Let's play Connect the Dots

Frederick Foresight · Nov 30, 2018

TreeFrogTrader said:
Yeh sure. There are probably about four people in the FBI- I mean the entire organization- that dont believe that Hillary got the look-the-other-way treatment. And by the way, all four or more have been removed for misconduct.
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Stay in touch. Don't let parallel universes make you a stranger.

Buy1Sell2 · Nov 30, 2018

Frederick Foresight said:
Mueller starts to piece together Russia puzzle in most significant move yet:

https://www.cnn.com/2018/11/30/politics/donald-trump-michael-cohen-robert-mueller/index.html

Silent for so long, Robert Mueller is beginning to show the public the building blocks of a case that could imperil Donald Trump's presidency.

In the process, the special counsel is beginning to expose the lies and obfuscations that people around Trump, and the President himself, erected to try to hide multiple, unexplained ties to Russians in, and before, 2016.

He is offering implicit explanations along the way for the President's oddly solicitous relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

And Mueller is now crossing a red line Trump once warned could prompt his firing -- by probing his business empire.

By securing a cooperation agreement with Trump's former lawyer, Michael Cohen, Mueller Thursday scored a motivated witness who has intimate knowledge of Trump's past business and personal life.
And by sponsoring a court document detailing Cohen's confession and by having his team spend 70 hours acquiring additional testimony, Mueller is signaling his new star witness may have more to tell and there may be more grave revelations to come.

In fact, Thursday may have been the most significant day yet in the Mueller probe that has cast a long shadow over Trump's presidency.

The cooperation agreement could offer documents, other evidence and testimony that could take Mueller deep into Trump's family and personal circle.

Cohen's admission that he had lied to Congress about a Trump effort to seal a deal to build a Trump Tower in Moscow, deep into the presidential campaign in 2016, raised a flurry of troubling questions that Mueller is yet to answer.

In effect, it told a story of a presidential candidate who was enmeshed in a commercial relationship with a nation that Mueller accused in previous indictments of waging "information warfare" against the United States to disrupt the election and help put Trump into the White House.

The dramatic development came in a week when it became clear that Mueller is aggressively pursuing another avenue in the investigation -- the possibility that some other Trump associates may have communicated with WikiLeaks, the website used to display Clinton campaign emails stolen by Russia and used by Trump to attack the character of the Democratic nominee.

"The two big picture questions have been -- was there any person who was acting as a link between the campaign and Russia or Wikileaks, and what incentive did Trump have to cooperate with the Russians and why is he so beholden to the Russians?" said Jens David Ohlin, vice dean of Cornell Law School.

"I think we now have potential answers to both those questions."

What Mueller has not yet proven

Mueller has yet to prove that Trump's business activities colored his approach to Russia. He has not directly contradicted Trump's fervent denials of collusion between his campaign and Moscow.
Furthermore, it is not known whether Mueller has documentary evidence to implicate the President in any wrongdoing, or is simply relying on Cohen's testimony. Many legal experts doubt he would wager on a witness like Cohen, who has admitted lying, without supporting evidence.

But there is no clear indication that Trump broke the law. And, despite Thursday's developments, there is no sign that a political situation in Washington that still makes impeachment an unlikely prospect has changed.

Trump, just after landing in Buenos Aires for the G20, showed that the investigation was still on his mind despite the upcoming conference.

"This is an illegal Hoax that should be ended immediately," the President tweeted late Thursday.
But Thursday's developments must also be seen in the context of Mueller's work so far.

In a series of indictments, he has built a picture of a sophisticated Russian hacking operation, an attempt to infect America's political dialogue with lies and distraction on social media and indicted and convicted a number of Trump associates and advisers over lying to his investigation.

He may now be trying to establish that Trump and those around him were well aware of Russia's activity despite their vehement claims there was no collusion.

Some observers believe that the rich detail in Mueller's legal filings is one way of painting a picture of Russian interference and the behavior of Trump world in case the President finds some way to block his eventual final report.

There are immediate and longer term political and legal consequences from Cohen throwing himself firmly in Mueller's camp.

His claims, made under oath and with the certainty of a long jail sentence if he is being untruthful, directly contradict Trump's assurances that he has had no deals or business relationships with Russia.
If that is the case, Trump has brazenly lied to the American people.

In another damaging blow, Cohen said he lied for political reasons.

"I made these statements to be consistent with Individual-1's political messaging and to be loyal to Individual-1," Cohen said in a document filed with the court, referring to the President.

His statement raises another question not answered in the document.

Did the President know that Cohen was lying to Congress, or did he coerce him to do so? If he did, such a move would surely rise to the level of the kind of abuse of power that would be part of any articles of impeachment.

The President slammed Cohen as "weak" on Thursday and said he was lying to Mueller to spare himself a long jail sentence after admitting to tax and financial fraud. He made the remarks to reporters before heading off to the G20 summit in Argentina, in an unsolicited statement that appeared to show his unease.

Trump's lawyer Rudy Giuliani also blasted Cohen.

And he tried to scotch a question that buzzed around Washington immediately after the Cohen news: Did Trump tell a different story about his hopes of building a Trump tower in Moscow in written answers to the special counsel than what Cohen has testified, a version of events Mueller clearly believes?

Giuliani said that there was "no contradiction" between Trump's responses to Mueller and Cohen. And he suggested that by waiting to move on Cohen until the President turned over his answers to his questions in recent days, he might have been setting a trap.

"Their sneakiness didn't work if that's what they were trying to do," Giuliani said.

Trump's defense may have backfired

Yet Trump's own self-defense raised another question that could weaken his position and cause trouble for his legal team.

He said that he was justified in seeking business opportunities in Russia while running for President because he might not have reached the White House and should not therefore be penalized by losing a chance to make money.

"There would be nothing wrong if I did do it. I was running my business while I was campaigning," Trump told reporters.

"There was a good chance that I wouldn't have won, in which case I would have gone back into the business, and why should I lose lots of opportunities?"

Trump's comment left the impression he was using his platform as a presidential candidate as a vehicle to enrich himself rather than to serve the American people.

More troublingly, the possibility that he could be seeking favorable treatment from Russia could offer a motivation for a change made to water down a hostile stance towards Russia in the platform at the Republican National Convention.

And the fact that he lied about not having business links with Russia after pursuing the deal offered Moscow leverage over him when he became President, opening the possibility of a serious national security threat if he was viewed as compromised.

Trump might have also undermined a possible avenue of defense, that Cohen was the primary actor in the search for a Trump Tower Moscow deal, when he said: "I decided not to do the project, so I didn't do it. "

Some Trump supporters warned against irresponsibly jumping to conclusions and questioned Cohen's credibility.

"The sky is falling all of a sudden because there is another plea deal. Who knows how this is going to play out in terms of the credibility of Michael Cohen," said Jim Schultz, a former Trump White House lawyer on "Cuomo Prime Time."

The White House was braced for some kind of Cohen bombshell ever since he appeared in Washington to meet Mueller's prosecutors earlier this month.

What must most worry them now, and other people close to Trump who could be implicated by the Russia organization, is what he has said in consultations that have now stretched over three full days.
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Weak.

Frederick Foresight · Nov 30, 2018

Buy1Sell2 said:
Weak.
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I think you mean "week." And while I admire your optimism, I'm pretty sure it'll take Mueller a bit longer than that.

Buy1Sell2 · Nov 30, 2018

Tom B said:
The Mueller investigation has come up empty on Russia -- You won’t believe what's coming next
By Mark Penn

The pattern and purpose of Mueller’s investigation and the endgame is becoming clear, and yes, it’s clearly get the president at all costs. The team Mueller hired really foretold the story — Andrew Weissmann as the stop-at-nothing pit bull and a group of Democratic-leaning lawyers, including some who have represented the Clintons, had the obstruction of justice charge ready to go on day one.

Trump’s first team of lawyers with their “don’t worry and cooperate” strategy set the president back, and let the whole thing spiral out of control.

The investigation, I believe, has come up truly empty on its central charge related to the president — collusion with the Russian government. They are now trying to find someone, anyone who had any contact with Julian Assange with the aim of calling that collusion-lite.

But mostly what Mueller’s team is doing is bludgeoning witnesses on unrelated charges to piece together a case against the president. They are shaping that case through the indictments -- and threats of indictments -- that are being used to get guilty pleas to make the president seem like an obstructor or co-conspirator. They are literally creating the crimes.

Let’s review what Mueller and his team are doing:

Michael Flynn — They discovered unreported lobbying by Trump's former National Security Adviser and leveraged that to get him to plead guilty to lying to the FBI. Why? So that they can claim Trump’s comment to James Comey about letting him go was obstruction of justice. Yet no other prosecutor would ever have brought this charge.

Michael Cohen — They got Trump’s former lawyer on all sorts of financial crimes related to his businesses and loans. But he pled guilty to campaign finance violations for payments that in the past would have been ruled on as personal expenses. Now they’ve also gotten him to cop to lying about when he killed the perfectly legal Russia tower project, only it appears that Trump’s lawyers ducked that perjury trap in the written questions.

George Papadopoulos— The former member of Trump’s foreign policy advisory panel was forced to plead to lying about the timing of his contacts. The goal was to legitimize the start of the investigation around him when all he did was pass on a surmise or a tip he received. Was the time and expense worth a 14-day sentence? Of course not. They had all the records they needed to figure out who he contacted when.

Jerome Corsi – The best-selling author was threatened with pleading to lying about his contacts with his friend and former Trump campaign adviser Roger Stone. There was nothing illegal about his comments or actions, and he is a journalist, though obviously, the general rules of journalism don’t apply to conservatives like him.

Roger Stone -- The former Trump campaign adviser sent out a tweet suggesting Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman John Podesta was next, and an email to Corsi asking him to get the rest of the emails. He was obviously trying to find out what was going on with these emails, and that’s not illegal in any way.

Paul Manafort – The former Trump presidential campaign chairman’s old tax and reporting cases going far back were dusted off to get him under the thumb of the prosecutor. It was revealed that he continued a joint defense agreement with the president and suddenly the prosecutor is saying he lied about his business dealings. It’s all about vengeance on him for failing to give them what they want and to make Trump look bad.

Sure, there are some anonymous Russians who will never be tried to add on top of this record. But it’s clear now Mueller is no longer looking for crimes in the presidential race of 2016. He is simply creating a narrative to delegitimize the president and to string together his words to Comey with the Flynn indictment, Cohen with Stormy Daniels payment, Roger Stone and Jerome Corsi with ties to Julian Assange, and now Cohen with underplaying Russia connections. And let’s not forget the Trump Tower meeting with the attorney who was also conveniently working with Fusion GPS.

There’s no doubt that the outline of Mueller’s report was written a long time ago and is being filled in. For those who thought Mueller would deliver a balanced and thoughtful report, these latest actions suggest that instead, we are seeing an all-out attack on the president and the presidency the likes of which we have never seen.

Get ready for the fight of the century coming soon and it will be about everything except collusion with the Russian government.

Mark Penn served as pollster and adviser to serial sexual harasser and accused rapist President Clinton from 1995 to 2000, including during Clinton’s impeachment. He was chief strategist on Hillary Clinton’s 2000 Senate campaign and Mrs. Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign.

https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/mar...-on-russia-you-wont-believe-whats-coming-next
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This is an absolutely brilliant article! Thank you for sharing.

Spike Trader · Nov 30, 2018

Frederick Foresight said:
I think you mean "week." And while I admire your optimism, I'm pretty sure it'll take Mueller a bit longer than that.
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This birther guy is a blast , reminds me of ChaaChiii..

Frederick Foresight · Nov 30, 2018

Spike Trader said:
This birther guy is a blast , reminds me of ChaaChiii..

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I hope they throw the book at Corsi. Maybe they can also throw his own book at him, corner first.

UsualName · Nov 30, 2018

TreeFrogTrader said:
Yeh sure. Next thing you know you will be telling us that the FBI pursued evidence of wrongdoing with Camp Hillary because "that's how it is done."

HQ Special and insurance policy for Hillary? Yes.

HQ Special and insurance policy for Trump? No.

See if you can spot the difference.
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Riiiiiight because Ivanka is now staring in the new season of Orange is the New Black.

Tom B · Nov 30, 2018

Frederick Foresight said:
What does that mean, "at all costs?" What costs? He's pursuing evidence of wrongdoing. That's how it's done.
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If you don't know what "at all costs" means, then there is nothing to discuss.

TreeFrogTrader · Nov 30, 2018

Frederick Foresight said:
I hope they throw the book at Corsi.
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No doubt that if that happens it would make for an exciting day in MooseDump.

Frederick Foresight · Nov 30, 2018

Tom B said:
If you don't know what "at all costs" means, then there is nothing to discuss.
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Oh, so you don't know either. Okay.