Let's hope all that bullshit works to our advantage in the elections!

Consider the source,but if this is true the SWHTF. Maybe Mueller is trying his best to get the President to fire him.

Mueller Examining Trump’s Tweets in Wide-Ranging Obstruction Inquiry

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/0...ler-obstruction.html

July 26, 2018

WASHINGTON — For years, President Trump has used Twitter as his go-to public relations weapon, mounting a barrage of attacks on celebrities and then political rivals even after advisers warned he could be creating legal problems for himself.

Those concerns now turn out to be well founded. The special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, is scrutinizing tweets and negative statements from the president about Attorney General Jeff Sessions and the former F.B.I. director James B. Comey, according to three people briefed on the matter.

Several of the remarks came as Mr. Trump was also privately pressuring the men — both key witnesses in the inquiry — about the investigation, and Mr. Mueller is examining whether the actions add up to attempts to obstruct the investigation by both intimidating witnesses and pressuring senior law enforcement officials to tamp down the inquiry.

Mr. Mueller wants to question the president about the tweets. His interest in them is the latest addition to a range of presidential actions he is investigating as a possible obstruction case: private interactions with Mr. Comey, Mr. Sessions and other senior administration officials about the Russia inquiry; misleading White House statements; public attacks; and possible pardon offers to potential witnesses.

None of what Mr. Mueller has homed in on constitutes obstruction, Mr. Trump’s lawyers said. They argued that most of the presidential acts under scrutiny, including the firing of Mr. Comey, fall under Mr. Trump’s authority as the head of the executive branch and insisted that he should not even have to answer Mr. Mueller’s questions about obstruction.

But privately, some of the lawyers have expressed concern that Mr. Mueller will stitch together several episodes, encounters and pieces of evidence, like the tweets, to build a case that the president embarked on a broad effort to interfere with the investigation. Prosecutors who lack one slam-dunk piece of evidence in obstruction cases often search for a larger pattern of behavior, legal experts said.

The special counsel’s investigators have told Mr. Trump’s lawyers they are examining the tweets under a wide-ranging obstruction-of-justice law beefed up after the Enron accounting scandal, according to the three people. The investigators did not explicitly say they were examining possible witness tampering, but the nature of the questions they want to ask the president, and the fact that they are scrutinizing his actions under a section of the United States Code titled “Tampering With a Witness, Victim, or an Informant,” raised concerns for his lawyers about Mr. Trump’s exposure in the investigation.

A spokesman for Mr. Mueller’s office declined to comment.

Mr. Trump’s lead lawyer in the case, Rudolph W. Giuliani, dismissed Mr. Mueller’s interest in the tweets as part of a desperate quest to sink the president.

“If you’re going to obstruct justice, you do it quietly and secretly, not in public,” Mr. Giuliani said.

Mr. Giuliani was referring to more typical obstruction cases, where prosecutors focus on measures taken in private, like bribing witnesses, destroying evidence or lying under oath. While some of Mr. Trump’s private acts are under scrutiny, like asking Mr. Comey for loyalty, his public conduct is as well. That sets this investigation apart, even from those of other presidents; Richard M. Nixon and Bill Clinton were accused of privately trying to influence witness testimony.

But as in those cases, federal investigators are seeking to determine whether Mr. Trump was trying to use his power to punish anyone who did not go along with his attempts to curtail the investigation.

If Mr. Mueller opts to tailor a narrative that the president tried to obstruct the Russia investigation, he would have to clear several hurdles to make a strong case. He would need credible witnesses (Mr. Comey and Mr. Sessions have been the target of concerted attacks by Mr. Trump and allies, undercutting their standing) and evidence that Mr. Trump had criminal intent (the special counsel has told the president’s lawyers he needs to question him to determine this).

“There’s rarely evidence that someone sits down and says, ‘I intend to commit a crime,’ so any type of investigation hangs on using additional evidence to build a narrative arc that hangs together,” said Samuel W. Buell, a professor of law at Duke University and former senior federal prosecutor. “That’s why a prosecutor wants more pieces of evidence. You need to lock down the argument.”

It is not clear what Mr. Mueller will do if he concludes he has enough evidence to prove that Mr. Trump committed a crime. He has told the president’s lawyers that he will follow Nixon- and Clinton-era Justice Department memos that concluded that a sitting president cannot be indicted, Mr. Giuliani has said. If Mr. Mueller does not plan to make a case in court, a report of his findings could be sent to Congress, leaving it to lawmakers to decide whether to begin impeachment proceedings.

Investigators want to ask Mr. Trump about the tweets he wrote about Mr. Sessions and Mr. Comey and why he has continued to publicly criticize Mr. Comey and the former deputy F.B.I. director Andrew G. McCabe, another witness against the president. They also want to know about a January episode in the Oval Office in which Mr. Trump asked the White House counsel, Donald F. McGahn II, about reports that Mr. McGahn told investigators about the president’s efforts to fire Mr. Mueller himself last year.

Mr. Trump has navigated the investigation with a mix of public and private cajoling of witnesses.

Around the time he said publicly last summer that he would have chosen another attorney general had he known Mr. Sessions was going to recuse himself from the Russia investigation, Mr. Trump tried behind closed doors to persuade Mr. Sessions to reverse that decision. The special counsel’s investigators have also learned that Mr. Trump wanted Mr. Sessions to resign at varying points in May and July 2017 so he could replace him with a loyalist to oversee the Russia investigation.

After Mr. Trump tried last July to get Mr. Sessions to resign, the president began a three-day public attack on a variety of fronts — tweets, a Rose Garden news conference and a Wall Street Journal interview — criticizing Mr. Sessions, raising the specter that he would fire him.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions has taken a VERY weak position on Hillary Clinton crimes (where are E-mails & DNC server) & Intel leakers!
6:12 AM - Jul 25, 2017

67.5K
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A day later, Mr. Trump doubled down, criticizing both Mr. Sessions again and Mr. McCabe, who was the acting F.B.I. director at the time.

Why didn't A.G. Sessions replace Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe, a Comey friend who was in charge of Clinton investigation but got....
9:48 AM - Jul 26, 2017

..big dollars ($700,000) for his wife's political run from Hillary Clinton and her representatives. Drain the Swamp!
9:52 AM - Jul 26, 2017

Similarly, Mr. Trump’s relationship with Mr. Comey was strained from the start by the president’s encroachment on the typically independent Justice Department. In late March of 2017, the president asked Mr. Comey to put out word that he was not under investigation. Mr. Comey demurred, and when the president called about two weeks later to ask again, Mr. Comey responded that he had passed along the proposal to the Justice Department, he later testified.

That request having gone nowhere, Mr. Trump issued an indirect threat the next day about Mr. Comey’s job. “It’s not too late” to ask him to step down as F.B.I. director, he said in an interview with Maria Bartiromo on Fox Business Network. The special counsel wants to ask the president what he meant by that remark.

A few weeks later, in early May, an aide to Mr. Sessions sought derogatory information about the F.B.I. director. Mr. Sessions, his aide told a Capitol Hill staff member, wanted one negative article a day in the news media about Mr. Comey, a person familiar with the meeting has said.

Four days later, Mr. Trump fired Mr. Comey, citing at first his management of the investigation of Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server to handle classified information.

By the fall, Mr. Comey had become a chief witness against the president in the special counsel investigation, and Mr. Trump’s ire toward him was well established. His personal attacks evolved into attacks on Mr. Comey’s work, publicly calling on the Justice Department to examine his handling of the Clinton inquiry — and drawing the special counsel’s interest.

Wow, FBI confirms report that James Comey drafted letter exonerating Crooked Hillary Clinton long before investigation was complete. Many..
6:21 AM - Oct 18, 2017

..people not interviewed, including Clinton herself. Comey stated under oath that he didn't do this-obviously a fix? Where is Justice Dept?
6:27 AM - Oct 18, 2017

As it has turned out, James Comey lied and leaked and totally protected Hillary Clinton. He was the best thing that ever happened to her!
6:56 AM - Oct 18, 2017

Mr. Mueller’s deputies told Mr. Trump’s lawyers they also wanted to question the president about similar statements at the time by the White House press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders.

“The Department of Justice has to look into any allegations of whether or not something is illegal or not,” Ms. Sanders said at a press briefing last September. “That’s not up to me to decide. What I’ve said and what I’m talking about are facts. James Comey — leaking of information, questionable statements under oath, politicizing an investigation — those are real reasons for why he was fired.”

Mr. Trump’s lawyers have pushed back against the special counsel about the tweets, saying the president is a politician under 24-hour attack and is within his rights to defend himself using social media or any other means.

The president continues to wield his Twitter account to pummel witnesses and the investigation itself, ignoring any legal concerns or accusations of witness intimidation. This week, he moved to strip the security clearances of six former senior national security officials, including Mr. Comey, Mr. McCabe and some of his most outspoken critics. And he tweeted false claims about the Russia investigation.

So we now find out that it was indeed the unverified and Fake Dirty Dossier, that was paid for by Crooked Hillary Clinton and the DNC, that was knowingly & falsely submitted to FISA and which was responsible for starting the totally conflicted and discredited Mueller Witch Hunt!
6:30 AM - Jul 23, 2018

Mueller will do whatever he likes, whenever he likes, and that will never change. Until he can be fired along with the leftist Rosenstein and the coward Sessions it is just best to ignore him.

If Mueller does charge President Trump with obstruction of justice, and/or anything else, what body would adjudicate the charge(s)? And what sort of penalties might result?

Back to our scheduled Winning:

quote:

Second-quarter GDP jumps 4.1% for best pace in nearly four years

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/07/27/us-gdp-q2-2018.html

quote:

Originally posted by braillediver:
Back to our scheduled Winning:

quote:

Second-quarter GDP jumps 4.1% for best pace in nearly four years

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/07/27/us-gdp-q2-2018.html

Which the mainstream media will ignore, choosing instead to report on the latest charge from Cohen.

quote:

Originally posted by Pipe Smoker:
If Mueller does charge President Trump with obstruction of justice, and/or anything else, what body would adjudicate the charge(s)? And what sort of penalties might result?

Whether a President can be indicted and charged with a crime has never been adjudicated. There are several memos discussing the point in the Justice Department, prepared in the Nixon/Clinton days. One is that a sitting President cannot be charged or that prosecution must be deferred until he leaves office. Usual penalties, procedures, since no one is “above the law.”

Another view is that the only recourse is impeachment.

So, we're speculating about speculation. Come back down to Earth, please. Let's stop with the disastrous hypotheticals.

I just got back from a mini vacation with the Wife my oldest Daughter and my #1 Grandson. We went thru Georgia, South and N. Carolina and spent a week in and Around Hendersonville. The point of this and how it ties to President Trump is. "Every Where" I went I saw Help Wanted signs, everywhere. This Country is jumping and hopping to grow and we are Winning!!! Laaarrrrgggeee

quote:

Originally posted by parabellum:
So, we're speculating about speculation. Come back down to Earth, please. Let's stop with the disastrous hypotheticals.

About as useful as panicking about polls. Thank you braillediver for the positive news.

quote:

Originally posted by SIG4EVA:

quote:

Originally posted by parabellum:
So, we're speculating about speculation. Come back down to Earth, please. Let's stop with the disastrous hypotheticals.

About as useful as panicking about polls. Thank you braillediver for the positive news.

It wasn't too long ago during the previous 'administration' when the economic numbers would come out with sleepy fanfare only to be quietly adjusted down to reality some days later. Do we see that now? I haven't.

Who Leaked the Trump Tape?

by Alan M. Dershowitz
July 26, 2018

Someone leaked the lawyer/client confidential tape containing a conversation between President Donald J. Trump and his lawyer Michael Cohen. A former judge, assigned by the presiding judge to evaluate the seized tapes, reportedly concluded that this conversation was privileged. Yet someone leaked their contents. The President Trump's current lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, then waived the privilege as to that tape. He said he never would have waived it had its existence and content not been improperly leaked.

So, the question remains: Who leaked this privileged material? If it was anyone in the Trump camp, there would be no violation of confidentiality, as the privilege belongs to the client, namely Trump, who can waive it. But no one else, most especially his lawyer, may properly waive the privilege. And Giuliani has categorically denied that it was leaked by Trump or anyone on his behalf. Indeed, he has expressed outrage at the leak.

Whom does that leave? Cohen is an obvious suspect, although I am confident that his excellent and experienced lawyer, Lanny Davis, would not have done so. Perhaps Cohen himself, who ran into Michael Avenatti at a restaurant, told him about the tape. We simply do not know.

It is unlikely that any judicial or prosecutorial authority is responsible for the leak, because they would have more to lose than to gain if they were caught.

The reason this is important to all Americans, beyond the immediate parties to this taped conversation, is that it may well discourage clients, patients, penitents and others from confiding in their lawyers, doctors, priests and the professionals who promise them confidentiality. Cohen promised confidentiality and yet the world heard what his client confided in him. We know he recorded the confidential conversation without the knowledge of his client. That is bad enough. Then it was deliberately leaked by someone who must have believed he or she would reap some benefit or advantage from having the public hear it.

We must find out who is the source of this damaging leak — damaging to all Americans who place their faith in the promise of confidentiality from the professionals in whom they confide.

It is an ethical violation, subject to serious sanctions including disbarment, for a lawyer to disclose, or cause to be disclosed, privileged conversations. And for good reason. The obligation of a lawyer not to disclose confidential information is codified in Rule 1.6 of the New York Bar. This broad rule prohibits, subject to exceptions not present in this case, any knowing disclosure of confidential information. That plainly covers the kind of conversation we have all now heard in the leaked tape: namely, the discussion between Trump and his attorney as to how to deal with a potential messy problem. We may not like the subject matter under discussion, but it is fully covered by the privilege, as the former Judge rightly found. That is why this leak is so difficult to fathom. The risks to the leaker are greater than any short-term benefit. But the fact remains that the leak occurred, and now it is imperative that the leaker be exposed and held to account.

This can be accomplished in several ways. Judge Kimba Wood, who is presiding over the matter, could hold a hearing in which the potential suspects are is placed under oath and asked the simple question whether they leaked the contents of the tape and/or whether they know who the leaker was. Obviously, people who are willing improperly to leak confidential material may also be willing to lie about it under oath, but the consequences of lying under oath are greater than leaking, as leaking is not a crime but perjury is.

Notwithstanding the importance of this issue, there seems to be little interest among the participants in determining who leaked the tape. There has been no call for an investigation. Perhaps this is because both sides think they benefited from the leak. I leave that to the public, and eventually the courts, to determine. What is clear is who was hurt by the leak: all Americans who rely on confidentiality – which means all of us – were hurt when the world was allowed to listen to a lawyer/client privileged conversation, that no one except the participants should ever have heard.

Alan M. Dershowitz is the Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law Emeritus at Harvard Law School and author of "The Case Against Impeaching Trump"
https://www.gatestoneinstitute...eaked-the-trump-tape

Remember when we were all lectured how Obama’s SHIT GDP numbers were the “new normal” going forward forevermore?

Trump leaked the tape. Watch the Netflix doc on him. It talks about how he leaked stuff to the press all the time during the Atlantic City Debacle and also when he was breaking up with his wife.

He does this to misdirect and control the narrative. Remember his "leaked" tax returns? Ya, also him and ended up in a big nothing burger just like this news.

The nitwits on NPR this morning were saying the growth in GDP was due to China buying up all the soybeans in anticipation of the tariffs and we would see that on the backend with a slump next quarter.

They said some other stupid stuff, but basically, the 4.1% growth is the harbinger of doom and a coming economic collapse worse than the one that kicked off the Great Depression.

quote:

Originally posted by Deqlyn:
Trump leaked the tape. Watch the Netflix doc on him. It talks about how he leaked stuff to the press all the time during the Atlantic City Debacle and also when he was breaking up with his wife.

He does this to misdirect and control the narrative. Remember his "leaked" tax returns? Ya, also him and ended up in a big nothing burger just like this news.

I know you’re our Resident Trump Hater, but that’s just nonsense.

quote:

Originally posted by Deqlyn:
Trump leaked the tape.

You know nothing of the sort.

So. Winston Churchill held information and leaked it too.... it's called politics.

Funny picture of Mueller & Don Jr within shouting distance: