Jul 172019
 


Salvador Dali Mme. Reese 1931

 

The circus will be coming to town a week later, but not to worry, the show will go on longer and there will be many added attractions, including a full troop of 800-pound gorillas and an entire herd of 8000-pound elephants in the room. And once the balancing acts, the clowns and the ferocious beasts pack up and move on, America might find itself without a Democratic Party, or at least one it would recognize.

The circus is the testimony of Robert Mueller before the House Judiciary (extended to 3 hours) and Intelligence Committees (2 hours). The Democrats will aim to use Mueller’s words to finally achieve their long desired impeachment of Donald Trump. But is there anyone who’s not a US Democrat who thinks that is realistic? House Speaker Nancy Pelosi doesn’t seem to think so.

In order for the Dems to get their wish, Mueller would have to say a lot of things that are not in his report. It all appears to hang on the interpretation of his assessment that a sitting president cannot be prosecuted, which the Dems take to mean that there actually was a crime that could -or should- be prosecuted.

It’s not clear why the hearing was delayed from July 17 to 24, but don’t be surprised if it has to do with US District Judge Dabney Friedrich’s decision that Mueller must stop talking in public about a case that is in front of her, because his words might prejudice a jury. That is the case that Mueller brought in February 2018 against Internet Research Agency, Concord Management, their owner Yevgeniy Prigozhin (aka Putin’s cook), and 12 of his employees.

Mueller thought he could get away with presenting a case against them because they would not show up, but Prigozhin did hire a major law firm. Ironically, Friedrich has reportedly also decided that the lawyers cannot talk about the case to their own client(s). She hasn’t thrown out the case or anything, she’s simply told everyone including Mueller to stop discussing it in public.

 

So it’s quite possible that once the House Democrats figured this out (the decision stems from May 28 but was unsealed only on July 1), they had to change strategy. Mueller has been barred from saying a single word about it, including in the House.

In his report, Mueller tried to establish a link between the Russian firms and the Kremlin, but never proved any such link. They are accused of meddling in the 2016 election through emails and social media posts, an accusation that looks shakier by the day.

With that part of his report out of the way, what is left for him to talk about? He himself already gave up on the whole collusion narrative, which would appear to leave only obstruction. Well, there’s the Steele dossier, but with John Solomon blowing another gaping hole in it yesterday, that may not be the wisest topic to discuss on the House floor. By now, only the very faithful still believe in the dossier.

The Republicans surely don’t, and they also happen to be House members, and get to ask questions of Mueller on the 24th. The spectacle last night where Nancy Pelosi insisted on calling Trump a racist was nutty (you don’t do that in the House), but the Mueller hearings promise to be much much more nuts still.

 

In the background a second investigation is playing out: DOJ IG Michael Horowitz has been probing if DOJ or FBI officials abused their powers to spy on the Trump campaign. His report has been delayed, if reports are correct, because Christopher Steele at the very last minute agreed to testify. Those talks apparently were long and detailed. Wonder what he had to say.

And there’s a third probe too: AG Barr has tasked John Durham, the US attorney for Connecticut, to follow up on the Horowitz report and look at whether officials at the CIA, the NSA, and/or foreign intelligence agencies (think MI6), violated protocols or statutes.

That case is about whether the FISA court was misled to secure a warrant to put Trump campaign aide Carter Page under surveillance. It can also take a new look at the text messages between Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, messages that Trump tweeted about on Saturday: “This is one of the most horrible abuses of all. Those texts between gaga lovers would have told the whole story. Illegal deletion by Mueller. They gave us “the insurance policy.”

The deletion reportedly may have been accidental. But it does set the tone. The door is wide open for the Republicans to go after Mueller. And he knows it, always has. He never wanted the hearings, he said it was all in his report. But the Dems wanted more, they want Mueller to say Trump is guilty of obstruction (of a probe that perhaps should never have taken place).

Personally, I wonder whether a Republican congressman/woman will have the guts to ask Mueller why he refused to talk to Julian Assange, the most obvious person for him to talk to in the whole wide world. But since the GOP hates Assange as much as the Dems, I don’t have high hopes of that happening.

What they certainly will ask is when he knew his probe wasn’t going anywhere. And if that was perhaps as much as a whole year before he presented his report. The Dems will tear into Mueller looking for obstruction. Like: if Trump were not the president, would you sue him? Problem with that is none of this would have happened if Trump were just a citizen.

But I lean towards Ray McGovern’s take, who says that the circus may not come to town on July 24 either. Because there’s no there there (something Peter Strzok himself said about the Steele dossier), and because the Dems know this is their last shot at glory. And the GOP doesn’t mind another week or so of preparation.

Since the Democrats, the media, and Mueller himself all have strong incentive to “make the worst case appear the better” (one of the twin charges against Socrates), they need time to regroup and circle the wagons. The more so, since Mueller’s other twin charge — Russian hacking of the DNC — also has been shown, in a separate Court case, to be bereft of credible evidence. No, the incomplete, redacted, second-hand “forensics” draft that former FBI Director James Comey decided to settle for from the Democratic National Committee-hired CrowdStrike firm does not qualify as credible evidence.


Both new developments are likely to pose a strong challenge to Mueller. On the forensics, Mueller decided to settle for what his former colleague Comey decided to settle for from CrowdStrike, which was hired by the DNC despite it’s deeply flawed reputation and well known bias against Russia. In fact, the new facts — emerging, oddly, from the U.S. District Court, pose such a fundamental challenge to Mueller’s findings that no one should be surprised if Mueller’s testimony is postponed again.

And I was serious when I said before that once the Mueller hearings are done, “America might find itself without a Democratic Party, or at least one it would recognize”. Because if and when the Mueller circus fails to provide the impeachment dream (try elections!), where are they going to go, what else is there to do?

They’ve been clamoring for impeachment for collusion (big fail), for obstruction (Mueller wouldn’t have it) and now racism, but that is merely based on interpretation of tweets. Nancy Pelosi wrote about ‘women of color’, not Donald Trump.

America needs a strong Democratic party, and it certainly doesn’t have one right now. The Dems should be calling for an end to regime change wars, that is a popular theme among their voters. But they don’t, because guess where their money comes from. They are in a very deep identity crisis, and Trump just has to pick them off one by one. They should look at themselves, not at him. Do these people ever do strategy?

 

 

 

 

 

 

Home Forums Circus Mueller is Delayed

Viewing 11 posts - 1 through 11 (of 11 total)
  • Author
    Posts
  • #48614

    Salvador Dali Mme. Reese 1931   The circus will be coming to town a week later, but not to worry, the show will go on longer and there will be ma
    [See the full post at: Circus Mueller is Delayed]

    #48617
    zerosum
    Participant

    Can I call it a Political Heat Dome Phenomenon

    #48618
    Dr. D
    Participant

    Ah, but not the Onion, because who can tell anymore?

    https://nypost.com/2019/07/17/82-year-old-nj-congressman-asks-to-join-aocs-squad/

    #48619
    Dr. D
    Participant

    I thought this would be easy, that the Democratic Party would reform and convert like the Republican Party has, under some variation of the working man’s Bernie. But now what can they unify under, and with whom? Their methods are based on excluding people by name, group, and race, not unifying them into a power bloc, which is the essence of consensual government.

    This would have worked if they had won ’16. They would have just told everybody how it was going to be, how to think or they’d send out the army (of lawyers) and attack everything that resists as they have been for 30 (100?) years. But they didn’t win. They lost. And exactly on this platform and methods. Without owning centralized government, they’re just helpless cranks ordering people around like Napoleon in a psycho ward. You need to ask people what we all want and can agree on, but they’ll do literally anything but that. Pelosi, Schumer, and Biden are all racists now? Who do you think is going to vote your policies through, you fools? Did you not read how government works in Common Core? Did you ever visit a school board meeting?

    As incohesive as the GOP is, the DNC has now ceded the entire field — all but 8% of Twitter America® — to the enemy. You know, guys that just want to go to work, save some money, and be left alone in Muncie or Bakersfield. As much as I watch this closely, daily, I can’t put together any replacement party or platform for their party now, which is shocking. How can that be?? But they’ve crossed some kind of social Rubicon I didn’t know was there.

    God bless them and good luck. The upcoming financial reset may give them some new and unexpected solutions they can coalesce around that we can’t foresee right now, but what any of that will be is a mystery.

    Meanwhile, know-it-alls like me don’t like not knowing things. We all find our Waterloo.

    #48620
    zerosum
    Participant

    “…. As incohesive as the GOP is, the DNC has now ceded the entire field — all but 8% of Twitter America® — to the enemy….”

    Hummmm!
    Some, bloggers and commentators are saying that the real power behind the thrones are still in power.

    #48625
    lasttwo
    Participant

    I agree Dr. D the dems did not listen to the people in 68 and did not listen in 16 probably in a bunch of other elections they lost. They need to put together platform that makes sense. and get rid of the super delegates and backroom deals. Biden is not the future- same old shit. hold your nose and vote. There are good ideas from some of the candidates. I hate to say it but they need younger people that will think about the future instead of trying to bring back something that is not coming back. Never ending growth is not a sustainable model. it is time to rethink how things are done. So many things are terribly inefficient. shipping food from all over the world – we started trying to buy from local growers with in 100 mi radius for many items it is cheaper and much higher quality -streamlining healthcare to get rid of all the parasitic extras. Changing the structure of lobbyist. Stopping the money spent and lives lost and hatred that develops for wars in places we don’t belong, Even with the holes in the new green deal at least it is a starting point . We have solar panels and I have to say they are impressive in the power they generate the payback is way better than a bank and way safer than the market. The money we spent blowing up other people and their stuff would put solar panels on every home in the US. The dems if they have any hope need to put together a platform based on what people really want and what makes sense for future generation. do you think china is thinking beyond 2020 I am quite sure they are. In my humble opinion – . dump anyone older than me because frankly after 62 shit just does not work like it used to, including the brain see I am just rambling away here.

    #48626
    Maxwell Quest
    Participant

    Salvador Dali Mme. Reese 1931

    Two words: Feminine Elegance

    The Democrats really took their party down a blind alley when they sold out to the oligarchs decades ago, and now have to compete with Republicans for Wall Street and AIPAC approval, leaving the commoner at the mercy of globalization and corporate cartels.

    But by all means, don’t bend toward any populist sympathies, but keep fueling the wealth inequality bubble with more central bank intervention, selectively enforcing laws, destroying privacy and habeas corpus, increasing the cost of living as rampant immigration depresses wages, reporting false BLS data, reducing infrastructure and social spending, fighting wars of choice, militarizing police, lying, spying, and greed.

    In short, don’t make any attempt to assuage the growing public dissatisfaction, frustration, anger, and disillusionment in DC institutions. Delay, dissemble, and dawdle, until it’s too late; and all your pomp, status, wealth, and institutions are swept away in an uncontrollable deluge of public retribution.

    #48627

    Salvador Dali Mme. Reese 1931
    Two words: Feminine Elegance

    Dali was much criticized by his peers for taking on -for money- portraits such as these. He never cared much. But look at the face, the hair, the robe -look at the folds in that dress!-, the hand with the rose in it, and you can see what an accomplished painter Dali was. And then take that knowledge and use it to judge his later, often surrealistic works. Dali mastered the -basic?!- technique, like Rembrandt, like van Gogh, like Picasso, and strived to use it to create a language of his own. People may not like his particular language, but nobody can deny he was a master painter. That’s what Mme Reese’s portrait tells me.

    #48630
    Maxwell Quest
    Participant

    … That’s what Mme Reese’s portrait tells me.

    Well said, Ilargi.

    I have to admit, judging him by his more well know surrealistic works, I wasn’t aware that Dali was capable of such artistic perfection.

    It’s possible that the price of his fame required that he blaze a surrealistic trail of bizarre images to the delight of art patrons looking for the new and provocative, but it is my hope that his art arose spontaneously as he wrestled with the angels and demons of his own nature and world around him… that his art was a result of a therapeutic ‘working out’ of inner and outer forces, or even a social commentary, rather than an egoistic waste of artistic genius.

    #48640
    Dr. D
    Participant

    The powers behind the throne are having a war. It spills out from time to time but is in the back pages always. Does this mean they are ‘in charge’? In charge only in their province, and only when not opposed or taken out. How do I know? Because if they weren’t opposed and there weren’t any good guys, the Bill of Rights wouldn’t still be standing, however shot to tatters.

    “Never ending growth is not a sustainable model”

    Now there’s a plan that the Republicans aren’t offering and everyone can get behind. A fresh, green life good for animals and children, green optimism, that’s a sell. Everyone was behind the Green New Deal that could provide massive stimulus and economic conversion before we found it was the Soviet Socialist system merged with the new religion of Identitarianism. Now they’ve blown the intro and have to backpaddle, but it –would– still work. Talk about nothing but kids, safe neighborhoods, no wars, green streets, local jobs, and you’ve got a whole wing of a working platform.

    They’re so completely submerged in race wars, however, I don’t see how they can get there. Go to any progressive initiative, even picking up trash in a park, and you’ll hear nothing but “what race and gender are you?” “You should be ashamed, and you should be promoted, and you should put your feet up, and you should be king” based exclusively on your weirdo intersectionality of skin color v victimhood, you know the one you never had since you’re from Westchester and your black parents were doctors and millionaires that immigrated with a cash payment and sent you to Yale.

    I’m trying to see any path to get there because of this self-created obstacle. Since race is a non-scientific made-up concept (ie. not real) my only fear is they will have to burn themselves out like the witch trials of the 1600s before at last — at last! — somebody says, “Hey, maybe not everyone is a witch and made to be burned. There is a suspiciously high number of witches, like 90%, and they suspiciously overlap in a Venn Diagram with ‘people I don’t like, oppose me, or want something from.’ In fact, I think I might have burned my cousin at the stake back there.”

    Then of course, NOBODY was ever involved in the Red Scare that purged all people from Hollywood, Congress, ice cream shops and what-not, and obviously ME and everyone I know was always against the Red Scare and the witch hunt. Even though objectively that cannot be true. But that’s human nature for you. Look at “Science!™” Nobody believed in continental drift until suddenly one day everybody had always believed in continental drift. It was always totally obvious, and so obviously I was never fooled. The problem is when they take blind alleys like this, it takes lifetimes to get back on track. Is it possible they will vanish and the GOP will split in two instead? Doesn’t seem, but we have had one-party rule for long stretches before.

    “German physicist Max Planck said that science advances one funeral at a time. Or more precisely: “A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it.”

    #48643
    lasttwo
    Participant

    There is an old adage I heard in the factories I spent my life working in. ” A company that gets a union deserves a union” Maybe the country that gets Socialism deserves Socialism. I know that my wife and I started with nothing not even education. We worked hard often 2 jobs and a decade of night school we eventually retired at the age of 50 with enough money to do so. I do not think if we started today that we could repeat it. I think the next depression will either start a Race or civil war or maybe the WPA and the CCC will make a comeback. I think which alternative is chosen may depend on the next election.

Viewing 11 posts - 1 through 11 (of 11 total)
  • You must be logged in to reply to this topic.