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Justice Department Appoints Former FBI Director Robert Mueller As Special Counsel For Russia Investigation (thehill.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Hill: The Justice Department has appointed former FBI Director Robert Mueller as special counsel to investigate Russia's involvement in the U.S. election. Mueller, a former prosecutor who served a 12-year term at the helm of the bureau, has accepted the position, according to Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein. "In my capacity as acting attorney general I determined that it is in the public interest for me to exercise my authority and appoint a special counsel to assume responsibility for the matter," Rosenstein said in a statement. "My decision is not a finding that crimes have been committed or that any prosecution is warranted. I have made no such determination. What I have determined is that based upon the unique circumstances, the public interest requires me to place this investigation under the authority of a person who exercises a degree of independence from the normal chain of command." UPDATE: President Trump has released a statement: "As I have stated many times, a thorough investigation will confirm what we already know -- there was no collusion between my campaign and any foreign entity. I look forward to this matter concluding quickly. In the meantime, I will never stop fighting for the people and the issues that matter most to the future of our country."
We didn't know the extent of the Nixon atrocities until more than a year after the break in. It's quite likely lots of evidence exists, but is being used in an ongoing investigation and will not be disclosed publically anytime soon. If trump asked Comey to back of Flynn, and we know he admitted to firing Comey over Russia issues, that is likely enough on its own. Not to mention the overwhelming list that grows by the day. If we see Paul Ryan buckle, it's all over.
when mueller finds there is no crime or collusion (as is obvious to anyone with a brain, who has looked in vain for actual verifiable evidence for any of that), at around middle of 2018, just in time for midterms, it would indeed be so much "winning".
trump's opponents are overplaying their hand on this. they should focus on opposing him on his polices that hurt voters, on his breaking election promises, and in promoting policy alternatives that benefit voters(all of them, instead of playing identity politics).
crying "russians!", "impeachment!" , "resistance!",etc, etc, while supporting illegal immigrants, open trade and borders, support for more wars in support of "allies", politically correct suppression of free speech, etc etc. will not help.
Even up until this afternoon I was certain the Republicans would wait until the fall or early next year, due to wanting to take the pulse of the voters, and in particular the base and any tight House races (there are only a handful of tight Senate races, or so I understand). But I think matters are quickly accelerating beyond any ability of the Republicans to control. While Trump's popularity with the base still seems fairly strong, he's shedding support elsewhere, and I suspect, unless things can quiet down for a bit, the base will begin to erode as well, and at that point, then so will loyalty for Trump among lawmakers.
This was inevitable, if for no other reason than Trump just cannot keep his mouth shut. He's like Richard Nixon's idiot brother, all of the same paranoia and deceit, but with half the brains. How can his defenders keep up his defense, when they'll deny the report or rumor against him in the morning, and then he'll fucking confirm the truth of the report that night? At some point, and I expect that point is coming soon, he's just simply going to start shedding supporters, simply because they don't want to be tied to the anchor when it's finally pitched overboard.
I waffle between Trump either being one of the stupidest human beings to ever get elected to high office, or him really not wanting to be there but too arrogant to just walk away, and wanting to be pushed so he can claim he was the subject of persecution. Certainly that's the way it's going if today's Coast Guard commencement is any indication.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Whatever the Democrats may be screaming, it's irrelevant to this. The Republicans control Congress. It's in their hands, and thus far every attempt they've made to support Trump has been thrown back in their face by his inability to keep his mouth shut. For chrissakes, the man is such an arrogant blowhard he was showing off to the fucking Russians in the Oval Office with a Russian journalist in the room. Whether he let slip any classified data or not, the fact is not only has he once again, within the space of a few days, made himself look like a big mouthed ass, he's now pissing off Israel, which means Israel and other allies, not to mention the State Department itself, are going to start holding crucial intelligence closer to their chests lest the Braggart-in-chief decide to show off to any other foreign powers.
Don't you see that it is Trump himself that is going to be forcing Republican lawmakers' hands? The opposing minority party always makes frequent demands for removals and impeachments and judicial proceedings. Christ, that's been the way Washington has worked since the day after George Washington walked off into the sunset. The difference here is that this is a man who seems bound and determined to make his supporters and allies look like idiots, and seems to want to hand his opponents, both Democrat AND Republican (because he has no lack of critics in the GOP) all the ammunition they could ever need.
At this point you even have some Democratic strategists hoping he doesn't get impeached and removed, because the longer he's in the White House, the worse the Republicans look.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
"...politically correct suppression of free speech..."
So, who's trying to kill net neutrality again?
Have you been watching Fox News? They have been commiting slander, libel and other things against the dnc staffer yet haven't said a peep against the fact that trump is leaking secrets to Russia. Fox and republicans don't care that trump is commiting treason. They are such hypocrites that if Hillary did half of what trump has done they would be hanging her.
But if one of their own does it ? It isn't a big deal. Republicans. Hypocrites to the core. Do as they say not as do.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
It took over a year for the Watergate investigation to (almost) reach the House Floor. It strikes me that your demand for immediate answers is more of you intentionally moving the goal post.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
breaking election promises
Can you really fault a guy for breaking promises when he tries to keep them and every single effort is sabotaged by some federal judge? It's almost as if there were some sort of collusion...
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
I would agree it was just Democrats shouting in the dark... if there didn't keep being problems. See here's the thing: The issue isn't with the e-mail leaks. That's not what is being talked about, it is if any of Trump's associates had illegal ties to the Russians and more importantly if Trump tried to cover it up.
Trump was told that Flynn was likely compromised and he shouldn't hire him. Had he not, well that story would end there. But he did hire him. He then pressured the FBI director to drop the investigation in to Flynn, and only fired Flynn when it leaked that he had this conflict of interest. He then implied the problem, and the reason he fired Flynn, was the leak not the compromise. Then he later fired the FBI director which his people claimed was related to the e-mails but he came out and said was because of the Russia investigation.
Guess what? That shit starts to look a lot like obstruction of justice. That's why this thing continues to have legs.
Oh an impeachment of a president? That's not "corrupt politicians" "overthrow[ing] of an elected President," it is constitutional, and is what is supposed to happen if the president breaks the law. Article one section 1 states that "The House of Representatives shall choose their speaker and other officers; and shall have the sole power of impeachment." Article two section four states "The President, Vice President and all civil officers of the United States, shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors."
So ya, if it turns out he obstructed justice, which you'd need an investigation to determine (and that is what is going on), accepted bribes, or other illegal acts then the House would be within its constitutional power to impeach him and the Senate to try him. That's not some covert scheme to subvert the Constitution, it is written right in the original text.
Most real world issues are subtle, nuanced and lack mainstream interest. Reducing arguments to simple black and white soundbites might "win the votes" of casual spectators, but reality is still there, and doesn't care a jot about any of that.
At least one significant member of Trump's administration had to resign almost as soon as he was appointed because he was found to be working with the Russians, and he's being investigated. I'm not sure where you're getting it from that anyone independent at all in a position to know has suggested there's no links between the Trump campaign and Russia - if that were known, there wouldn't have been multiple FBI investigations to begin with.
And if there weren't multiple FBI investigations into Trump's team's connections with Russia, Comey would still have a job.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
My prediction is that, while Trump remains popular amongst people who voted for him, he will be safe from impeachment. Impeachment would likely turn these voters against the Republicans.
But once his base starts to turn away from supporting him, then impeachment becomes likely as Trump will be a liability to the Republicans instead of an asset.
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
Waiting for evidence and being skeptical is intentionally moving the goal post?
Right... Meanwhile all journalistic integrity has gone out the window. Goldwater rule gone. Relying on unverifiable claims from anonymous sources too much. Too much personal opinion injected into news pieces. Narrative crafting is common.
Journalists understand you cannot interview someone you love or family members because your reporting would be biased nor honest because of your emotions. Someone you hate and have absolute contempt for? No problem, your emotions wont' get in the way of honest reporting...
This is both sides. You would be an idiot not to wait for actual verifiable evidence because there is no one that is reporting anything with any shred of integrity. I keep reading articles how the Russians hacked this or that and then a few paragraphs down; "we have no evidence the Russians are involved.".
None for Obama or for George W. Bush, unless my memory is completely failing me. Is it?
Or some sort of couple hundred year old piece of paper standing in the way.
Wow. Your powers of Getting Things Exactly Backwards are pretty impressive! Does it physically hurt?
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
it's meant that all our checks and balances have collapsed
No it doesn't. Just because "people that think like me" didn't win elections does not mean ALL checks and balances are gone. They are still being eroded away slowly with bipartisan support.
Did you say we lost ALL our checks and balances after 2008 when the Democrats controlled the Congress and Executive? No? Ok then, stop the hyperbole.
Can you really fault a guy for breaking promises when he tries to keep them and every single effort is sabotaged by some federal judge?
I can certainly fault the incompetent boob who doesn't understand the difference between being president and being dictator.
The federal judges are just enforcing the US constitution, which Trumplethinskin has never read and wouldn't understand if he did.
Bueller, Bueller, (you read that in Ben Stein's voice), won't find shit, he didn't find shit about US war crimes, he didn't find shit about Cheney's war profiteering, and he didn't find shit about the US engagement in torture--even after it was posted on the internet.
He is going to continue to cover the POTUS's ass and make sure that nothing is found.
And like the voting machine tampering in the 2016 election, he will make sure that any evidence that is found relating to the Cheeto is tainted to give reasonable doubt in case there is an impeachment.
What, the constitution says the government can pick and choose which law to enforce and which law to ignore? Where does it say that?
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Let me give you some advice the next time you want to criticize Wikipedia. Go click on that link above to the Wiki article. Now, look at the text, notice how it has various numbers in brackets in superscript. You can hover over them and some text will pop up. That's called a "reference". Those "references" are where the claims in the article come from. If you click on one of those, or scroll allllll the way down to the bottom, you'll see the list of references for the article, all 283 of them. Those are what you need to attack the credibility of, because the Wikipedia article itself is really just a collection of claims given in those references. Just go ahead and start at #1 and work your way down, debunking each of those references. Make sure not to skip #4, which quotes a report from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and National Intelligence Council:
We assess with high confidence that Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered an influence campaign in 2016 aimed at the US presidential election, the consistent goals of which were to undermine public faith in the US democratic process, denigrate Secretary Clinton, and harm her electability and potential presidency. We further assess Putin and the Russian Government developed a clear preference for President-elect Trump.
Make sure not to skip this one, either. You wouldn't want it to seem like you're cherry-picking.
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
If we are talking about hypocrisy -- whoever leaked the story to WaPo out of "concern" about the danger to the sources certainly knew that it's much more likely ISIS would find out what happened by reading the story about the secrets on the front page of WaPo.
If the deep state doesn't exist, then why are there wars to protect the petrodollar system no matter which party is in charge?
your thin skin doesn't make me a troll
Please explain, with relevant citations, how any of the Bill of Rights applies to the Executive's authority over immigration restrictions.
Putin thought Hillary would win just like everyone else.
When does that piece of paper matter to the leftists? Freedom of speech? Not if it's "hate speech" (which is anything found to be inconvenient at the time). Right to bear arms? Nope, not unless you work for the Government (or them). I know, the right to due process? Well, once again if you are in the wrong political party the leftists and leftist media will try and convict you long before any evidence is shown. I don't need to go on, but surely we could play this game for a long time.
Face facts, this is not an issue with the Leftists and their media with President Trump. This is an issue with _ANY_ President who is not on the left. I'm old enough to remember how the media and leftists bashed and played the same games against Reagan. Perhaps try going back and reading some papers from his day.
Everyone on the left gets a free pass. Remember when President Obama leaked the CIA chief's name from Afghanistan? Where were the calls of impeachment for him? How about the open mic incident where President Obama told President Medvedev he would have "more flexibility" to negotiate with Putin after the election. (Left leaning site confirms). Where were the calls of collusion? Where were the calls from the media and left for Obstruction on Hillary for deleting emails? How about perjury which the left's villain turned hero Comey outlined in front of Congress? Was it Comey lying to Congress then or Hillary, because one did and nobody on the left cared. How about Bill committing perjury? Where was the outrage by the media and "gotcha" for an open and obvious lie? *crickets*
But no, there is no media collusion and it's all about the Constitution. If of course you are def dumb and blind (intentional or not). You should probably read, talk, or listen to Constitutional experts (Larry Elder, Dennis Prager, Mark Levin, Ben Shapiro, etc..). Hint: You won't find any on CNN or MSNBC, or any of the other MSM stations. MSM brings you their echo chamber.
Posting anonymously since this post is being bombarded with moderation from commie leftists.
I support net neutrality, but I don't think it's a speech issue, rather it's more an issue of economics. At least, we haven't seen any evidence of somebody's speech being squelched as a result of a lack of net neutrality.
Political correctness on the other hand does very often squelch somebody's speech, and in fact we see it happen at US universities often.
What the hell are you talking about? Name one thing that couldn't be said or written while net neutrality is active? Companies may not be allowed to implement a business plan that amounts to "shove a large rod up our customers' rear ends" under net neutrality, but they could still write it if they wanted with or without net neutrality.
Maybe you should try again with the 2nd or maybe the 18th amendment? I mean you're not even bothering to justify that claim never mind doing so in any sort of logical sense, so why not insist that net neutrality is inhibiting the sale of alcohol? It makes just as much sense.
Not while he is President - kind of a flaw in the system at the moment.
So all those weirdos who pretend to be colonials at political events rejoice - you've got yourself a King who is above the law - so that's a worse situation than the King that George Washington fought against. So long as enough Senators are on his side he's untouchable.
Anyone who thinks the most incriminating stuff is out there isn't paying attention. He didn't fire Comey because everything was already on the table. He didn't clamp down on white house visitor logs or continue to obscure his tax filings because he has nothing more to hide. There's another shoe that's going to drop.
Trump's combination of paranoia, criminal involvement, and complete inability to keep his mouth shut is fucking amazing. There's no way this administration doesn't go down in flames. Whether it takes the GOP with it for the foreseeable future is another story, we'll just have to wait and see.
It's not directly a free speech issue. But remember, it's not just making fast lanes for paying web sites/services - it's about severely throttling to stopping access to sites/services that don't align with the ISP. For example they could stop access to the FCC feedback section, slashdot, or stop access to Reddit. Again it's not just about making paid fast lanes, it's also about making access very very slow to impossible to things the ISP dosent like. You think ISP will stop the abuse of the system when they get an upper hand?
> Reducing arguments to simple black and white soundbites
This is precisely why the US so desperately needs a real third party. It reduces but sadly does not eliminate, the tendency to make every binary decision into a political position, and every political issue into a binary decision.
Net Neutrality is totally a free speech issue. If Internet content starts getting different treatment by owner what you can read and, most importantly, what you can say becomes a function of how much money you have.
I'd agree with everything you wrote, but would also add that the colonists saw what mixing government and religion does. The King ran the Church of England which was the official religion of England. If you didn't belong to the Church of England, you were effectively a second-class citizen. Meanwhile, the King could change the rules of the religion to suit his whims. If he decided that the whole "Lent" thing was a bother, he could do away with it. If he decided that he wanted to become vegetarian, the religion could outlaw all meat. (Obviously, these are exaggerations to make a point and didn't happen in history that I know of.)
The people who want to remove the "Church-State Separation" keep thinking that this will mean that the Church (by which, they mean THEIR church and not that horrible church down the road that does everything wrong) will influence what the government does. If you remove the separation, though, the influence will flow both ways. I wonder how many of these Church-State Separation opponents would want government officials forming a committee to decide how Baptism should be performed or which prayers should be included in the service.
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
Actually he got less votes than Hillary... but still got i
Irrelevant. The E.C. is a good thing IMO. She lost a majority of popular votes in a majority of states. There is no such thing as a national vote.
That indicates a problem with the system
No it doesn't'. The point of the E.C. is to ensure the Executive has the interest of a majority of states. We are a union of states not a mob. The same idea for the Senate (equal representation of the states to give smaller states power) is the idea for the E.C. There is nothing wrong with balancing the interest and needs of different states. The constitution was ratified with the distinction of rural and urban states and compromised to each of their needs in the form of a bicameral congress (with both equal and proportional representation) and the E.C.
Just because Clinton won huge majorities in a few large states does not mean she should dictate to the other states. We are a union of states not a mob.
Unless you have irrefutable evidence of foul play
Likewise.