I think we all know AG Barr lied about the Mueller report but permit me to go back to this:
The moment Attorney General William Barr laid eyes on a letter from special counsel Robert Mueller criticizing Barr’s summary of his two-year investigation, he knew his goose was cooked. Mueller was creating a written record that wouldn’t allow Barr to bastardize his concerns the way he had mischaracterized Mueller’s report. “Bob, what’s with the letter? Why didn’t you just pick up the phone and call me?” Mueller didn’t need to tell Barr what they both knew: Mueller now considered Barr an untrustworthy adversary—a liar, in essence. Going forward, Mueller was going to memorialize his views in writing
. Fast forward to how AG Barr handled the Whistleblower complaint:
The CIA’s general counsel made a criminal referral — or at least, she thought she did — of a whistleblower’s complaint concerning President Donald Trump’s interactions with Ukraine’s president. According to NBC News, which cited unnamed officials familiar with the matter, Courtney Simmons Elwood, the CIA’s top lawyer, considered her Aug. 14 phone call with high-ranking DOJ officials to be a criminal referral. However, unnamed Justice Department officials told NBC News they didn’t consider the conversation to be a formal criminal referral — because it wasn’t in writing.
Bob Barr is a pathetic excuse for Attorney General. We need to remand that he resign – TODAY!
Barr has decades of experience in this area.
“And thereby hangs the upcoming brawl. Mueller says essentially that he is drawing no conclusions on obstruction of justice. Meanwhile, Barr—and Rod Rosenstein—are saying that, because Mueller drew no conclusions, he did in fact draw a conclusion. The law, as it has been said, is an ass.
There will be insufferable cock-a-doodle-doo’ing from the usual suspects for the next two years, and we all better get used to it. I suspect that both Barr and Mueller will get hauled before various congressional committees. In fact, the basic overriding result of Barr’s summary is that the whole matter now has been dumped into the laps of a divided and hyper-partisan Congress in such a way as to guarantee that the Congress will be more divided and more hyper-partisan than ever before. The Democratic House will hold hearings and the Republican Senate will yell about Hillary Clinton. The Internet will be indiscriminately insane for the foreseeable future.
For those of us who are Iran-Contra obsessives—and you know who you are out there—this summary carries a similar aroma. A lot of important people are going to pass the buck around to each other, over and over again, until the country forgets what all the fuss was in the first place. This should be no surprise, again, because, back in 1992, when he was George H.W. Bush’s AG, Barr advised that president to pardon all of the people convicted in Iran-Contra—people who, unsurprisingly, all could have testified that Bush’s non-involvement was a self-serving lie. Maybe he’ll give this president* the same advice. Who knows?
The wild card, of course, is the president* himself. He’s got another wankfest scheduled this week and he’s liable to say anything. And Paul Manafort still will be in jail simply because he got tied up with a guy who opened the floodgates on Manafort’s crimes. He’ll sit there forever, hoping for a pardon that will never come because he’s not the guy who got to appoint his own attorney general to bail him out.
Sucker.”
https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a26921794/mueller-report-summary-willam-barr-donald-trump/
Elmer Fudd at his best and Trump keeps babbling unafraid of what is going on around him and he still has not shut up. We can only hope we can make this stick and he is ousted before 2020.
Unfortunately that is not going to happen. Not a chance the Senate votes to impeach.
However, the House impeachment is necessary simply for justice and to rally the Dem voters for the election. Turnout is always the key, and this will increase Dem turnout.
Even is the Senate doesn’t vote to convict, the stain of impeachment will hang over this narcissistic president. And he and the GOP will have to ride that into November 2020. Not a good look.
So if NBC is to be believed, the CIA’s top lawyer believes that criminal referrals can be made to the DOJ with phone calls.
This raises serious questions:
1. Why did the CIA’s top lawyer seek to avoid a written record?
2. Has she made these sneaky referrals in the past?
3. Do you REALLY want the CIA to gather prosecutorial information on Americans and refer it to the DOJ?
Be careful what you wish for. Do you want to unleash the full power of the CIA on the American public?
I most certainly do not! I want my constitutional rights to be protected.
JimH
I try to avoid rebutting you as some of the stuff you write is borderline.
Three people were on this call talking to the DOJ. NBC News. There was no need for written document to be in place. It was a report of a possible crime the same as the police coming out upon your phone call to investiagte, find nothing, reassure you everything is ok, and then leave. DOJ did nothing except shrug its shoulders.
That sure sounds like there was a pattern of practice in reporting as determined by a previous memo. Verbal reporting was acceptable according to the memo.
It appears Elmer Fudd did not call back the CIA and telling them he saw no problem or that he was acting upon this issue. These are three senior officials reporting on a potential problem with the White House talking to a foreign power to investigate a political opponent. Then too, isn’t this the FBI’s bailiwick? Why couldn’t Trump get Elmer to investigate Biden?
DOJ changes written policy on reporting and the reported violation is closed. And oh by the way, we did look at this and found no issues. Three other people in the CIA, in the White House, etc. saw a problem and it was blocked by the DOJ. From reading everything, I believe there is reason to delve deeper into this. By the president’s (and I say this title loosely) actions he adds to the initial report and the follow-up written report there is a problem.
A deflection? Perhaps and maybe to what he is doing to Medicare in destroying it. Why would he choose a national security issue to deflect with and risk his presidency for a 2nd term? He needs to go as he is unstable. His actions in the last week support his instability to be a president.
Potential problems with CIA referrals to the DOJ:
Information secured by the government without a valid search warrant.
Fruit of the poisonous tree:
See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fruit_of_the_poisonous_tree
Failure of the government to disclose exculpatory evidence.
Prosecutorial misconduct:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosecutorial_misconduct
Evidence provided by the government which is tainted by omission.
False evidence:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falsified_evidence
“Has she made these sneaky referrals in the past?”
JimH – Trump sycophant has just made everyone who ever called 911 “sneaky”. Hey Jimmy – say hello to RUDY for us!
“Information secured by the government without a valid search warrant.”
Seriously Jimmy boy? Did this whistleblower sneak into the bedroom where Donald was telling Melanie he really did not get on her or what? Your little defenses of the Traitor in Chief are beyond laughable. Even Jay Sekulow isn’t THAT stupid.
It has been reported that the DOJ (Barr) concluded that obtaining dirt on his opponent did not constitute something “of value” to Mr. (I hesitate to say “President”) Trump and therefore the statute was not violated. The law is not an ass; Attorney General Barr is.
“It has been reported that the DOJ (Barr) concluded that obtaining dirt on his opponent did not constitute something “of value” to Mr. (I hesitate to say “President”) Trump and therefore the statute was not violated. The law is not an ass; Attorney General Barr is.”
Barr is a (fat) a$$? LOL! Now if we are to believe the long winded rant from JimH, it was not Barr but some FBI agent named Elmer Fudd. Elmer Fudd Jimmy boy? Are you writing for The Onion now or what?
Jim H’s favorite FBI agent Elmer Fudd in action:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uzQ9kxs6RL8
Of all the Trump trolls, Jim H. may be the funniest!
Run75441,
You either believe that the CIA should be involved in domestic law enforcement or you don’t. I don’t.
“Amendment IV
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”
https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/bill-of-rights-transcript
Perhaps Democrats think that a little CIA backdoor communication is harmless to the protections of 4th amendment but I do not. I do not want the CIA reporting to the DOJ that they should look HERE for this PARTICULAR EVIDENCE. Under those conditions how would any court be able to rule out evidence which was the “Fruit of the poisonous tree”. The defense attorney would never know that the “poisonous tree” was the CIA which had done searches without search warrants.
Have you found a copy of that memo which sets “forth in a memo governing how intelligence agencies should report allegations of federal crimes.” Can you post a link to it?
My gut tells me that this memo will be one which demands that intelligence agencies report their own violations of federal law not the violations of others.
JimH is still trying to peddle this nonsense that the CIA violated Trump’s 4th Amendment rights? What utter bull$hit. At least JimH provided us with something other than a stupid Wikipedia link. Hey JimH – did you attend Wikipedia Law School or what?
Our President is a traitor and JimH argues that if a CIA agent happens upon information exposing his treason – that should not be forwarded to the FBI? JimH – Trump’s #1 sycophant. Hey JimH – tell us what provision of the U.S. Constitution shows treason is AOK.
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/whistleblower-lawyer-representing-second-whistleblower
Whistleblower Lawyer Now Representing Second Whistleblower With ‘First-Hand’ Info
I guess our Trump troll JimH needs to get busy sliming this 2nd patriot!
Deflection. The 4th Amendment issues do not apply to the Impeachment duties of the House. It votes that is what the House does. It does not conduct a trial process criminal standards also simply do not apply. Under the same Constitutional provisions the Senate is to conduct a trial, as it is called in the Constitution, but even here this is not a criminal matter by its very terms – these are all political processes, by design.
There is a clear propaganda effort to deflect and obfuscate by throwing these inapplicable issues out there. Though I have little doubt that some are planning to file a 4th Amendment claim into the courts, asking the Court to use it to override the Impeachment provisions in the base Constitution.
As for the whistleblower statutes and the 4th Amendment, the President would need to await legal actions against him to bring out such claims in the courts. So the meme broadcastings being done are just attempts to obscure. I am of the opinion that the public’s law on whistleblowing, laws signed by a president, not only are enforceable but by their terms ensure that controversies arise because someone other than the whistleblower investigates to produce a sense of reasonable cause. And for what it is worth, I carried around the Dear Colleague letter for Senator signatures on the earliest of the whistleblower bills that found its way into the Civil Service Reform public law, decades ago — so the law is settled here, in my view, as is the spirit of these public laws.
The House votes. All members would have an opportunity to vote should articles of impeachment come forward.
Some members, in the minority, have offered 4th Amendment like recommendations as if the House was the judicial branch. The letter they sent should have been sent to the Senate where, indeed, it would be fair procedure to consider minority rights as they conduct their review of evidence uncovered and provided as support for their votes to convict or not convict. Good ideas for that body, but then again, this is not a judicial department action, it is political in its nature in the public’s legislature, so even hearsay like evidence may/could be persuasive to some in arriving at which way to vote. And that is what the Senate does too, they vote. And this is by design not something the judicial branch does, nor is it able to rule on anything that occurs, in my view.
“You either believe that the CIA should be involved in domestic law enforcement or you don’t. I don’t.”
You understand that Ukraine is another country, right?
“You understand that Ukraine is another country, right?”
Is it? Putin will soon annex all of Ukraine as part of mother Russia. And we know Trump has been Putin’s poodle from day 1. So we should expect the USA to also become part of mother Russia. Which means the CIA will be merged with the KGB. MAGA!