The Mueller Report (justice.gov) 679
Almost two years after Special Counsel Robert Mueller was appointed to investigate Russian interference in the 2016 election and the Trump campaign, his report -- a redacted version of it -- is finally out [PDF]. [Update: Here's a PDF file of the report that supports search functionality.]
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Re:This won't change anything (Score:5, Insightful)
The report says that Trump tried to get Mueller fired. That alone is extremely concerning and demonstrates that the system needs an overhaul, because there is no way that the person being investigated should be able to both appoint and fire the investigator.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/wor... [bbc.co.uk]
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Is this News for Nerds... (Score:2, Insightful)
"I'm fucked" (Score:5, Informative)
So far, my favorite part of the report is this, on page 290 of the version released at the press conference this morning (which is paginated differently from the one on the DOJ website for some reason).
Then the paragraph goes on to describe Trump demanding Sessions resign as soon as he found out a special counsel had been appointed. Clearly the reaction of an innocent man.
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But if you read the whole thing (Score:3, Informative)
Why is the DOJ's PDF a scan rather than free text? (Score:4)
Re:Why is the DOJ's PDF a scan rather than free te (Score:5, Insightful)
Probably to make sure the redaction worked. Too often redacting PDF files fails and the original text can be recovered. Printing and then scanning ensures that any metadata and text that was simply covered with black boxes can't be extracted.
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Cory Booker thinks same and just released new PDF (Score:3)
The Hill: Booker tweets out searchable version of Mueller report to counter White House [thehill.com]
Report.pdf (Score:2)
Huh. Like it could be any other report? Oh, it's in "/storage"...
Why is everyone missing the obvious here? (Score:3)
How both political parties are handling this publicly is just silly. Everyone keeps talking over the obvious that's confirmed in this report. Russia is attempting to actively mess with the elections in the United States. It's like the tribalism between the two parties can't stop for fifteen fucking seconds to address that people are being manipulated (or at least the attempt is being made to) by a foreign country. Geez, do all politicians from both sides think so little of the election process to devalue the conclusion that's clearly made and addressing it would severe the public's interest?
And before we start hearing the "well the US meddles in..." Exactly, we ought to outraged about that as well. Foreign countries ought not meddle with other country's democracy. What's good for the goose is good for the gander logic ought not apply here. How in Jeebuz name does the general public get so fucked in the head to be so finely focused on all the wrong things to point out?
AG Barr cannot be trusted (Score:5, Informative)
Specifically, he said his decision to not prosecute Trump over the obstruction of justice issues was not based on the issues around whether a sitting president could be indicted [cnn.com]:
Reading the summary of volume 2 of Mueller's actual report, the determination that a sitting president could not be indicted under DOJ rules was a fundamental and central concern that dictated how Mueller approached the investigation. Mueller's decision to not provide the normal binary decision to either prosecute or not prosecute Trump was due to acceptance of the regulations and policies prohibiting prosecution of the sitting president, and he went further in stating that it would be unfair for a prosecutor to accuse a sitting president of a crime because they would not have the normal recourse a criminal defendant would have of mounting a defense in court to try to clear their name. However, Mueller's way around that is that he believes a sitting president is still subject to a criminal investigation that can collect evidence, and it is permissible for the prosecutor to clear the president of obstruction of justice charges if the evidence doesn't support a prosecution. Subsequently, the special counsel explicitly refuses to clear Trump of obstruction of justice, which is as close to accusing Trump of obstructing justice that Mueller believes he is legally allowed to go. This is in contrast with the conspiracy charges with the Russian election interference where they more clearly decline to make any charges beyond what have already been made, and say they have insufficient evidence to go further.
Reading between the lines, this shows just how far out of line AG Barr has gone. Mueller believes that the DOJ and by extension him as special counsel lacks the authority to so much as accuse Trump of crimes while he is in office. Thus the clear constitutional authority to handle these matters while the president is sitting is congress, and congress can determine whether or not the behavior merits impeachment. NOT BARR. Even under the expansive rules that protect the president from federal prosecution, Barr has taken upon himself an undeserved authority to try to clear the president of wrongdoing when the special counsel explicitly went out of their way not to, and Barr has obfuscated and covered up that the decision for this should not be up to him no matter how you slice it.
Re:and..... (Score:4, Insightful)
no proof of collusion
Too heavily redacted to tell. Also not text-searchable, so not only haven't you read it yet, but you haven't even gone though looking for collusion yet.
can we PLEASE move on now???
The door's that way. You are invited to leave any time.
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"Too heavily redacted to tell."
Your logic is bad. Proof is a requirement, you cannot use the existence of redactions to create the narrative that implies the opposite or otherwise in the presence of a vacuum of information. Additionally, you are in no position to dictate how fast anyone can read and/or following that how much they were able to understand.
The redaction must be removed to make a decision either way, until then the best we can say is that this report is not proof of anything just a bunch of
Re:and..... (Score:4, Interesting)
"Too heavily redacted to tell."
Your logic is bad. Proof is a requirement,
Yeah, proof is a requirement. And the proof isn't being presented to the public, only a heavily redacted summary of the supposed proof from which entire pages have been effectively removed. I guess by your own argument, this report is worthless. Thanks for your agreement.
It is as ridiculous to claim that this report exonerates Trump as it is to claim that it damns him. It does neither, and not only because we're not allowed to see the whole thing. We're also not allowed to see the evidence.
Kinda like how to deceive people while telling nothing but the truth being a serious skill to have.
But that's not even what the report does. The report never claims to exonerate Trump, or that there was no evidence whatsoever of coordination between the Trump campaign and Russia. Even Barr's summary of the summary didn't claim either thing! Nor does the report. But lots of people are stepping forward to claim that it does. It doesn't. The report does nothing. It doesn't claim that there was collusion, and it doesn't claim there wasn't. It leaves the determinations up to Congress. And if Congress gets to see the full report, then maybe they can make a useful one. You can't. I can't. And I don't claim otherwise.
My claims about Trump are related solely to what we've seen him do. We've seen him do things in the news and on Twitter that are reasonably considered obstruction. We've seen him on the news calling for the Russians to release Hillary's emails. Just because he doesn't do it secretly doesn't mean it's not illegal, nor does doing it in public mean he's not doing it in secret. And no one knows what he's talking about with Putin, except his translators. He repeatedly has met with Putin in talks which are open secrets — we know they're meeting, but we don't know at all what they're talking about. You know those arguments about nothing to hide, that Republicans love to make? Yeah. Trump's got something to hide, and he's hiding it.
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no proof of collusion
Too heavily redacted to tell. Also not text-searchable, ...
You are not kidding. (Also not text-selectable.) There are even pages entirely blacked out.
I do find the black-out notations interesting though. For example, on page 65: (ellipses are mine)
In sum, the investigation established that the GRU hacked into email accounts of persons affiliated with the Clinton Campaign, as well as the computers of the DNS and DCCC. The GRU then exfiltrated data ... and disseminated that data ... through WikiLeaks. The investigation also established that the Trump Campaign displayed interest in the WikiLeaks releases, and that [ Harm to Ongoing Matter ]
It's going to be a long slog through the document.
Re: and..... (Score:2)
The investigation also established that the Trump Campaign displayed interest in the WikiLeaks releases
I bet the DNC âoedisplayed interestâ, as did Podesta and Hillary herself - so what?
âoeInterest in the WikiLeaks releasesâ is a crime? Hell, the entire nation was âoeinterestedâ in what WikiLeaks released, you may remember, every major (and minor) news organization in America breathlessly reported on leaked democrat emails - I would be shocked to learn the Trump campaign was NOT interested in the wikileaks releases!
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I would be shocked to learn the Trump campaign was NOT interested in the wikileaks releases!
Wikileaks isn't Trump's thing [youtube.com], remember?
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Not only were they interested in the leaks, but they had a two-bit player, Roger Stone, in their campaign go begging to Assange to try to find out what they had. So, the narrative goes like this:
-Trump and Putin were colluding to take down Hillary
-Putin hacked into Hillary's illegal server and got some major dirt on her
-Putin then passed the data over to Wikileaks
-Trump then had his stooge, Roger Stone, go find out what they had
Question: If Trump and Putin were colluding, what was the point in having Roge
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In fairness, Mueller's own summary of the report was that he found no evidence of collusion. Only obstruction was in the wind. Personally, I think people have their instruments miscalculated because they don't like this president. It shouldn't be obstruction for the President to interfere with his executive agencies anymore than a supervisor to disrupt his employees work. It is obstruction for those agencies to interfere with the Presidency. If congress wants to investigate the President they should be appo
Is it (Score:2)
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In our legal system that makes him not guilty because you are lowering the bar for evidence. There might be pieces of circumstantial evidence but there is not any conclusive evidence or else there would be enough evidence for a jury. There isn't anything productive in jumping to conclusions without solid evidence. The whole thing was sketchy in the first place. I know we like to conjure images of evil Russians after all our tension in the cold war but ultimately Russia is just a foreign nation and we aren't
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If that is the case, Republicans have no need or reason to review the Clinton email server case because, as Comey said:
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It shouldn't be obstruction for the President to interfere with his executive agencies anymore than a supervisor to disrupt his employees work. It is obstruction for those agencies to interfere with the Presidency.
Yeah, nope. That's total bullshit. By this logic you have people unaccountable to anyone in your administration.
If congress wants to investigate the President they should be appointing and empowering independents to do that.
...I thought that's the whole point of the special counsel institution?
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"Yeah, nope. That's total bullshit. By this logic you have people unaccountable to anyone in your administration."
Who? Everyone is accountable to the President in the executive in hierarchical fashion and the President is accountable to congress in the form of impeachment, veto override, and confirmation.
"...I thought that's the whole point of the special counsel institution?"
Not if they appoint special council from among the staff of an executive agency and then call firing him for investigating his boss f
Re:and..... (Score:5, Insightful)
In fairness, Mueller's own summary of the report was that he found no evidence of collusion.
That's not what it said. What it said was:
What that means, for those of you who seem to have trouble comprehending English, is that the report does not speak to the issue of whether Trump's campaign "colluded" with Russia. They also said that the report "did not establish" that the Trump campaign coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference. [washingtonpost.com] That is not the same as saying that they did not find evidence of coordination. It either means that there was evidence insufficient to reasonably seek conviction (as in the investigation of Hillary Clinton's email server — which, yes, she had created on the advice of Colin Powell, specifically for the purpose of destruction of evidence) or that they had such evidence but chose not to use it. Since Mueller has taken so long on this report, and since the documentation used to produce the report is largely classified, we will likely never get to find out which.
It shouldn't be obstruction for the President to interfere with his executive agencies anymore than a supervisor to disrupt his employees work.
They're NOT HIS. They are OURS. The President is just a man doing a job. He doesn't own slaves, and only his direct appointees are his direct employees. Interfering with the justice department is interference no matter who does it.
Look how much blood is being called for over what turned out to be bogus charges?
The report explicitly says it doesn't exonerate Trump. It says that they did not prove coordination. That doesn't mean there wasn't coordination, it means they did not prove it. It doesn't even mean they couldn't prove it. Did not and could not are different things. Mueller is a Republican who has a hard-on for the rule of law, and the Republican party is the laws and orders party. Not law and order, they're opposed to those things affecting them, but they sure do like laws and orders. They love laws which are open to selective enforcement, and for all their complaining about executive orders, they love those too.
Of course he utilized the authority at his disposal to try to shut down what he already knew to be a witch hunt that has been standing in the way of him doing his job.
You mean of course he obstructed justice? Yes, we've all seen him do it. He's done it on television, he's done it on Twitter. And since we've literally seen him do it, and the report doesn't find that he did it, we can conclude that the report is rotten. The hope was that the report would be non-partisan, because Mueller was seen as being principled. That hope has been shown to be false. We know the report is bad because we outright watched Trump obstruct justice, as a nation.
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"and since the documentation used to produce the report is largely classified, we will likely never get to find out which."
Welcome to government, the moment you allow government to have secrets you have lost all power to manage it, because how can you manage anything when you do not even know what it is doing how it is responding or NOT responding to information it has hold of.
This is why a Democracy is not actually possible in action. A real Democracy is actually just loosely controlled anarchy, where the
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Welcome to government, the moment you allow government to have secrets you have lost all power to manage it, because how can you manage anything when you do not even know what it is doing how it is responding or NOT responding to information it has hold of.
If we had a representative democracy worth the name, we could do so. But our government actually functions as an oligarchy thanks to financial influence. We tried to take the money out of politics, but a bi-partisan effort put it back.
This is why a Democracy is not actually possible in action.
Democracy is a spectrum, not a boolean. We effectively don't have it, but not because of any laws of the universe. It's because we have not put in sufficient effort to regulate our government. People want to sit back and let someone else handle everything. That's natural, but
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That's not what it said. What it said was:
âoeIn evaluation whether evidence about collective action of multiple individuals constituted a crime, we applied the framework of conspiracy law, not the concept of âcollusion,â(TM)â
What that means, for those of you who seem to have trouble comprehending English, is that the report does not speak to the issue of whether Trump's campaign "colluded" with Russia
That's because there is no crime - felony or misdemeanor - related to collusion. It is not illegal AT ALL. The ONLY thing that is illegal, misdemeanor or felony, is conspiracy. You cannot investigate "collusion" as there is no legal definition of it. Which is why the Democrats push it so hard - it can be ANYTHING they want it to be.
In fact, we could easily claim that the DNC and Hillary colluded with Russia extensively, and that you have colluded with Russia - since there is no definition of what legal
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Barr and Rosenstien agree,,,no Collusion, No Obstruction.
Are you a Truther now?
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Do you really believe in any way, shape or form the redacted version will cover up everything? Let's look at this logically.
2 years of trying to "find" someone on President Trump. Ok where is the proof? Or even leads? With how hostile and aggressive Trumps opposition has been, if there was any proof he would have been destroyed by now 10 times over. Everyone who is against President Trump wants to believe he did something wrong so they can get rid of him.
Personally, I'm tired of this. 2 YEARS!! Wasti
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He _was_ disbarred (in all but name) for those lies. They were perjury while answering a federal civil rights lawsuit.
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no proof of collusion
Too heavily redacted to tell. Also not text-searchable, so not only haven't you read it yet, but you haven't even gone though looking for collusion yet.
So, the executive summary by Muller AND the opinion of Barr and Rosenstein are not enough for you? Those parts are NOT redacted and they clearly say that in their opinion there was "no collusion" between Russians and ANY Americans (including Trump's campaign staff). Are you going to say these guys are just flat wrong?
We don't need the redacted parts to know what they think this report shows about collusion. The AUTHOR of this report tells us in his summary. Unless you believe he lying....
By the way...
Re:and..... (Score:5, Insightful)
If you still push the "Russia collusion" conspiracy at this point you are beyond help.
If you still don't believe that Trump was involved with a meeting between Trump Jr. and Russians in Trump Tower about whose agenda Trump Jr. lied, you are beyond dumb.
If you don't see the problem with Trump repeatedly meeting with Putin since becoming president and going so far as to destroy evidence to prevent We The People from finding out what they're talking about, you're corrupt.
Re:and..... (Score:5, Funny)
Can you connect the dots that prove collusion for me. I am a little slow. Mueller and Barr couldn't do it but I am sure you could. Especially if you link to honorable sources like CNN.
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BS.. I'm calling BS..
Mueller and Barr both *clearly* say that there was no Americans knowingly involved in Russia's attempts to disrupt the election. This would include Trump Jr's meeting in Trump Tower.
I know this is hard to accept, but unless you are going to claim Mueller is just part of some conspiracy to cover up something, you really cannot keep drawing from this well. Mueller concluded that the meeting was NOT evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russians. End of report.
So, are you buying in to the collusion to cover up theory now or are we going to drop this specific farce?
"A statement that the investigation did not establish particular facts does not mean there was no evidence of those facts."
Robert Mueller
Re:and..... (Score:5, Informative)
Mueller and Barr both *clearly* say that there was no Americans knowingly involved in Russia's attempts to disrupt the election.
No, and this is hilarious. The report gives two reasons why they didn't pursue Trump Jr., Kushner, and Manafort over the Trump Tower meeting despite all three knowing that the purpose of the meeting was Russian interference in the election, but their primary defense here is ignorance. Literally: the reason why the investigation chose not to pursue that prosecution is because the investigators didn't think that they could prove that those three knew that what they were doing was illegal. I'll quote:
Additionally, in light of the unresolved legal questions about whether giving "documents and information" of the sort offered here constitutes a campaign contribution, Trump Jr. could mount a factual defense that he 187 U.S. Department of Justice Attorney Work Prod1:1et // Ma, Cmnain Material Proteeted Under Fed. R. Criffi. P. 6(e) did not believe his response to the offer and the June 9 meeting itself violated the law. Given his less direct involvement in arranging the June 9 meeting, Kushner could likely mount a similar defense. And, while Manafort is experienced with political campaigns, the Office has not developed evidence showing that he had relevant knowledge of these legal issues
I'm still reading, no where near through it yet, but that one jumped out at me.
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Why the fuck would they redact that whole section? This is the whole point of the report, this i
Re:and..... (Score:5, Insightful)
Personally I find it rather telling that they literally put up road block after road block and screamed from every tower that there was "nothing to see here" at every opportunity. This president is to be very sure the most corrupt in the history of the office and our governments function has been forever damaged by his administration.
Re:Cool, can you post the quotes? (Score:5, Informative)
But that is very, very, very different than proving he didn't collude, which is what you're asserting.
Proving a negative is a logical fallacy. Also, I believe you are mischaracterizing the post you're responding to. The AC didn't state that the report "proved he didn't collude" he said "there is no evidence of collusion between the subjects of the investigation and Russia"
What I've gotten from my (admittedly brief) delve into this opaque document (it would be nice if they left the damn thing text based so it could be searched) can be summed up as the Trump campaign benefited from the activities of people who broke the law, and may have known they were benefiting from unlawful activities, but ultimately what they did was either not a crime, or we don't have sufficient proof to charge (and note that the required burden to charge is much lower than to convict).
Re: and..... (Score:2, Insightful)
If you still don't believe that Trump was involved with a meeting between Trump Jr. and Russians in Trump Tower about whose agenda Trump Jr. lied, you are beyond dumb.
And the sources for the Steele Dossier are... (Hint: Steele travelled to Russia to collect source material against Trump) I guess Russian dirt on your opponent is OK if you pay for it, but if offered freely itâ(TM)s a crime?
If you don't see the problem with Trump repeatedly meeting with Putin since becoming president and going so far as to destroy evidence to prevent We The People from finding out what they're talking about, you're corrupt.
Could you please point me to the transcripts of any former Presidentâ(TM)s private conversations with world leaders (except Nixon) so that âoeWe the people could âoe(find) out what they were talking aboutâ? Which part of âoeprivate conversationâ means
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Re: and..... (Score:5, Interesting)
...and you think Russian collusion is a conspiracy theory.
You just listed the 14 talking points to pretend that the Mueller investigation was the result of a politically motivated conspiracy. Only problem is it's pure speculation - and ignores the stated reason for opening the investigation, which was Popadopolis bragging about having Russian dirt on Hillary to someone who reported it to Australian intelligence, who reported it to US intelligence. Essentially, there was a pretty damning scary thread of evidence that, had it not been followed, would've been dereliction of duty. And there was plenty of evidence that the Russians hacked the DNC, so that needed to be investigated too...
And then on top of all that, you get the constant lies and attempts to obstruct the investigation. Now, I'm willing to believe that Trump's ego (that's the 'nice' word for whatever his pathology is) simply couldn't stand the idea of the public knowing he had Russian help in winning the election. And of course, he knew about that help during the campaign - which apparently doesn't constitute a crime, so there's that. But it sure constitutes the slimiest campaign ever by the slimiest candidate ever. In any case, the ego in question chose to obstruct justice in order to save face. Well, that's illegal - except that Barr thinks it isn't. Well, goody for him. But if any of this makes you feel better about the man who's serving as President, you're way more deluded than anybody who simply thinks he committed impeachable offenses.
But hey, Hillary!!!
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LOL! Well, there was that private conversation that Obama had. You know the one where he asked for some leeway until after the election when he would have some more flexibility?
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1) If nuclear war breaks out, we're all going to be doing what we can to survive. There will be no victor in WW3.
2) In most all American neighborhoods, there's a good amount of fire power. There's always that one guy, or in some cases, those folks, that are armed to the teeth. I've got several riffles and a few shotguns and plenty of ammo, in my home, to be a real nuisance.
If #1 happens, well damn that sucks, but we'll all have to do the best that we can.
If America is invaded, they'll have a hell of a fi
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Speaking evidence that's so bad it's dispositive....you do know that even the biggest Russiagaters admit that Jr. walked away from that meeting empty handed, yes? What you might not know is that the Russian lawyer meet with the founder of the Fusion GPS [cnsnews.com] law firm before and after the Tower meeting. Yes, the same Fusion GPS firm behind the Ste
You can accept all the dirt you want (Score:5, Insightful)
As for Hilary, do you honestly believe if there was actual evidence she colluded with Russia the GOP wouldn't be running hearings right now? CNS News is a right wing think tank funded hack site. You need to find more credible sources [wikipedia.org]. The Steele Dossier was written specifically to be sold as opposition research. It wouldn't surprise me if Hillary's campaign bought it the same as any major campaign would buy opposition research. The Fusion GPS guy did his purchases _after_ Trump was elected. No Uberbah, Hillary wasn't in bed with the Ruskies. You've fallen for a right wing story meant to distract you from Trump's wrong doings...
And you know the fuck what? This entire thing is a side show. Trump just Vetoed a bill that would have pulled us out of the war in Yemen. A blatantly illegal war that you'd think the 10th amendment loving libertarians would be furious over. He's going to shut down the ACA [cnbc.com], and before you start celebrating remember what that means [mediamatters.org]. His banking deregulation [vox.com] is letting big banks go back to the same practices that caused 2008. He's keeping interest rates low right now to keep the whole mess under wraps, but as soon as he's reelected that zit's gonna pop.
We have massive structural problems that are going to come down on our heads any day now and we're quibbling over bullshit like this.
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> I subscribe to that mindset
To convince you someone has to prove a negative. Okay.
You need to explain this, I have no idea what you're talking about.
As for O.J. Simpson: no. We don't know that a crime was committed. We know that two people died. We know the manner in which they died, and we can be confident that it was by someone else's hand, but we don't know who killed them or why. That is not enough to indicate a crime.
For Trump Jr.: we know that Jr. and company tried to receive election material from a foreign official. This is collusion (layman term, not a crime), but it is no
Re: and..... (Score:5, Informative)
Trump literally colluded with Russia on national television, when he literally asked Russia to get Hillary's emails. I don't have to look for anything.
Thatâ(TM)s great, except when Trump said that:
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Re:and..... (Score:5, Insightful)
I used to think he was joking when he said that. But the Mueller report apparently says that after saying that publicly, he ordered staff people in dead seriousness to see what they could do to get those deleted emails.
Of course, the Russians didn't have them, and there's no proof anybody ever asked the Russians themselves for them. Russia hacked the DNC and Podesta. There's no evidence that anyone ever hacked Clinton's private server. Hillary haters are quick to confuse the issue to imply that classified info was either leaked or stolen from that server, but again there's no evidence of that. And, the classified stuff on there was there by mistake - i.e., it wasn't classified at the time it was sent. Look, Comey was right that she was sloppy. But she didn't give classified docs to her reporter girlfriend - that was Our National Hero, General Petreus. Who was found to have committed a crime, because, y'know, he committed a crime...
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no proof of collusion
Too heavily redacted to tell.
Since you've read it you should enlighten us about what page/sections contain the proof of collusion.
Reading comprehension is not your strong suit, is it?
I don't have to read it to know how heavily redacted it is, only skim it.
LOL.. PLEASE tell me you see how absurd this claim of yours is. So, if you found even ONE redaction, no mater why it was made, that would be enough for you to claim a cover up... Do you even understand the reasons this report had to be redacted? Does national security and matters of law mean anything to you?
You see, you are setting up to force those who disagree with your conclusion to prove a negative... The report clearly says "no collusion" in those words and you refuse to accept the conclusion? Is
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Which is literally a stupid talking point. One that those parroting it haven't spent two seconds thinking about before repeating it.
Because Trump was joking about getting emails from Hillary's secretary of state server. What was leaked were the DNC emails. What was hacked was Podesta's account.
Like the rest of the Russiagate hysteria, what is offered as "e
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The irony (Score:3)
...both T and H got off the hook due to lack of intent.
There's plenty of evidence that Russia was (and is) up in our political business, though; and cultivated influence with the Trump family via business dealings and flattery. That's still concerning.
Re:The irony (Score:5, Informative)
Interestingly, the crime H was accused of with the email doesn't require intent, which is the interesting problem. I had a clearance "Back when", and it was made real clear when you signed the paperwork that NO intent was required.
More that one soldier, Sailor, Contractor etc has been convicted with no intent
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I would say there is already plenty of proof that Russia is meddling.
The problem is being able to connect Hillary or Trump to being willfully and directly involved. There are lots of ways to make people look bad. And yes, intent... or the legal term mens rea, is what needs to be proven.
A person must knowingly and willfully commit to a crime to be guilty of it. Kinda like if a lady asked a bunch of guys to help her steal someone else's tent making them think she own's it. The guys helping her would stil
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Nope and nope, respectively. There simply was no there there with Trump and Russia. As for Hillary, you can easily make a case for intent on her email server given that she blasted the Bush Administration [youtube.com] for using private email accounts a mere couple of years before setting up her own private email server. Moreso when she was given extra training as an Original Classification Authority as the SoS deals with some of the highest levels of classified in
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So, all the Russians that were indicted, and Flynn and Manafort convictions, and Page's current, that wasn't collusion?
Shut up and go away, traitor.
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no proof of collusion can we PLEASE move on now???
PSST!!! The worm has turned.. We are going to be talking about "obstruction of justice" now.... Try to keep up!
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I seem to recall people saying this about the White Water investigation. A lot of this stuff is like that, it's tit-for-tat politics. Long lengthy investigations are only allowed if they are against someone from the opposing party. What politicians seem to forget is that their party does not remain in power forever; eventually they lose power and all those laws, changes in procedures, and dirty tricks will end up being used against them. Ie, what goes around comes around. Hypocrisy is a requirement to b
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Has anyone checked that they properly did the redactions yet?
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Has anyone checked that they properly did the redactions yet?
Yes, it's a flattened image, no selectable text.
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on obstruction of justice (aka, he vocally disagreed with a sham investigation / attempted coup
Yeah, "attempted coup". Federal investigations (by a guy from the party at the helm no less) are now "attempted coups". Is this supposed to be yet another part of starving the beast?
Unfit - but has great re-election chances! (Score:2)
Yeah, stuff like violating the Emoluments Clause and corrupt dealings with Israel and the Saudi's. Too bad Democrats and their pals like Russia Madcow in the media didn't spend the last three years of their time and political capital on Trump's actual bullshit. It's like how Republicans spent years accusing Clinton of being a heroin kingpin or of Obama having a fake birth certificate, instead of focusing on their actual corruption.
So the prob
Re:Why is this on Slashdot? (Score:4, Insightful)
This is the obligatory post asking why Slashdot continually stokes trolls with the windy fire of non-tech political news that has no purpose here except to inflame.
Nobody wonders why you troll by asking this question. We know you're a troll.
Even if this story weren't of interest to everybody, it would still be relevant here because the story has technical aspects. Now hush, the adults are interested in the story, not in your whinging.
What exactly is technical? (Score:3, Insightful)
Even if this story weren't of interest to everybody, it would still be relevant here because the story has technical aspects.
Oh really? Please do elaborate on what from this report is technical in nature.
. Now hush, the adults are interested in the story
I'm not saying the story is not of interest, I'm saying its non-technical and non-nerd.
The problem with todays politics is that like Satan's Peanut Butter, it has gotten in EVERYTHING. Not just the chocolate to make a delicious treat, but also in the gas t
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Guccifer 2.0, wikileaks, etc
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Even if this story weren't of interest to everybody, it would still be relevant here because the story has technical aspects.
Oh really? Please do elaborate on what from this report is technical in nature.
A bunch of GRU hackers hacked the DNC, the RNC, several US voter databases, possibly voting machines, they used bots to influence people through social media networks. I for one am quite interested in how they did that including the politics, plotting and logistics of it.
. Now hush, the adults are interested in the story
I'm not saying the story is not of interest, I'm saying its non-technical and non-nerd.
Hacking is interesting to nerds, if it does not interest you then perhaps you are not a nerd?
The problem with todays politics is that like Satan's Peanut Butter, it has gotten in EVERYTHING. Not just the chocolate to make a delicious treat, but also in the gas tank and in the closest with spare linen.
Being old enough to have made the acquaintance of WWII relics some of whom fought for the Western Allies, some for the Soviets and some for the Axi
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Nobody is forcing you to read or comment on this story. There are others if you dislike this one.
Re: Why is this on Slashdot? (Score:2)
Because Congress got the 400 page redacted report on a CD-ROM! Can you imagine!
Thatâ(TM)s the technology angle, I guess.
Re: Why is this on Slashdot? (Score:2)
Democrats LOST seats while investigation was on-going, now that itâ(TM)s over you think Demswill take the Senate? Itâ(TM)s more likely the Dems will over-reach and hurt themselves I the Senate and Congress by 2020 election.
Canâ(TM)t wait to see Adam Schiffâ(TM)s âoeevidenceâ of collusion, obstruction that heâ(TM)s been talking about these last two years...
Re:So The Holy Mueller has spoken... (Score:4, Funny)
Which means Trump is to be arrested and Her Royal Thighness is to be made President immediately right?
I'm not actually sure if Mike Pence would object to being called, "Her Royal Thighness" ...
Of course he would (Score:2)
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He's the most guilty-acting innocent person since Saddam's WMD dance.
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For all the effort that Trump & Co. are putting into damage control, it's hard to believe that it will work.
It's not hard to believe at all. He's been incredibly successful at riling up his core base to change the narrative.
Why would Trump and his underlings expend so much energy on their PR operation, unless there was something big (or, possibly, many somethings) [in the Mueller report] that they really want to sweep under the rug?
There is probably something big, but... there's a chance there isn't. With any other President I wouldn't think this, however with Trump I feel like there's actually some possibility he views release of the report as capitulating to the Democrats and might vehemently fight it purely to avoid that perceived loss.
Re:And Trump is still completely exonerated (Score:5, Informative)
"I'm not even a Republican, and I can't help but find the amount of time wasted on this stupid thing to be ridiculous. Can you imagine if the same thing was done to Obama? The amount of disrespect that the left in general has shown this particular democratically elected president is insane."
You're right! It's totally crazy! It would be like if the Republicans spent years investigating Bill Clinton for one crime he had been accused of, and didn't find him guilty of that crime, but instead turned around and impeached him for the way in which he handled that investigation. That would be totally nuts! I'm sure the right in general would never show that amount of disrespect.
Re: And Trump is still completely exonerated (Score:2)
Clinton lied under oath, on video tape, and suborned perjury from friends/colleagues... Trump did not.
Why did Clinton lie? I donâ(TM)t know, but he thought if he pounded the table to punctuate each word of his lie people would believe him... they didnâ(TM)t.
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"I'm not even a Republican, and I can't help but find the amount of time wasted on this stupid thing to be ridiculous. Can you imagine if the same thing was done to Obama? The amount of disrespect that the left in general has shown this particular democratically elected president is insane."
You're right! It's totally crazy! It would be like if the Republicans spent years investigating Bill Clinton for one crime he had been accused of, and didn't find him guilty of that crime, but instead turned around and impeached him for the way in which he handled that investigation. That would be totally nuts! I'm sure the right in general would never show that amount of disrespect.
Ummmm.. Where I thought the Republicans where stupid to impeach Clinton... What you say here is not *exactly* true.
Clinton was impeached for lying under oath about if he did or didn't have a sexual relationship with Lewinsky. Stupid as it was, the Republicans impeached him for that and the Senate declined to convict him. Clinton did lie, but it was still stupid to impeach.
Re:And Trump is still completely exonerated (Score:5, Informative)
So Clinton was impeached for lying under oath while being questioned about a relationship with one person in a hearing that was supposedly about a sexual harassment claim by a different person that was tangentially related to the original subject of the investigation, which started about six years prior to the impeachment.
Neither of the Clintons were found guilty in relation to the original Whitewater scandal. Whether they were actually innocent or the Republicans just didn't care enough to pursue the issue fully once they had something else to impeach Clinton with i have no idea.
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Marrying Hillary indicates EXTRAORDINARILY bad judgement when it comes to sexual matters.
Re:And Trump is still completely exonerated (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not even a Republican, and I can't help but find the amount of time wasted on this stupid thing to be ridiculous. Can you imagine if the same thing was done to Obama?
Oh you mean like when government officials or public figures such as Trump, sheriff Joe Arpaio, state Rep. Matthew Hill, Judge Roy Moore, Sen Richard Shelby, Rep. Roy Blunt, Rep. Jean Schmidt, Rep/Gov Nathan Deal, VP candidate Sarah Palin, Sen David Vitter, former Speaker Newt Gingrich, Mike Huckabee, Rep Michele Bachmann, and Rep. Mike Coffman, among many others, who spread the whole birther movement, and the associated dozens of lawsuits across multiple states, 12 federal and 6 state civil suits, primary ballot challenges in 13 states, general election challenges in 5 states, and 10 court challenges that spawned from it? Oh, I guess it's really not hard to imagine after all.
And just to put it out there, this was Obama's response to the whole birther movement once his long form birth certificate was released: "I know there is going to be a segment of people for which no matter what we put out this issue will not be put to rest. But I am speaking to the vast majority of the American people, as well as to the press. We do not have time for this kind of silliness. We've got better stuff to do." Trump's response to the Mueller Report release : "For the haters and the radical left Democrats- Game Over." One sounds like a presidential statement, the other a schoolyard taunt.
Re:Hillary Lost Because of Hillary (Score:5, Interesting)
On the contrary, this has been one of the shortest and most fruitful independent investigations in history. It's yielded no less than 34 guilty pleas, convictions, and indictments. Compare that to Whitewater or Iran-Contra, which lasted MUCH longer, and had many fewer convictions.
Your choice to view this report as nothing more than a Clinton ploy only shows how severely you're willing to compromise your own intellectual integrity in order to protect your fragile pro-Trump worldview. In reality, it's damning evidence that our democratic process is being manipulated by foreign actors - it's a grave threat to our political and economic stability.
Just look at the goddamn facts, man! Russia is systematically eroding the integrity of our elections! Why the hell are you still talking about Clinton?
So? (Score:2, Insightful)
Take a federal prosecutor. Give him a huge staff, budget, and a general warrant to comb through decades of people's lives in search of crimes, free of that pesky need to have probable suspicion to investigate someone. He could then investigate a random group of people and come up with dozens of indictments - which are really just an accusation from said prosecutor.
What Trump should do now - and seal his re-election chances in the pro
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So, your assertion that if a federal prosecutor combed through the lives of most people, they would uncover countless financial and process crimes?
On that note, It's funny how thieves always think everyone else is thief, but what do I know
> ave Barr appoint a sp
The part you didn't quote (Score:3)
The fraud (soliciting donations with a promise of impartiality) and money laundering (Hillary Victory Fund funneled donations to the states and back to her campaign to avoid contribution limits) alone would see a lot more than 34 people getting indicted.
Yeah, parties can set whatever nominating rules they want. One of those rules set by the DNC was that it would operate with complete neutrality in presidential races. And then the organization went on to solicit massive amounts of donations while violating
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This has been the longest and least-successful damage control campaign ever for a losing candidate.
Nobody except Trumpkins and FoxNews drones gives a crap about Hillary anymore. Your comment, however, is a pretty god of the damage control efforts of the Trump administration. It's worth keeping in mind that the entire Russia thing and the Muller investigation is a self inflicted wound that traces it's origins back to the moment Trump decided to fire Jim Comey which was about the dumbest thing he could possibly have done.
The Rest of the Story (Score:2, Informative)
they campaign definitely met with Russian officials to discuss dirt on Hilary
Trump's campaign met ONCE with this person, who was offering to let them know about Hillary accepting Russian money. Since there was no proof, the campaign dropped it even when re-approached by that same agent.
So what we have here is a story about Hilary accepting Russian payments, Trump's campaign being told about it, and that becomes a story about *TRUMP* colluding with Russia?
OOOOOKKKKKKK....
There's enough smoke that something
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The Anonymous Coward should stay anonymous if he is going to spew such unadultered nonsense.
-Exit polls showed that Trump got a typical number of Republican votes. His numbers were just a little lower than Romney's. The idea that people switched from Democrat to vote Trump flies in the face of reality. Trump won because Democrats didn't turn out. Democrats didn't turn out because there was no enthusiasm for the stump of a candidate they called Hillary, and because the leftist media were all saying that
Re:Joe McCarthy is rolling over in his grave... (Score:5, Insightful)
....to give a big thumbs up to Democrats, the media, and never-Trump Republicans for all their hard work. This hysterical conspiracy theory has brought us closer to war with Russia since the Cuban Missile Crisis in the 60's. Most US/NATO troops in eastern Europe since the end of WWII, arming Ukrainian neo-Nazis, sending Navy ships to the Black Sea, pulling out of missile treaties that were some of Reagan's crowning achievements...
Uh, the annexation of the Crimea and the war war in the Donbass were both on 2014, and Russia has been meddling in places like Europe and the Middle East long before the whole collusion thing happened. Putin has been President or PM of Russia for almost 20 years, in politics since 1990, and was in the KGB for 15 years. He is playing the long game, and we would be about where we are no matter who was president.
Barr can't be trusted (Score:5, Insightful)
Besides how he got the job; Barr had previously misled and obstructed congress and his talent is in NOT getting held in contempt while acting as contempt as one can. He misled (safe lied) to congress before in summation and when the documents were forced out it was shown that he was carefully lying.
Now he has the same job; with a job application paper this time to get that same job. Since confirmation was a sham this stuff didn't get out there. Why anybody would assume he decided to improve from his past behavior after that job fishing he did is beyond reason.
Mueller is a prosecutor thinking only of criminal court and plays it very safe in that realm. The congress does not have to hold everything the level of criminal courts; they can fire / impeach for anything they want just like your boss. You know you'd be fired 100s of times already for the things that have gone one in public. Could Trump act much more guilty than he has? We all know there was Russian involvement and some level collusion and Trump obstructs as if he knows. If he knew nothing of it he'd not be creating a constitutional crisis over all of this. If some idiot staffer did something hang them out to dry and disavow; we all know Trump is disloyal, he only helps those who are actively helping him.
If you just pay attention and have an ounce of common sense; no legal games are needed this is not a court room where the rich and organized crime get away with murder (but not tax evasion, perjury, obstruction, etc.. which are smaller crimes worth the price of not actually getting caught.)
Not true for three reasons (Score:5, Interesting)
There are at least three reasons why something can "fail to be able to be prosecuted" but "fail to exonerate." The first is that there is insufficient evidence to support "beyond a reasonable doubt." I mean, look at the OJ verdict. Failed to prove he was guilty, but didn't exonerate him. A civil trail then found him liable for wrongful death and took away most of his stuff. The second is a political/legal nuance question. This seems to be where Muller ended up. Sure, he shot at the guy, but he didn't hit him and he had a heart attack. The facts can be universally agreed upon but whether that counts as murder, or manslaughter or attempted murder is a legal question that a prosecutor has to decided initially, but may ultimately get resolved by judges. Muller seems to say "here's what happened, but it's up to someone else to do the years of trials to get the supreme court to decide what to do. Third, someone may be guilty, but it's not worth prosecuting them. An example is jaywalking - if Trump jaywalked it wouldn't be worth prosecuting him. In this case, there are questions about whether the president can even be prosecuted if Muller found literal smoking guns.
But Muller clearly said that the evidence supprots the middle reason - there's enough there to prosecute or not depending on how you read the law. It's not black and white. And you know what, as much as partisans on both sides were hoping for complete exoneration/complete condemnation, it was always going to end up in the middle.