How could you let this happen, Jeff? You were supposed to protect me.
Donald J. Trump, President of the United States speaking to then Attorney General, Jeff Sessions after Sessions recused himself and Robert Mueller was named Independent Special Counsel.
Such is the attitude of Donald Trump when it comes to the head of the Department of Justice and others in his administration. They aren't there to serve the nation, they're supposed to be all about protecting him and him alone.
Of course, the flood of quotes which came out of the Mueller report could fill so many posts on this blog it would be easy to simply sit down and do nothing but copy them for weeks on end. You know, ones like the insult leveled at former White House Special Counsel, Donald McGahn. "Why do you take notes?" the President demanded. "I never had a lawyer who took notes. Roy Cohn never took notes."
For those of you not up on your history Roy Cohn initially became famous because he was Senator Joseph McCarthy's right hand man. In the early 1950's McCarthy ran amok accusing all sorts of Washington bureaucrats of not only being communists, but homosexuals as well. In the 1970's, Cohn's list of clients, along with Donald Trump, included mob bosses, Tony Salerno, Carmine Galante, and John Gotti.
In 1986, Cohn was disbarred for misappropriation of a client's funds, lying on a bar application, and pressuring a dying client to amend his will in order to include--you guessed it--Roy Cohn as a beneficiary. Obviously there were reasons Roy Cohn didn't take notes.
Mueller's report indicates Don McGahn's response to the presidential outburst was, "Because I'm a real lawyer." That sounds pretty gutsy and honorable, right?. Perhaps, but you have to remember this is the same guy who also insisted Trump nominate Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court and El Don was happy to go along with his avid advice.
But, we digress. What is important in the Mueller report isn't what Mr. McGahn did, it is what he didn't do.
According to those notes and his testimony to Mueller, Donald McGahn refused to carry out a directive by The Big Orange Guy in June, 2017. It was at that moment in time, Trump told McGahn to approach the DOJ, then tell them they must fire Robert Mueller.
McGahn immediately recognized the order as utter insanity and one which could give democrats a genuine reason to impeach the President. Instead of doing it he wrote out a letter of resignation and threatened to quit. Reince Priebus, among others, convinced him to stay on, ultimately leaving us stuck with Gorsuch and the notorious, sex maniac, Kavanaugh.
Less than a year later Trump directed Mr. McGahn to order officials at the DOJ to prosecute Hillary Clinton and James Comey because--well--he wanted them to. The White House Special Counsel had to inform the Commander in Chief, whose knowledge of government is a tad limited, he couldn't order the DOJ to do anything. He also had his people tell Trump's people if the AG's office even began investigations into Clinton and Comey, given everything else that was swirling around, there would be an almost certain surge, once again, toward impeachment.
It was during this madness, McGahn wrote an email to then White House Chief of Staff, Reince Priebus, saying, Trump wanted him to, "...do some crazy shit."
On Thursday, after this all came to light thanks to Mueller, Donald John Trump told aides, his former Special Counsel was a, "lying bastard."
We've learned many things in the few hours since the redacted version of Mueller's report has become available. First, William Barr is a liar and a shameless shill for his boss. He is also such an idiot he apparently thought no one in the media, or public would actually read the report after he gave his sanitized, pro Trump, version of it.
Second, Jared, Ivanka, and Don Jr are too stupid to be indicted. They meandered in and out of the meetings with Russians and phone calls to other nefarious persons without a clue anything they might be doing was at best illegal, at worst treasonous.
Third, if it wasn't for the real lawyer, Donald McGahn--that lying bastard--as Trump now describes him, the President of the United States would have been, in his own word, "fucked."
That's right, if McGahn had obeyed Trump and Mueller had been removed, drawing up articles of impeachment would have been the House of Representatives very next move.
By now we all know an honest man in this administration is hard to find and those who aren't willing to lie, or commit criminal acts don't last long. Unfortunately for the republic, Don McGahn is not only honest, he lasted just long enough to pack the Supreme Court with right wing whirling dervishes and save Donald Trump's ass.
Predictably, Trump, unlike the rest of us, is just too much of a narcissistic son of a bitch to realize it.
4-20-19
What I'm having trouble understanding is the Mueller report statement, according to the news media, that Trump is not guilty of obstruction because his people failed to follow instructions. Should not attempted obstruction be a crime, similar in the legal sense to attempted murder? They used to say Reagan was the teflon president, because nothing stuck to him. I would suggest he was the flypaper president compared to what we have now.
ReplyDelete