Tag Archives: Russia probe

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Tax returns might answer our questions about Trump, Russia

I cannot shake the feeling that the most interesting and sought-after findings in Robert Mueller’s investigation into Donald J. Trump’s presidential campaign will exist in the tax returns the president has refused to release for public scrutiny.

The special counsel reportedly is winding his exhaustive probe down. He’s been at since mid-2017 when the Justice Department hired him to examine those allegations of “collusion” between the Trump campaign and the Russian goons who interfered with our electoral process.

The tax returns keep refusing to go away.

Trump promised to release them after the Internal Revenue Service completed an audit. The IRS said an audit doesn’t preclude release of returns. Trump has gone silent on the tax returns, which presidential candidates dating back to 1976 have opened up for public review. The idea is to give the public a full accounting of the financial activities of the men and women seeking to become our head of state.

Trump hasn’t gone there. He won’t do it. He is breaking a campaign pledge, kind of how he pledged to make Mexico pay for The Wall he wants to build along our southern border.

Mueller’s investigation has been thorough, or so we have been led to believe. I happen to accept the notion that the former FBI director, a highly efficient prosecutor, has discovered a mountain of information about the president.

My strong sense echoes what many of us have heard already, that he has obtained those tax returns or at minimum has developed enough knowledge of what is in them. The returns well might reveal a trove of information about the nature of Trump’s business dealings around the world. After all, he has boasted repeatedly about the vastness of his empire — even though he has told us he has “no deals” in Russia. And we believe him, right?

The tax returns have been of considerable interest to many of us, especially those of us who have suspected that Donald Trump isn’t quite the fellow he presented himself to be, the kind of guy who won enough Electoral College votes to be elected to the only public office he ever has sought.

It might be that Mueller’s findings won’t reveal a thing about Donald Trump’s business dealings. However, I still insist, along with others, that the president should show us what is in those returns to allow us to make that determination for ourselves.

If he won’t, then I have this hunch that special counsel Robert Mueller will do it for him.

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Get ready for plenty of congressional push back

I am willing to concede that I would feel differently if we had a president I supported, someone whose policy I endorsed. That’s not the case with Donald J. Trump.

Having made that declaration, I look forward to the president getting some much-needed push back from half of the legislative branch of the federal government.

The U.S. House of Representatives will flip from Republican to Democratic control in a couple of days. Nancy Pelosi will become the next speaker of the House. Democrats will ascend to committee chairmanships. They, not the GOP, will control the legislative flow. Democrats’ voices will be heard more clearly and plainly than Republicans’ voices on Capitol Hill.

What does this mean for the president? It means he will be unable to dictate to the House which bills to introduce. It means he faces the likelihood of subpoenas being issued for his key aides, perhaps Cabinet officials — maybe even a member or two of his immediately family. They’ll be summoned to testify before House committees on a whole array of issues that have bedeviled the Trump administration since it took office nearly two years ago.

I refer, of course, to “The Russia Thing.”

The House’s first order of business will be to push the Trump administration and their Senate colleagues — who still are run by the GOP — to find a way out of this ridiculous stalemate, the one that has shut down part of the government. Too many families, roughly 800,000 or so of them, have been deprived of income during the Christmas holiday. Just as importantly, too many families have been denied access to key government services to which they entitled.

Donald Trump entered the political world after living in an environment where he called the shots. He didn’t have that luxury even when he and his fellow Republicans controlled the entire federal government.

He really won’t have it now that Democrats take control of the House of Representatives.

The president is entering a new — and for him, uncharted — world when the next Congress takes its oath office.

So are the rest of us. Thank goodness.

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2018’s drama was almost too much to bear . . . but wait!

Watching the convulsive presidency of Donald John Trump from out here in the midst of Trump Country was an exhaustive event for almost all of 2018.

There were moments, sometimes lengthy stretches of time, when I wondered consciously: How in the world does this guy, Trump, endure all this? How is he able to get through the day?

It dawned on me at some point during the year that Trump loves this turmoil. It’s how he is wired. He thrives on chaos, controversy, confusion.

I, though, am not wired that way. Even from some distance from Ground Zero of all this madness I got worn out watching it all implode and explode around the president.

Every week seemed to bring another revelation that might sink this guy’s presidency. Key campaign aides pleaded guilty to felonies; Trump fired Cabinet officials and White House aides left and right; Robert Mueller’s investigation cinched the rope tighter around the West Wing.

That was all in the year that’s headed for history. The new year — if we can stand it — promises to be even more tumultuous than 2018 turned out to be.

I hope to be able to withstand it all. Yes, I say that even though I am a mere observer from out here in the cheap seats, the peanut gallery.

I no longer have any curiosity about whether the president can hold up under the pressure. I believe this individual is built for it. His genetic disposition is to embrace it.

Yet, with Democrats now set to take control of one-half of the legislative branch of government, there’s a decent chance we’ll get to see Donald Trump stretched to the limits of his ability to withstand the pressure that is going to build around him.

I’m just going to enjoy the view from out here in Trump Country.

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Wishing the POTUS . . . luck in the new year

The new year is at hand. 2019 promises to be a doozy. Where it all goes remains anyone’s guess.

Of course I refer to special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into the president of the United States. Mueller reportedly is getting ready to wrap it up and will present his findings to Congress and, hopefully, to the public.

No one knows what’s in the guts of his report. I do have this sense that it is going to present commentators, bloggers, pundits, editorial writers, columnists and just plain folks on all sides plenty of grist.

Whether it clears Trump of any misdeeds regarding his campaign and the Russians who interfered with our election or whether it implicates the president directly of wrong doing, the fecal matters is going to hit the fan.

Democrats are going to take the gavel in the U.S. House of Representatives later this week. Republicans will retain control of the U.S. Senate. Donald Trump will keep his fingers tightly on his Twitter buttons.

Most eyes will focus on how the Democrats respond to regaining control of one legislative chamber. Will they unleash the hounds on Trump? Will they churn out more subpoenas than we can count? Will they launch impeachment proceedings the moment Mueller’s report goes public? Will they even wait for Mueller’s report?

I would not want to be Donald Trump at this moment, not that I ever wanted to be Trump ever at any time!

The new year is going to present him with untold and unprecedented challenges. A guy who spent his entire adult life seeking to be master of his own destiny now finds himself at the mercy of others. Congress will be calling a lot of the shots now, once Robert Mueller finishes his examination and hands over his findings.

My feelings about the president are well-known to readers of this blog. I won’t waste my energy wishing him well.

I am left merely to wish him “luck” as he enters the new year along with the rest of us. It looks as though we’re headed for a rockin’ and rollin’ ride.

 

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Facing an ‘IQ’ quandary

I am troubled by a twin prospect related to the investigation of alleged “collusion” between the Donald Trump presidential campaign and Russian operatives who attacked our electoral process in 2016.

One is this: What will the president’s reaction be if special counsel Robert Mueller determines that the Trump campaign did something improper, if not illegal in winning the election?

The other is this: How might POTUS react if Mueller determines there’s no “there” there, that Trump is innocent of wrongdoing, that his campaign did not a single thing wrong?

My fear is this: The latter finding is going to detonate what I will call the president’s Insufferability Quotient, or IQ for short. If Mueller determines that his lengthy and expensive probe into the “Russia Thing” has taken him down a series of blind alleys, it is going to ignite the Mother of All Twitter Tirades from Donald “Stable Genius” Trump.

He is likely to explode with “I told you there was no collusion!” tweets and various and sundry pronouncements. He’ll keep going and going and going . . . seemingly forever!

Both options are capable of producing this kind of reaction from Trump. The first one, which might include some indictments of individuals exceedingly close to the president, well could send POTUS into a frenzy the likes of which we’ve never seen . . . not even from this guy. It might provoke Trump into doing some truly foolish and foolhardy things, such as firing off blanket pardons to protect individuals from prosecution from the Justice Department.

That’s when we get a serious, true-blue, rock-solid constitutional crisis of the first magnitude. Strangely, that I can handle emotionally.

What might prove a bit more problematic would be if Mueller comes up empty and hands the president enough ammo to fire off until the next presidential election in 2020 and far beyond.

The man’s IQ will be off the charts.

Therefore, and it pains me to say this, I am hoping that Mueller produces some tangible evidence of wrongdoing — if only to protect myself and many millions of other Americans from the incessant barrage of in-your-face reaction from Trump.

He’s already shown himself to be insufferable in the extreme. I don’t believe I can bear the sight and sound of Trump’s Insufferability Quotient skyrocketing into outer space.

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Resolved: No resolutions for 2019, except for maybe one

I hereby resolve to make no New Year’s resolutions as we bid a warm and heartfelt welcome to 2019.

OK, I might make one exception, which I’ll get to in just a moment.

My history with New Year’s resolutions is about as successful as my history of making political predictions, which is to say it stinks. I don’t have the mental or emotional discipline I used to possess; therefore, resolutions are likely to topple over after I make them.

Thus, I don’t even try any longer. Most of the time, that is.

My one exception involves this blog. I won’t declare it officially, which would hold me totally accountable for resolution fidelity. However, I plan to keep pounding away on High Plains Blogger at the president of the United States, Donald John Trump.

I have to qualify it by inserting the “I plan” qualifier. I’m like the politician who says he has “no intention” of seeking another public office. When I hear a pol equivocate like that I hear him or her saying, in effect, that he or she doesn’t “intend” to do something in the moment, but cannot predict what might occur the next day, or even the next 45 minutes. You got that?

So I won’t commit fully to anything regarding this blog. Situations might change dramatically in the next year. Donald Trump might be out of the picture before the end of the next year. Or the probe into alleged collusion might turn out to be a total loser, that special counsel Robert Mueller has come up with nothing at all . . . just as Trump has said. Something tells me, though, that Mueller has come up with some mysterious “something” on the president.

The rest of ’em? Those resolutions about losing weight? Keeping a civil tongue? Showing better manners? No need to commit to any of those other resolutions. Yeah, the weight-loss goal always looms. I’ll deal with it in due course, but I just cannot commit to anything with the promise of staying totally faithful to the commitment.

I’ll wait for the new year the way I’ve done it for the past, oh, many years. I will go to bed early, then awaken on New Year’s Day. The sun will come up. I’ll have breakfast with my wife. We’ll bid “good morning” to Toby the Puppy.

Then I’ll settle in for another year of blogging. I plan to keep my powder dry.

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Whether to impeach or censure POTUS

When did a parent’s rebuke of your behavior or an expression of extreme disapproval stop you from doing something wrong ever again? Did it deter you? It didn’t always stop me from misbehaving.

I mention this because of a new poll that declares that most Americans want Donald Trump to be (a) impeached and removed from office or (b) censured by Congress.

The Harvard CAPS/Harris poll says that nearly 60 percent of Americans want the president to pay some sort of price, via punishment, for the way he has conducted himself.

The poll shows that Americans are split on the level of punishment. Thirty-nine percent of those polled believe Trump should be impeached, put on trial and then convicted of something.

Twenty percent want a censure, which is little more than an official scolding of someone in high office. Congress can censure the president, but it doesn’t deliver any actual punitive action. It only means that Congress is just so darn angry that its members want to express themselves via censure.

If someone were to ask me, to “poll” me, I would be on the fence. I am not yet ready to declare that Trump should be impeached. You see, I am continuing to place a huge amount of faith in what special counsel Robert Mueller delivers to Americans in due course. I want the investigation to end sooner rather than later, although I want Mueller to run all his traps and chase down every lead he can before issuing his report.

This poll, interestingly, suggests that about 40 percent of respondents don’t want Congress to take any action against Trump.

According to MSN.com: The poll results come as Trump faces criminal investigations in both Washington, D.C., and New York related to whether his campaign coordinated with Russian officials and actors to help sway the 2016 presidential election.

At the same time, federal prosecutors implicated Trump earlier this month in a separate case related to payments made to two women to keep them quiet about affairs they say they had with him.

I’m going to wait for the proverbial movie on this one. I just want to await the results of Mueller’s probe. If he produces something that suggests Trump has done deeds that could get him tossed, I am all in on impeachment. Then we’ll await the trial.

Censure? Forget about it. It’s nothing more than a slap on the wrist that means nothing, man.

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Make it all public, Mr. Special Counsel

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Can you hear the chatter coming from Washington, D.C.?

It indicates that special counsel Robert Mueller might be nearing the end of his exhaustive investigation into whether the Donald Trump campaign colluded with Russians who interfered with our electoral process in 2016. The latest report suggests he’ll be done by the middle of February.

There’s been some additional chatter that Mueller might not let the public in on all of his findings, whatever they produce.

Here’s a request. No, a demand! Make it public, Mr. Special Counsel. Make as much of it public as you possibly can.

Mueller, of course, need not reveal national security secrets if there are any to be found in his report. But the rest of it? The stuff that is pertinent to the public’s keen interest in what he’s been pursuing for more than a year? It needs to be laid bare for the public to peruse and ponder.

Mueller already has cost the public a lot of money. The amount runs in the tens of millions of dollars. That’s our money. It comes from our pockets. Thus, the results of that public expenditure become the public’s business.

Donald Trump would have us all believe that “no one cares” about the special counsel’s work. He has suggested that “only the ‘fake news’ media” are interested in this stuff. The president is badly, egregiously mistaken.

Accordingly, the special counsel should keep in mind that the public interest has been buttressed by the public’s money.

Let us see all that we need to see.

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Senate GOP should rethink resistance to Mueller protection

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has stated he has faith that Donald Trump won’t fire special counsel Robert Mueller.

I do believe McConnell has more faith in the president acting rationally than many of his fellow Americans possess.

Which brings me to the Senate’s latest refusal to enact legislation would protect Mueller from a foolish presidential act.

Mueller is closing in on the end of his lengthy investigation into alleged collusion between the Trump presidential campaign and Russian operatives who interfered in our election. He’s also closing in on Trump and his closest aides and associates.

Is there any way to guarantee that the president won’t do something profoundly foolhardy by, say, firing Mueller? Of course not! It’s because Trump cannot be pigeonholed, he can’t be measured by any of the standard methods.

That ought to give Senate Republicans reason enough to enact this legislation that would prevent Trump from doing something stupid. Think of it: If the president does deliver an act of profound stupidity by firing Mueller, he delivers to Congress a tailor-made case for obstruction of justice that, I do believe, is an impeachable offense.

Is the Senate majority leader really ready for that event? He cannot predict it won’t happen without some legislative protection for Robert Mueller.

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No need to lock him up . . . at least not yet?

Michael Flynn went before the judge today and got a snootful from the jurist who holds the man’s future in his hands.

The former Donald Trump national security adviser, though, was spared a prison sentence from U.S. District Judge Emmitt Sullivan until after Flynn is finished cooperating with special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe into the alleged Russia collusion matter during the 2016 presidential election.

To be totally candid, I don’t really care whether Flynn serves time in prison for the felony crimes to which he has pleaded guilty. Mueller is asking the judge to spare Flynn prison time because of the extensive cooperation he has given the probe into allegations of collusion, conspiracy and perhaps other matters relating to the Trump campaign — if not the presidency itself.

Sullivan reminded Flynn this morning that he is under no obligation to follow Mueller’s recommendation and scolded the retired Army lieutenant general for being an “unregistered agent” for a foreign power while serving as national security adviser. Sullivan told Flynn that “arguably you sold your country out.” The hearing reportedly was contentious as Sullivan — who was appointed to the federal bench by President Clinton — gave Flynn the holy what-for in connection to his admitted involvement with the Russian government.

Mueller is going to get more information from Flynn as he seeks to conclude his investigation. I hope the end arrives sooner rather than later.

As for Flynn — who once led Republican National Convention cheers to “lock up!” Hillary Clinton for using her personal email server while she was secretary of state — all I want from him at this point is full cooperation with Mueller and his team of legal eagles.

Something tells me Flynn has more beans to spill regarding Trump’s campaign and whether the president himself committed illegal acts on his way to being elected to the nation’s highest office.