collateral financial shit will hit the fan. 

Quote

The one additional part of the WaPo article is broad and vague but in its own way represents the most peril for the President and his entourage. At one point the [WaPo] article reads: “Mueller is overseeing a host of investigations involving people who are or were in Trump’s orbit, people familiar with the probe said. The investigation is examining possible contacts with Russian operatives as well as any suspicious financial activity related to those individuals.” Earlier in the piece, there’s this: “Investigators have also been looking for any evidence of possible financial crimes among Trump associates, officials said.”

The finances of Trump, his businesses, his family and their business dealings, and the finances of his associates, sycophants, toadies et al. are now under the magnifying glass of kick-ass forensic accountants.  I just heard Jared Kushner referred to as a Trump associate on Morning Joe. 

Quote

Experts will tell you that “financial crimes” can often mean technical infractions, ways of structuring or organizing movements of money, failures to disclose, certain actions that are prima facie evidence of efforts to conceal, etc. This doesn’t mean these are just ‘technicalities’ in the colloquial sense. They are rather infractions the nature of which may be hard for a layperson to understand but which often end up snaring defendants when other crimes are too difficult to prove...

...If Mueller is taking a serious prosecutor’s lens to Trump’s financial world and the financial worlds of Michael Cohen, Paul Manafort, Mike Flynn and numerous others, there’s going to be a world of hurt for a lot of people.

I think I'm a gonna invest in popcorn futures....just sayin'. 

[fraurosena]

30 minutes ago, Howl said:

Josh at Talking Points Memo does a close read of a WaPo article:  The WaPo Obstruction Blockbuster and the World of Hurt To Come

Main points:

Mueller is pursuing the obstruction of justice angle, but the original impetus likely came after Comey's firing but before Mueller's appointment (Rosenstein? McCabe?)

Big Mouth McTrump handily outed himself on firing Comey over the Russia investigations when he told Sergei Lavrov  “I just fired the head of the F.B.I. He was crazy, a real nut job. I faced great pressure because of Russia. That’s taken off.”.  I think Trump also confirmed this in his Lester Holt interview the following day.

There's a financial angle where some, much, all of this will play out.  Here's a tasty sentence for context: "It sounds like Mueller sees all of that within his purview, in all likelihood because the far-flung business dealings of Trump and his top associates are the membrane across which collusion and quid pro quos could have been conducted."

This part is a little harder to summarize, so here's the shit will hit the fan with the collateral financial angle. 

The finances of Trump, his businesses, his family and their business dealings, and the finances of his associates, sycophants, toadies et al. are now under the magnifying glass of kick-ass forensic accountants.  I just heard Jared Kushner referred to as a Trump associate on Morning Joe. 

 

LOL, that's the exact same article I posted above. 

Like minds, eh? 

 

I found this rather insightful article about the insidiousness of what TT is doing. 

Trump isn't preparing to fire Mueller. What he's doing is worse.

Spoiler

Have you heard that President Trump might fire Special Counsel Robert Mueller? Have you heard that he is irretrievably compromised, a close confidante of former FBI Director James Comey? Have you heard that Comey's Senate testimony vindicates President Trump and makes Mueller's work needless at best? Have you seen the story headlined on the Drudge Report that Mueller is staffing his investigation with Democratic donors? Do you agree with disgraced former House Speaker Newt Gingrich that it is "delusional" to think that this investigation could possibly be fair?

Since Comey's testimony last week made it clear that President Trump may very well have obstructed justice by firing the former FBI director, it has been Defcon 1 in Trump world. They know that Comey alone probably can't bring down Trump, and therefore the president's apologists have pointed the firehose of innuendo, fabrication, and exaggeration at Mueller himself. All of these viral spores — the Drudge links and fever-swamp hit pieces — are designed to infect the broader public with doubt and hostility toward Mueller's investigation of the alleged ties between the Trump campaign and Russian operatives seeking to undermine America's democracy. The axis of fabulist websites like Polizette and Breitbart is working overtime to discredit Mueller, operating hand in hand with their more mainstream handmaidens in the Republican mediasphere.

Just don't be fooled about what they're really up to.

President Trump is not going to fire Mueller any more than the Golden State Warriors are going to trade Steph Curry this offseason. It might be unwise to gamble on the president's faculties and political sensibilities, but in this case not even Trump is this stupid. Pink-slipping Mueller would destroy what little is left of his presidency by making it clear to everyone that the president has something criminal to hide. In a year that has seen almost nothing but a series of scandals and violations of the rule of law by the clownish amateurs running the country, firing a special counsel before he has even had a chance to do his work would cause a subcritical political meltdown in the capital. Whether Trump is really considering firing Mueller, as press reports indicate, or whether this is just another staffer throwing marbles down the steps for reporters to chase is anyone's guess. But Trump is already badly adrift politically, his approval ratings mired in the 30s, his profoundly unpopular agenda hopelessly stalled in Congress. The last thing Trump or the Republicans need is another layer of intrigue on the Russia scandal.

What is happening, instead, is an effort to cast doubt on Mueller's conclusions, whatever they ultimately may be, and to turn as many swamp creatures against the investigation as possible. The goal is to create a cloud of doubt, to make sure that every news article about the investigation mentions Mueller's detractors and notes the GOP commentariat consensus that he has embarked on a witch hunt designed to bring down an innocent president. Fouling the air with unseemly allegations, second-hand rumors, and clever half-truths is precisely the strategy that Republicans have used to undermine broad consensus on issue after issue, from Hillary Clinton's honesty to the reality of anthropogenic climate change.

This cynical strategy must not be allowed to succeed. The baseline viability of the American constitutional order is at stake here. Mueller served the longest stint as the FBI's head honcho since J. Edgar Hoover. Appointed to the office by George W. Bush, he was so well regarded in Washington — Garrett Graff says he "might just be America's straightest arrow" — that former President Obama reappointed him for a special two-year term. There isn't enough dirt on this guy to fill a windowsill flower pot and he is held in the highest regard by otherwise ruthless partisans on both sides of the aisle in Washington.

Notably, even elected Republicans otherwise inclined to pawn their integrity for a Diet Coke and an Amazon gift card have not stooped to smearing the unimpeachable Mueller. At least not yet. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said that firing Mueller "would be a disaster." Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), another elected Republican who frequently criticizes Trump but rarely does anything substantive to rein him in, called a move against Mueller "extremely unwise." Arizona Sens. John McCain (R) and Jeff Flake (R) went on the record with similar statements of support for Mueller after rumors of his firing sent everyone in D.C. scrambling to Twitter.

However, it should be clear by now that Graham, Collins, McCain, and other "moderate" Republicans are not where we should be looking for where the party will ultimately end up on any given issue. The same group of Republican senators that expressed so much dismay at the super-secret TrumpCare bill now appears to be willing to cave and vote for it, if only to get Trump a single legislative victory. Collins, of course, was more than willing to mouth Republican talking points at Comey during his testimony in an effort to run point for Trump, and we should expect all Republican senators to eventually toe the company line on Mueller as well. They seem incapable of withstanding the political pressure from Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and the party's rabid base long enough to hold the president accountable.

That means the thing to look for is not whether Mueller will be fired, but how the GOP reacts when conclusions start getting leaked and the final report comes in, whenever that might be. The fusillade of attacks on Mueller should therefore be seen not as an opening salvo in the campaign to unseat him, but as a long game designed to discredit him and his investigation. Today's Breitbart fantasy will be next month's talking points for Susan Collins. The real question for anyone who cares about the integrity of American democracy should be this: Why is the GOP, once again, willing to to debase itself to prevent the whole truth from coming out? If Trump and his advisers are genuinely innocent of collaboration with the Russians, or of other Russia-related financial and political malfeasance, why wouldn't they simply shut up and get out of the way?

The answer to that question could very well determine how much longer Donald Trump will be the president of the United States.

 

[GreyhoundFan]

Oh, this is priceless: "The Republican response to reports of an investigation into Trump, annotated'. You have to read the article to see the notes, which are important. Basically, they are trying to say "nothing to see here". Yeah, right, the more they protest, the guiltier everyone seems.

[LeftCoastLurker]

I don't think I've seen this posted yet, if it has been I'm sorry.

In response to the Capitol shooting yesterday, Paul Rand said, "I do believe that without the Capitol Hill police it would've been a massacre."

Less than a year ago, here's what he said on Twitter about guns...

 

[Tangy Bee]

On 6/14/2017 at 9:33 AM, usedbicycle said:

I'm glad y'all are calling this out. On another thread about the Staddon-Neely wedding, people got pissed at me for saying how awful some parts of NC are in terms of Trump fanatics and and all-around-horrible Baptist churches. Yes I know the State has Asheville, Charlotte and other progressive places, but I've lived in several southern states and there's something particularly virulent about churches in NC. 

 

 

Yep. And SC is not much different. I live in a small town 20 minutes from Charlotte. Two extreme fundie baptists churches here. Skirts only for the majority of the women. One pastor has 10 kids. Two graduated from Crown. I've heard some locals actually say they are moving to the mountains of NC, because there are no blacks or hispanics up there. Sad but true. 

[GreyhoundFan]

@LeftCoastLurker -- yeah, Rand Paul is one of the Repugs who seem to have no understanding of irony or hypocrisy.

 

Jennifer Rubin has been burning up the WaPo op-ed pages :"The criminal investigation of Trump puts his presidency in peril"

Spoiler

The Post reports:

The special counsel overseeing the investigation into Russia’s role in the 2016 election is interviewing senior intelligence officials as part of a widening probe that now includes an examination of whether President Trump attempted to obstruct justice, officials said.

The move by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III to investigate Trump’s conduct marks a major turning point in the nearly year-old FBI investigation, which until recently focused on Russian meddling during the presidential campaign and on whether there was any coordination between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin. Investigators have also been looking for any evidence of possible financial crimes among Trump associates, officials said.

Former FBI director James B. Comey, in his testimony last week, quite clearly was laying the factual predicate for a possible obstruction charge — detailing Trump’s efforts to persuade Comey to drop the investigation of Michael T. Flynn, Trump’s former national security adviser, and when that did not work, firing Comey with a false pretextual explanation.

The president and his surrogates are already on the warpath, falsely suggesting that Comey engaged in improper or illegal conduct in leaking his memos and, putting out the line via Kellyanne Conway, that members of Mueller’s legal team had given to Democratic politicians (and therefore were biased). None of that will prove successful, in large part because there reportedly are a parade of other witnesses. (“Daniel Coats, the current director of national intelligence, Mike Rogers, head of the National Security Agency, and Rogers’s recently departed deputy, Richard Ledgett, agreed to be interviewed by Mueller’s investigators as early as this week.”) These witnesses are likely to provide an account not unlike Comey’s in which the president wanted them to interfere with Comey’s Russia investigation.

No wonder Trump is still ruminating about firing Mueller. His aides correctly point out that this would be politically disastrous, fueling impeachment fever. But Trump certainly has one thing right: His presidency is imperiled so long as Mueller compels witnesses to testify, accumulates written evidence and traces the myriad of ties between the Trump team and Russians.

Onlookers have assumed that any obstruction was intended to prevent evidence of “collusion” or Russian infiltration of Trump’s campaign from surfacing. However, the subject matter of the underlying investigation may extend to financial crimes, putting Trump’s and his associates’ international business dealings under the microscope.

The addition to Mueller’s team of a prosecutor including Andrew Weissmann, Supreme Court advocate and criminal law expert Michael Dreeben, and others experienced in complex fraud and international bribery cases suggests that the probe may be looking at more than “collusion” between Russian officials and Trump team members. For example, “it appears he has recruited an experienced Justice Department trial attorney, Lisa Page, a little-known figure outside the halls of Main Justice but one whose résumé boasts intriguing hints about where Mueller’s Russia investigation might lead. Page has deep experience with money laundering and organized crime cases, including investigations where she’s partnered with an FBI task force in Budapest, Hungary, that focuses on eastern European organized crime. That Budapest task force helped put together the still-unfolding money laundering case against Ukrainian oligarch Dmitry Firtash, a one-time business partner of [Paul] Manafort.”) News reports speculate that Mueller could be investigating potential money-laundering by Trump team members.

It bears repeating that only Mueller and his team know the exact contours of an investigation. A counterintelligence inquiry into Russian interference now extends — as these things inevitably do — to possible financial dealings of Trump and his associates and possible “procedural” crimes (e.g. obstruction, perjury, lying to the FBI). The president might want to consider finding an actual expert in criminal law to represent him; this investigation is extensive, serious and possibly career-ending for a growing list of figures, which now certainly includes the president.

I had not heard anything about Lisa Page, but she sounds like a heavy-hitter.

[onekidanddone]

38 minutes ago, GreyhoundFan said:

Jennifer Rubin has been burning up the WaPo op-ed pages :"The criminal investigation of Trump puts his presidency in peril"

I had not heard anything about Lisa Page, but she sounds like a heavy-hitter.

They squawk about the 'illegal' leaks, but do they claim leaks are false? Can a leak be called a leak if it is a lie? I mean if I leaked to the press that @GreyhoundFan likes to post on FJ, would be a leak?  If I 'leaked' to the press @GreyhoundFan has dinner with the Duggars every third Wednesday and loves tater-tot casserole, that would not be a leak that would be a lie right?