Tag Archives: FBI

national news

WH counsel saves Trump’s bacon

Oh … brother. Donald John Trump keeps stumbling toward, oh I have no idea at this point!

The New York Times has uncovered yet another blockbuster story. The president actually ordered the firing of special counsel Robert Mueller — but backed off when White House counsel Don McGahn said he would resign rather than carry out the order.

Can you say, Saturday Night Massacre II?

The “massacre” occurred in 1973 when President Nixon ordered then-Attorney General Elliot Richardson to fire special counsel Archibald Cox; Richardson quit. Then the president turned to William Ruckelshaus to fire Cox; Ruckelshaus quit as well. Up stepped Solicitor General Robert Bork to carry out the order; Bork did it. The rest, as they say, is history.

I believe in my heart of hearts that Donald Trump owes McGahn a huge debt of thanks for saving him from himself.

Can we ever keep the president’s stories straight?

He says Mueller is conducting a “witch hunt.” Then he pledges complete cooperation with Mueller’s probe into whether there was collusion between the Trump campaign and Russian seeking to influence the 2016 election outcome. The president expresses anger that Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself from the Russia probe. He says there’s not reason to talk to Mueller. Then he says he’ll submit to questions “under oath.” He said he has no intention to fire the special counsel.

Now comes this report that Donald Trump actually ordered Mueller’s firing, only to challenged openly by the White House’s lawyer.

Does this man — the president — have any clue as to the political destruction that would occur were he to actually fire Mueller?

My hunch is much of that damage might be done with this report.

And the saga continues …

national news, political news

Mueller: still trustworthy

Robert Mueller must have grown a second head.

He must also have been seized by demons, or brainwashed by enemy terrorists.

The special counsel whose appointment by the Department of Justice drew bipartisan praise has become the bogeyman that congressional Republicans have feared.

Thankfully, not all GOP congressional members have bought into the fear being fanned by those on the far right wing of their party. U.S. Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, says Mueller should be trusted to do the right thing as he continues his probe into allegations that Donald Trump’s presidential campaign colluded with Russians seeking to influence the 2016 election outcome.

This paranoia among some in the GOP suggests that Mueller isn’t the “friendly” party they envisioned when the DOJ appointed him.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself from the Russia probe, given his role in the Trump campaign and its transition into the presidency. The task of finding a special counsel fell to Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein, who selected Mueller, a former FBI director with impeccable credentials.

Don’t you remember the high praise that poured forth from both sides of the political divide? I damn sure remember it. I joined in that praise, given Mueller’s reputation for meticulous preparation and deliberate purpose.

Even the subject of his probe — Donald J. Trump — is alternately combative and cooperative as it regards Mueller. At this moment, allegedly, the president is willing to talk “under oath” to the special counsel if he gets asked to be questioned. I hope the president doesn’t turn combative again.

As for Mueller’s reputation, I believe it should remain intact. He’s still the same man that Justice Department officials selected for this important and complex job.

So … let the man do his job.

national news

Oh, and about the special counsel …

Robert Mueller is back in the news.

While our attention was yanked away while we watched Congress and the president writhe and wriggle over immigration and funding the government, the special counsel’s office was busy interviewing players in Donald John Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign.

We now have learned that Mueller interviewed fired FBI director James Comey sometime this past year. Mueller’s legal team has talked to Attorney General Jeff Sessions.

What’s on the special counsel’s mind? He is looking for answers to the Big Question: Did the Trump campaign collude with Russians seeking to influence the 2016 presidential election outcome?

Sessions was a key campaign adviser while serving in the U.S. Senate. Comey — as you no doubt recall — led the FBI while it looked into the e-mail use matter involving Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Rodham Clinton; then he turned his sights on the “Russia thing,” before he was fired in May 2017 by the president.

Mueller is trying to ascertain, reportedly, whether Comey’s firing, along with the dismissal of former national security adviser Michael Flynn, was meant to obstruct justice, impede the Russia meddling probe.

Gosh, who could be next on Mueller’s call list? Oh, I know! How about the president himself?

Trump says the investigation into collusion is a big fat nothing. He calls it a witch hunt. He blames it all on Democrats, the “fake media” and other critics of him and his administration.

Here’s a thought: If the president’s phone rings and it’s Robert Mueller on the other end of the call, the president ought to agree on the spot to meet with him — if what he says about the veracity of the probe is true.

If not, well … then we have a problem. Isn’t that right, Mr. President?

national news

That’s some Trump 2016 campaign ‘leak’

George Papadopoulos seems to have a big mouth that spews a lot of, um, intelligence when it’s lubricated with liquor.

Who is this guy and what does it mean? According to the New York Times, Papadopoulos is a former low-level Donald Trump presidential campaign aide who, during a drunken bender in London, told the Australian ambassador to Great Britain that Russian government officials had compiled dirt on Hillary Rodham Clinton.

So … its meaning? The young man who served as a foreign policy adviser to the Trump team said enough to alarm the Aussie envoy, who then alerted U.S. government officials. He also triggered the FBI investigation into the “Russia thing” that prompted the president to fire former FBI director James Comey earlier this year.

Another bombshell … maybe?

The revelation has the potential of creating yet another firestorm regarding special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe of the Russia collusion allegation. The Department of Justice selected Mueller — also a former FBI director and a highly respected career prosecutor — to lead the probe into whether the Trump team colluded with Russian agents who sought to meddle in the 2016 presidential campaign.

The president keeps insisting there was “no collusion.” He has said Mueller is engaged in a witch hunt, although of late he says he believes Mueller will treat him “fairly.”

My own view is that this one-time low-level underling — Papadopoulos — might have spilled enough of the beans to lure the special counsel’s legal team toward pay dirt.

Bizarre.

legal news, national news, political news

No, Mr. POTUS, probe makes U.S. look ‘very good’

Donald Trump believes the ongoing investigation into the “Russia thing” makes the United States look “very bad.”

I believe I will take issue with the president of the United States on that one.

Trump told The “failing” New York Times that he didn’t “collude” with Russian agents seeking to influence the 2016 presidential election. He made the point at least 16 times during the conversation, the Times reports.

OK, then. Why is it bad? I am absolutely certain it’s “bad” for the president if special counsel Robert Mueller and his legal team deliver the goods on the Trump campaign.

As for the image this probe casts around the world, I believe the investigation makes the United States look “good” in the eyes of our allies and perhaps even our foes. Why? Because it demonstrates a level of political accountability, which is one of the hallmarks of our representative democracy.

We elect men and women to public office to represent our interests. We expect them to do right by us and for us. If there was collusion, we need to know all about it. How is that a bad thing? How does a Justice Department-appointed special counsel — who happens to be a former FBI director — perform a disservice to the nation if he does his job with skill and precision?

One more time, Mr. President: Let the probe continue. If it comes up empty, then let Robert Mueller draw that conclusion all by himself.

But … if the special counsel reels in The Big One, that’s a different matter altogether.

national news

Nothing to FBI/Mueller probe? Then back off, Mr. President

Donald J. Trump is ending 2017 by declaring war on federal law enforcement.

What a charming way for the president of the United States to sign off on an old year and welcome the new one with forbidding declarations.

He’s gone after the FBI. He is calling it a dysfunctional agency. He has labeled its investigation into whether the Trump campaign colluded with Russians seeking to influence the 2016 election a “witch hunt.” He fired the FBI director, James Comey, this past spring.

Trump cannot stop yapping about how much he detests the investigation, how much he distrusts special counsel Robert Mueller — whom the Justice Department hired to take over the probe.

The president’s continual disparagement of federal law enforcement agencies is troubling at many levels. I’ll just cite a couple.

One is that the FBI has long been held in high regard by Trump’s fellow Republicans. But the party has become the Trump Party. Longtime Republicans have grown infatuated with the man rather than the party’s ideology.

Indeed, the president lacks an ideology. He doesn’t adhere to core principles. His seemingly sole interest is in boosting himself, his brand.

The other level brings me back to a point I want to make yet again. It is that if Trump is as clean as pure-driven snow on the “Russia thing,” he should welcome the special counsel’s probe, not condemn it.

He should allow Mueller’s probe to run its course. He should let Mueller reach a conclusion. If it finds nothing at the end of its journey, then Trump can crow all he wants.

His continual yammering and yapping about Mueller, the FBI and his foes, however, suggests to me that the special counsel may have something to keep pursuing.

And that is what is giving Donald J. Trump fits.

national news

This former GOP rep has, um, ‘evolved’

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Joe Scarborough has gone through an interesting evolution since when he was a young member of Congress from Florida.

He was a conservative Republican who once voted to impeach President Clinton. Then he left public office in 2001 and has pursued a career as a cable news host and commentator.

Now he is one of Donald J. Trump’s most reviled critics. He has left the Republican Party; he’s engaged to be married to his MSNBC “Morning Joe” co-host, Mika Brzezinski.

He is now speaking more, um, candidly about the president and, to my mind, is speaking more truthfully about many of the nonsensical things that fly out of the president’s mouth.

He said this week that had Democratic presidents, such as Barack Obama or Bill Clinton, “slandered” the FBI the way Trump has done, conservatives would mount a virtual all-out rebellion against either of them. They would give Obama or Clinton “holy hell” for saying the things Trump has said.

He now accuses the GOP of being “accomplices with their silence” about the president’s harsh criticism of the FBI.

Indeed, there once was a time when Americans hardly ever heard Republicans say things out loud that one could construe as critical of law enforcement. Indeed, the GOP was often considered to be the “law and order” party.

Those days are gone. The roles seem reversed, with Democrats now standing solidly behind the FBI as it seeks to do its job.

So, too, is Joe Scarborough, the one-time Republican who’s had enough of his former political party and its leader, the president of the United States.

Welcome to the club, Joe.

national news

Trump trashes FBI yet again

Put yourself in the shoes of a professional law enforcement officer with desires to work for the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

Your director works at the pleasure of the president of the United States. The FBI director’s job is to manage arguably the world’s premier investigative agency. Yet the president calls out the management of your agency almost daily, using language one hears on junior high school playgrounds.

The FBI has long been considered a place where trained professionals do their jobs with skill and precision. Yet the president — the nation’s top dog — keeps questioning its competence and its professionalism.

POTUS takes aim at FBI

Donald J. Trump seeks to embark on a sort of scorched-Earth policy with regard to the FBI. The man he chose to lead the agency, Christopher Wray, is now being hamstrung by the man who hired him. Wray cannot shake himself loose from the shackles that Trump clamps around his ankles.

The president keeps invoking the name of the man he fired, James Comey, who was investigating whether Trump’s presidential campaign colluded with Russian hackers who sought to influence the 2016 election outcome. And, yes, he attaches epithets to Comey’s name, along with that of Hillary Rodham Clinton, the president’s election opponent.

Now the president has joined the conservative chorus in seeking the departure of Andrew McCabe, who was Comey’s chief deputy at the FBI. Trump has accused McCabe of being too cozy with Clinton while the agency was investigating her use of private email servers while she was secretary of state during the first term of the Obama administration.

I guess I just cannot put myself into the shoes of anyone with designs of becoming an FBI agent. The president’s Twitter tirades against the FBI cannot possibly be a lure to anyone who seeks to serve their country.

legal news, national news

FBI doesn’t deserve bashing from POTUS

Maybe my memory is failing me. Or maybe it isn’t.

I’m having trouble remembering the last president of the United States to disparage the nation’s foremost law enforcement agency, the FBI.

Therein is where Donald J. Trump is doing things so very differently from his predecessors. He’s calling the FBI a lot of names. He alleges that morale is in the crapper; he says its leadership is in shambles; he is saying the FBI needs to be rebuilt.

Oh, and he’s calling the FBI’s role in the examination of Russian interference in our 2016 presidential election a “sham” and a “Democratic hoax.”

I’m trying to put myself in the shoes of an FBI agent. How would I like working for a government being run by a head of state and government who is so distrustful of my agency?

Trump keeps savaging FBI

If the president is going to contend that morale is so lousy, perhaps he is playing a major role in flushing it down a sewer hole.

He’s also been disparaging the attorney general, whose agency — the Justice Department — controls the FBI. Trump dislikes that AG Jeff Sessions recused himself from the Russia-election meddling probe, as he should have done. The president’s reaction has been to send signals that Sessions’s time as AG might be dwindling.

Of course, there’s also the issue of Trump questioning the intelligence community’s assessment that Russia did meddle in the election and that Vladimir Putin issued the order to do it. Putin told the president he didn’t meddle — and that denial from the former head of the Soviet spy agency is good enough for Donald Trump.

Strange. Very strange.

media news, national news

Trump is ‘talking past the sale’

A former boss of mine had a saying — perhaps he still says it — that overzealous advocates had a habit of “talking past the sale.”

He meant it to suggest that someone who had a point to make could have stopped trying to make it long ago.

Thus, the president of the United States is “talking past the sale” as it regards a network news broadcast journalist’s erroneous report regarding Michael Flynn’s admission that he lied to the FBI about his contact with Russian government operatives.

ABC News suspended investigative reporter Brian Ross for four weeks without pay after he reported erroneously that Trump instructed Flynn to talk to the Russians while he was running for president; in fact, Trump’s instruction occurred after he was elected, which puts the issue in an entirely different context.

ABC News acted. Ross is off the air for a month — or perhaps longer. The network policed itself. Trump, though, is not letting it go. Oh, no. Now the president is urging “investors” to sue the network for reporting “fake news.”

C’mon, Mr. President! Let … it … go, will ya?

The network has taken ownership of its mistake. However, Ross has given Trump plenty of ammo to keep up his “fake news” barrage against all the media outlets that cover the news — except, of course, Fox News, which caters to the president’s insatiable appetite for “positive news.”

Trump is delivering yet another example of how he doesn’t understand curious relationship between the media and the government. Yes, reporters make mistakes. Some of them are grievous errors, which I consider Ross’s blunder to be.

The president of the United States, though, need not spend a moment more of his time on this matter. He’s got plenty of serious issues on his heaping plate to consume his attention.