Mueller Report: So Where Are We Now?

lithy

Most Prominent Member of Chat
20 Year Member
Genuinely curious, non-troll thread about where the Dumpster denizens are now.

So a report has been submitted, AG has given a summary to Congress. Apparently no new charges coming. Are you skeptical of Barr's summary? Do you want to read the full report? Should Barr and Mueller be subpoenaed? Is a very public, very long fight about getting the report released to the public good for the Democrats? If it still doesn't really show anything much less 'a smoking gun' how bad to Democrats look?

I can't view this as anything more than a boost for Trump, but maybe I'm still missing something.
 

Xavier

Orochi's Acolyte
20 Year Member
I dunno we live in a Democratic Republic.
We need a system of checks and balances.

Several things about the Trump campaign and his presidency are alarming and needed to be investigated and still need more investigation.

I view this as healthy and am reassured that although slow the system is still working as it should.

You don't know just because there are no new indictments doesn't mean that say a sealed one several months ago wasn't deposited in some safe somewhere over those hush money payments.

This tells me there was found to be no collusion with the Trump campaign and Russia to hack the election results in his favor.

Any questions of obstruction and other topics have not been decided about their legalities.

Barr who was hired at the pleasure of the president just put out what they agreed on.
 

evil wasabi

The Jongmaster
20 Year Member
When a prosecutor says that they don't recommend prosecution, it doesn't mean that shit doesn't stink. It just means the prosecutor doesn't like his or her chances to win a trial. And judging by the MD emoluments trial against Trump, that has all the judges on the panel appointed by the GOP, and one of them in particular a Trump appointee, why bother.

Yes, I want to read the report. I think that every democrat and independent does. I think a lot of the republicans want to read it. Even the supporters of Trump, in the hopes of vindication.

At the very least, it will increase the quality of the discussion.
 

SML

NEANDERTHAL FUCKER,
20 Year Member
Yeah, I think the report should be public.

But I also never plastered Mueller memes all over the place.

As things stand, I think that most people still feel the way they did about the president as they did before Barr's letter. Feelings of victory or defeat are kind of vague, since we're all looking at a four page memo on a two year investigation.

I think that Democrats need to realize that POTUS won't be going anywhere without a vote, and maybe this will push some of them toward that realization.
 

fake

King of Spammers
15 Year Member
Barr saying Mueller didn't find anything is like my mom saying I'm cool. He was vocally against the investigation in the first place, released unsolicited literature on how a president can't be indicted, etc. Oh, and he was hand-picked by Trump.

Like Wasabi said, not recommending further action on collusion doesn't mean the Trump team didn't collude. I mean, it's pretty clear they did colloquially collude. Proving that they legally did another matter.

Barr's relative silence on obstruction is deafening. Mitch striking down every attempt to release the full report says quite a bit. The fact that Barr wrote a 4-page summary what is likely to be a ~500-page document does too.

Let's be real. I hoped Mueller would find some damning enough to take Trump, his family, his sycophants, and Sean Hannity down. Apparently he didn't. But that doesn't mean he found nothing and that Trump isn't any dirtier than any other person who has run for president.
 

fake

King of Spammers
15 Year Member
Double Post Time:

What I posted above is my logical take on it. But I'm sure there are a LOT of toe-in-the-water democrats and middle of the road people who are not smart and will think that A) Trump did nothing wrong and B) the democrats are just slinging mud. So Mueller could have to moved the needle toward republicans quite a bit for 2020.
 

LoneSage

A Broken Man
20 Year Member
Let's be real. I hoped Mueller would find some damning enough to take Trump, his family, his sycophants, and Sean Hannity down.

I did some introspection this morning. I'd like to think I still have a strong sense of justice, so I thought what it says about me that I wanted Trump to get fucked so hard even if he's innocent of crime. Then I remembered all the heinous shit and division he's helped foster for America.
 

fake

King of Spammers
15 Year Member
I did some introspection this morning. I'd like to think I still have a strong sense of justice, so I thought what it says about me that I wanted Trump to get fucked so hard even if he's innocent of crime. Then I remembered all the heinous shit and division he's helped foster for America.

Yeah, I mean, I wouldn't want Mueller to embellish or anything like that. I just hoped he found damning evidence - enough to convict. I want Trump to go down. But it has to be done the right way or it will get real ugly in the long run. If Trump were seen as a martyr, it would be big trouble.
 

SML

NEANDERTHAL FUCKER,
20 Year Member
No bullshit:

The redacted report shows both that there is a case for obstruction charges and that Mueller intended Congress to settle the question. This is clear

Which seems to indicate, and this is just my opinion of course, that Barr's memo and press conference were all about compelling impeachment proceedings while poisoning the well against those proceedings.
 

fake

King of Spammers
15 Year Member
Which seems to indicate, and this is just my opinion of course, that Barr's memo and press conference were all about compelling impeachment proceedings while poisoning the well against those proceedings.

How so?

Here's my quick take from the highlights I've read:

It looks really bad for Trump. He and the campaign clearly colluded with Russia in the colloquial sense. In the legal sense, it would be hard to prove, because it requires more than one side just *accepting* help, apparently?

For obstruction, he clearly obstructed justice, but Mueller knew he'd start a civil fucking war if he gave that conclusion himself, so he gave Congress TEN examples of obstruction that they can take and run with.

Trump also TRIED to do a lot of bad stuff but his staffers refused to comply. If they had complied, he would be completely and utterly fucked.

The pee tape is real. Not only did a Russian agent imply to Michael Cohen that "the flow of the tapes has stopped" but also used the term "flow".:keke:
 

SML

NEANDERTHAL FUCKER,
20 Year Member
How so?

Here's my quick take from the highlights I've read:

It looks really bad for Trump. He and the campaign clearly colluded with Russia in the colloquial sense. In the legal sense, it would be hard to prove, because it requires more than one side just *accepting* help, apparently?

For obstruction, he clearly obstructed justice, but Mueller knew he'd start a civil fucking war if he gave that conclusion himself, so he gave Congress TEN examples of obstruction that they can take and run with.

Trump also TRIED to do a lot of bad stuff but his staffers refused to comply. If they had complied, he would be completely and utterly fucked.

The pee tape is real. Not only did a Russian agent imply to Michael Cohen that "the flow of the tapes has stopped" but also used the term "flow".:keke:

Barr's memo and press conference both suggested that the decision of whether or not to charge with obstruction was meant for DoJ to decide, and that there wasn't enough evidence to charge.

So it's up to Congress to do something, but the public has had a month to absorb "No collusion, no obstruction."

That's all I mean when I say Barr is poisoning the well against the impeachment proceedings that seem to be in order.
 

fake

King of Spammers
15 Year Member
Barr's memo and press conference both suggested that the decision of whether or not to charge with obstruction was meant for DoJ to decide, and that there wasn't enough evidence to charge.

So it's up to Congress to do something, but the public has had a month to absorb "No collusion, no obstruction."

That's all I mean when I say Barr is poisoning the well against the impeachment proceedings that seem to be in order.

Ah, gotcha.

Yeah, I was raising my eyebrow when he was acting like it was his place to decide on charging Trump. It seems to me like Mueller went pretty easy on Trump and his family, but left enough strings for Congress to pull.

My question at the moment is...Several people have said that impeachment would be counterproductive for the left. Was this just BS? If it wasn't, is it still the case, now that we have details? What are the better options?
 

evil wasabi

The Jongmaster
20 Year Member
I don't know if counter productive, but the memo clearly expressed the frustration at how Trump's team purposefully and deliberately destroyed evidence to obstruct the investigation, and how this affected the investigations ability to conclude issues, so I would bring the hammer down on them before they can destroy anything else that is material to the investigation.
 

Xavier

Orochi's Acolyte
20 Year Member
Looks like the whole wikileaks section is redacted - ongoing investigation
 

fake

King of Spammers
15 Year Member
LOL at Fox News going bullet point by bullet point on things media outlets got wrong (e.g., Trump telling Cohen to lie about something or other). Just going to gloss over the other column of all the stuff the news ran with that Mueller proved to be true. FFS.

Edit: Pelosi called a conference call on Monday citing the report's verbiage about Congress being able to prohibit the abuse of his authority.
 
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evil wasabi

The Jongmaster
20 Year Member
Only a few people are reading this and most reddit threads are people demanding tl;dr or spewing some nonsense from BreitbartChan Fox. Many of the posts aren’t really from Americans seeking to discuss this, but from sock shops running on a script.

Tripredacus, convince me I’m wrong
 

Xavier

Orochi's Acolyte
20 Year Member
Thats my impression as well, most people are going to keep feeling the way they feel.

It's like words and stuff. If I wanted to read and stuff I'd go to school. Maybe if Mueller testifies.

I ocr'd it and turned it into text.
Skimmed it and read around 40 pages (heavy dissection) so far.

Pretty tight definition of criminal conspiracy:

In evaluating whether evidence about collective action of multiple individuals constituted a crime, we applied the framework of conspiracy law, not the concept of "collusion." In so doing, the Office recognized that the word "collud[e]" was used in communications with the Acting Attorney General confirming certain aspects of the investigation 's scope and that the term has frequently been invoked in public reporting about the investigation. But collusion is not a specific offense or theory of liability found in the United States Code, nor is it a term of art in federal criminal law. For those reasons, the Office's focus in analyzing questions of joint criminal liability was on conspiracy as defined in federal law. In connection with that analysis, we addressed the factual question whether members of the Trump Campaign "coordinat[ed]"-a term that appears in the appointment order-with Russian election interference activities. Like collusion, "coordination" does not have a settled definition in federal criminal law. We understood coordination to require an agreement-tacit or express-between the Trump Campaign and the Russian government on election interference. That requires more than the two parties taking actions that were informed by or responsive to the other's actions or interests . We applied the term coordination in that sense when stating in the report that the investigation did not establish that the Trump Campaign coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.
 
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Tripredacus

Three 6 Mafia
10 Year Member
Only a few people are reading this and most reddit threads are people demanding tl;dr or spewing some nonsense from BreitbartChan Fox. Many of the posts aren’t really from Americans seeking to discuss this, but from sock shops running on a script.

Those are called NPCs.
 
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smokehouse

I was Born This Ugly.,
15 Year Member
I have a differing opinion...perhaps many politicians are realizing that this deep digging may be a bad idea for everyone (everyone being them). Drop an atomic bomb and the soil becomes so irradiated that no one can live on it.

Here's the flat fact, there isn't an innocent in nearly all of national politics...especially when you consider the upper crust. I couldn't care less about BS US political "parties", I'm talking about upper level politicians that if you dig deep enough, are all guilty of committing crimes to get where they are.

So let's say that they dig, and they're successful and find that silver bullet that get's Trump ripped from the presidency, sure. Now what? Does the digging stop? Will this tactic be used from this point forward to turn every presidency from this point forward into a 4-year political/criminal shit show?

The Republican's pulled this same shit with Clinton in the 90s...and were successful at finally finding something so absurd, but technically legal. In the end, it tarnished everyone and accomplished nothing.
 

evil wasabi

The Jongmaster
20 Year Member
I have a differing opinion...perhaps many politicians are realizing that this deep digging may be a bad idea for everyone (everyone being them). Drop an atomic bomb and the soil becomes so irradiated that no one can live on it.

Here's the flat fact, there isn't an innocent in nearly all of national politics...especially when you consider the upper crust. I couldn't care less about BS US political "parties", I'm talking about upper level politicians that if you dig deep enough, are all guilty of committing crimes to get where they are.

So let's say that they dig, and they're successful and find that silver bullet that get's Trump ripped from the presidency, sure. Now what? Does the digging stop? Will this tactic be used from this point forward to turn every presidency from this point forward into a 4-year political/criminal shit show?

The Republican's pulled this same shit with Clinton in the 90s...and were successful at finally finding something so absurd, but technically legal. In the end, it tarnished everyone and accomplished nothing.

The rationale for no impeachment by the Democrat leadership (Pelosi and Hoyer) is that it will be counterproductive to the Dems, taking up all their resources over the next 2 years when they should be working to take over the white house and keep their seats in congress.

I don't agree that no politician is innocent. You're saying that every politician is a racist xenophobe, incompetent businessman, pussy grabber, golden shower recipient

Maybe other options have their warts. Biden's warts that some paid banshee, who even Arnold Schwarzenegger wouldn't fuck (and he's fucked some uglies), called him creepy. Then we see guys appear like Buttigieg who look like complete studs. On the republican side, you have guys like Romney whose wart is just that he's too rich to be that guy you'd drink a beer with. Otherwise, pretty clean guy.

People have been force fed this idea that the system is horrible, and corrupt, and everyone in it is a thief, criminal, pedo, fag, #metoo,
and you have to stop for a second and ask "who is telling me these things?" and
"why do they tell me these things?"

We hear these things when someone in power is doing horrible shit, covered in scandals as if scandals were russian prostitute urine, and those who want him in power desperately want to normalize him.

Maybe it would help if you didn't have to deal with Rahm for so many years.
 

smokehouse

I was Born This Ugly.,
15 Year Member
My comment concerning innocence really isn't addressing morality on an outside-of-the-legal-system scale. That kind of innocence is subjective.

I'm more talking about political ties, professional ties, the people behind the people behind the people that help you get to a high level of elected official. The people way behind sub-sub groups titled "Americans for justice" or "Citizens for a better tomorrow" (just made those up, BTW, any ties to something real is unintentional), or some other pop-up, heavily funded political group with yet another non-descriptive name. Groups that support politicians via low level campaigns, via contributions, or digging into political opponents in attempts to sway public opinion under the guise of everyday people presenting the evidence. Groups that come and go like water when they're found to be shill group for another group led by the super wealthy or massive companies.

This shit is all dirty pool, I feel it is being deluded to believe otherwise. This is all collusion, it's all the elite powers of this world making us the voters think that this politician is evil, or this one is good through people paid off to pose as down to earth citizens.

Is Trump guilty of it? I'm sure he is. Is Pelosi and Schumer guilty of the same shit via different means? I'd be willing to that's a solid yes as well.

Again, back to the atomic bomb thing...gotta be careful swinging a sword around that is that sharp, you might accidentally slice of your partner's head in the process.

Like you said, 2020 is almost here...they have bigger things to do now. They've accomplished what they wanted to do, which is make a bunch of noise. Time to move on.
 
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