December 2, 2017

"I had to fire General Flynn because he lied... It is a shame because his actions during the transition were lawful."

123 comments:

Matt Sablan said...

That's as the kids say, savage.

Michael K said...

Why Flynn would lie to the FBI is a mystery. He had to know that those calls were monitored by NSA and Obama had already weaponized the intelligence agencies.

I don't understand it. Maybe he will eventually explain.

Achilles said...

The leftists have played their final card. The Trump collusion story is dead. The nothing burger is revealed.

But the DNC Russia FBI collusion story is just getting started.

The Democrats tried to kill the king and failed. Time for the price of failure to be paid.

Inga...Allie Oop said...

“Why Flynn would lie to the FBI is a mystery. He had to know that those calls were monitored by NSA and Obama had already weaponized the intelligence agencies.”

He took the risk to lie because he had a lot more to hide regarding the Russians. The risk didn’t pay off. Perhaps he thought Trump could just fire Comey and everything would just disappear. Didn’t work out that way, did it?

Matt Sablan said...

I assume he lied because he thought diplomacy should be secret. Or something stupid. Pretty much had to be something stupid. He should have with the FBI claimed executive privilege. It is what Obama's team would do

Matt Sablan said...

Wht would anyone think firing Comey would stop an investigation into Flynn that had been ongoing before Comey was relevant?

Yancey Ward said...

Michael K,

Until we actually see the transcripts of Flynn's interviews and the recorded calls, it is an unanswerable question. He may well have been trying to keep information out of the hands of the Obama Administration about the changes Trump's was going to make after January 20th. Flynn may just be stupid- who knows?

Achilles said...

Inga said...

He took the risk to lie because he had a lot more to hide regarding the Russians. The risk didn’t pay off. Perhaps he thought Trump could just fire Comey and everything would just disappear. Didn’t work out that way, did it?

Stalinist douche gotta be a Stalinist douche. They will find a crime! It is there somewhere!

Meanwhile the FBI is covering up clearly criminal conduct by many Democrats. The only reason this continues is because democrat voters like Inga don't care about the rule of law.

Is it any wonder so many leftists supported Stalin and Hitler in the 30's? It never stopped. Ted Kennedy was caught actually conspiring with the Soviets to defeat Reagan in 1984.

These people are just awful.

Darrell said...

Flynn should have said he was shooting at sea lions, initially. During the second interview, he should have said that he was sitting on a park bench and at some point he reached underneath and found something wrapped in an old t-shirt. When he touched it, it turned out to be a cellphone and it immediately redialed its last number--IN RUSSIA.

Yancey Ward said...

I will point out, again, we don't know what excuse the FBI used to get Flynn to sit down with them. They had to have told him something in order to get him to agree to the first interview. The nature of the that "something" is still a secret, it appears.

Inga...Allie Oop said...

Why would Flynn lie? Arrogance and much more.

“Flynn had to know he was being recorded when he spoke to the Russian ambassador. He also had to know it is a crime to lie to the FBI. Why then did he lie when agents questioned him about those conversations?

Part of the explanation may be a tendency during his tenure with the DIA to tailor the truth to his purposes. The New York Times has reported that his subordinates spoke of “Flynn facts.”

And this proclivity to offer “Flynn facts” may have been a key element of his bond with the tireless purveyor of “Trump facts.”

That melding of alternate realities with the Commander in Chief may have led Flynn to feel armored against anything as niddling as being charged with lying to some lowly FBI agents.

That would be particularly so because these lies involved what is described as “a senior official of the Presidential Transition Team” in the Statement of the Offense that accompanied Flynn's guilty plea on Friday.”

https://www.thedailybeast.com/michael-flynn-had-to-know-the-fbi-had-heard-his-calls-with-russians-so-why-did-he-lie-about-them

MayBee said...

I'm assuming he lied because he thought someone political in the FBI would make a big deal out of the truth.
Which is kind of what is happening.

I don't believe in these Martha Stewart-esque charges. And I find Comey's religious tweet commentary yesterday to be reprehensible.

MayBee said...

Why would Flynn lie? Arrogance and much more.

Perhaps he saw how many lies Hillary and her people gave the FBI without any charges, and thought he would get the same courtesy.

Nyamujal said...

So,with this tweet Trump has admitted that he knew Flynn lied to the FBI when he asked Comey to let the investigation go.


Yancey Ward said...

I see Inga is back flogging made up stuff as fact. Now Flynn "had a lot more to hide". Sheesh.

Nyamujal said...

After Trump was elected Obama asked him not to appoint Flynn. He didn't listen.
After Flynn resigned, and he wasn't fired, Trump asked Comey if "he could find it in his heart to let this go. He(Flynn) is a good guy. I hope you can let this go".
In March 2017, Trump tweeted: "Mike Flynn should ask for immunity in that this is a witch hunt, by media and dems."
Trump and Flynn were pretty tight once and Trump went out of his way to protect him. That has all gone now.

Matt Sablan said...

This tweet does not show that. Even if it did, the FBI routinely doesn't charge people for lying to them. See Abedin. Clinton. Podesta. Even if Trump was given and read the FBIs interviews with Flynn prosecutorial discretion could be asked for.

Achilles said...

Inga said...

That melding of alternate realities with the Commander in Chief may have led Flynn to feel armored against anything as niddling as being charged with lying to some lowly FBI agents.

This is hilarious. You are such a douchey loser and so are all of your leftist friends clinging to this story.

Hillary lied to FBI agents repeatedly in an interview about her Email server. A clearly criminal act.

But there are no notes from that interview. There are no video tapes or audio tapes of that interview. Conveniently.

And there are memos from Comey explaining he had determined the outcome of the investigation before it was completed.

But you think Flynn lying about a completely lawful act is high crimes and treason. You are a complete joke.

It is time for the people involved in this Stalinist fraud to do serious jail time.

Matt Sablan said...

Would a reasonable prosecutor bring a charge like this? They didn't against a bunch of other political aides who lied to the FBI. What makes Flynn different?

Bruce Hayden said...

“This tweet does not show that. Even if it did, the FBI routinely doesn't charge people for lying to them. See Abedin. Clinton. Podesta. Even if Trump was given and read the FBIs interviews with Flynn prosecutorial discretion could be asked for.”

The difference here is an independent prosecutor and his staff of Clinton campaign supporting attorneys with an essentially unlimited budget, as contrasted to the usual financial triage that US Attys have to deal with.

Yancey Ward said...

Nyamujal,

That was already known when Flynn was fired. Flynn was asked specifically by Pence whether or not he lied to the FBI- it was why Pence questioned him in the first place- he had been accused of lying to the FBI.

Trump shouldn't have suggested anything to Comey, but that wasn't by itself unethical and certainly not illegal- the simplest explanation is that Trump felt bad about firing him for lying about something that wasn't illegal in the first place- we now know there was no underlying crime because of Flynn's plea from yesterday (just like Scooter Libby).

I personally think the proper thing for Trump to have done after firing Flynn would have been to issue an immediate pardon to him. Trump didn't have the courage of his apparent conviction that Flynn didn't deserve prosecution in the matter. I had the exact same criticism of Bush who didn't pardon Libby when he left office- I considered it a disgraceful act on Bush's part.

Darrell said...

Bullshit Inga. The FBI already had a transcript of the conversation from their illicit phone tap. If you deviate one word from what they have, they can charge you with lying. Who remembers a conversation word-for-word months later? It's a reindeer game. The FBI never records or videotapes its interviews so that your defense attorney can't subpoena them. If they want to bring charges against you, they can. Anyone. Any time. The organization is divorced from fighting crime and enforcing the law. It is a political tool.

Ignorance is Bliss said...

Nyamujal said...

So,with this tweet Trump has admitted that he knew Flynn lied to the FBI when he asked Comey to let the investigation go.

Except that Trump never asked Comey to let the investigation go. He expressed hope that Comey would be able to, using the same prosecutorial discretion that he used to not charge Hillary. Comey made it clear in his congressional testimony that Trump had the constitutional authority to order Comey to end the investigation. Since Comey didn't end the investigation, that means that Comey understood that Trump was not asking him to.

Achilles said...

Nyamujal said...
After Trump was elected Obama asked him not to appoint Flynn. He didn't listen.

If Obama was put under the same scrutiny as Flynn he would be charged with at least a dozen counts of lying to the FBI. There are dozens of proven lies he told the american people. It would be awesome to have Obama explain what he knew about Fast and Furious, The IRS targeting scandal, the FISA unmasking scandal just to name a few.

But as a good lefty you are not interested in anything as objective as equal treatment under the law. The law only applies to your political enemies. Awful.

Darrell said...

Empirical evidence--phone records--proved that Scooter Libby was telling the truth in the matter the FBI used to bind him up for trial. It didn't matter. The farce played out.

Achilles said...

Matthew Sablan said...
Would a reasonable prosecutor bring a charge like this? They didn't against a bunch of other political aides who lied to the FBI. What makes Flynn different?

The left uses the law as a tool to gain more power. That is all. It is not applied evenly or fairly when they are in charge.

They are not good people.

The problem is not that these people exist. They always have and always will. There will always be the amoral and the corrupt who will flout the law and abuse the rule of law. The problem is the people who know what is right and hold republicans to that standard but do not have the courage to hold democrats/leftists to that standard when the leftists fight.

At some point the squishy middle is going to have to choose. They need to realize the leftists are a cancerous growth on a free society.

trumpintroublenow said...

I think Flynn had a reasonable chance of being acquitted for the false statement charge. As noted, he had no apparent reason to lie since he knew or should have known that the FBI already knew about his various conversations with the Russian ambassador. And his "lie" was of the "I do not recall" variety.

To me the plea indicates that Flynn had significant exposure re other crimes. The statement of the offense says that there are other facts relevant to the offense not included in the statement.

Mueller is in the middle of his investigation. Strategically, it would be a bad move for him to tell his targets everything he knows to date, and hence what he doesn't know.

So I don't think yesterday was a good day for Trump.

Jon Burack said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Inga...Allie Oop said...

So the President admits he knew Flynn lied to the FBI, a crime, yet Trump claims Flynn did nothing unlawful?? Trump goes out of his way to shut down the Investigation Comey and the FBI was conducting? Trump contacts numerous Senators and Congressmen to tell them he hopes they will shut down their Senate and House investigations too? Why was Trump so desperate to shut down these investigations?

Hagar said...

He could very reasonably have thought that meddling in Trump's future policy plans was not any of the FBI's business - which it isn't, or at least should not be.

He then made a somewhat wishy-washy public statement, and then V-P Pence got way out over his skis and made a categorical statement that had to be retracted on national TV. That was Pence's error, not Flynn's, but in Washington the hired help does not cause the top politicians to embarras themselves without consequences.

And this "lying" is not a Martha Stewart charge, i.e., made up language, but a Scooter Libby charge, i.e., lying about something that had nothing to do with what the FBI was supposed to investigate to start with, and an action that was entirely legal but not wished to be publicized for other reasons.

Jupiter said...

Blogger Michael K said...
"Why Flynn would lie to the FBI is a mystery."

Shortly after the election which determined that Hillary Clinton will never be President of the United States -- perhaps my favorite election ever, and I do want to call it to Inga's attention -- I began to hear about this Flynn fellow. So, I bought his book. And by the time I was halfway through it, I decided he didn't have much to say, and wasn't very good at saying it. He seemed to have a pretty high opinion of himself, but it was not at all clear why anyone else should share that opinion, or even why he wrote the book. I think he's a bit of a hustler, and maybe not quite as bright as he needs to be to operate at the levels he has chosen.

Darrell said...

Flynn was fired because Pence talked to him before a press conference and used what was said to answer questions from the press. The press, using illegal leaks supplied to them, then made Pence look like a liar. Something like that can not stand--except in a Democrat administration. Like when the press was told a YouTube video caused the attacks in Egypt and Benghazi on the anniversary of 9/11 during the Obama administration. The press never had any interest in that after it turned up to be made up out of whole cloth.

Jon Burack said...

One of the few Trump tweets that is precisely true, and to the point.

I have no idea what Inga thinks Flynn was lying to cover up. I am pretty sure she has no idea either - no idea, but what she wishes it might be.

This entire investigation is little more than the criminalization of political differences. In that respect it is a lot like the equally futile and disgraceful John Doe investigation of Walker. I wish Althouse would apply her legal knowledge to an exploration of those parallels, or at least what appear to me to be parallels. A perfectly obviously political investigation gussied up to look like it's about crimes when it is not.

One more point. I heard Mark Shields yesterday (quite by accident) prattling on about how this all is like an early stage in Watergate. That is what the press wants you all to think. This would be like Watergate if, instead of an actual break-in at the Democratic headquarters, the door was still locked and nothing was missing, but someone said they saw a Republican operative walking the hotel halls near the still locked door. In other words, Watergate STARTED with a clear and obvious crime. So far, a year plus in, and Mueller still has zero evidence an actual crime even happened.

Darrell said...

Mueller wants Flynn to say shit against Trump and the people around him, Then when they dispute it, he can charge them with lying. Farce 101.

Darrell said...

Flynn knows that Scooter Libby went to jail, even though he was innocent of all the charges. And he knows that Bush was cowed into not pardoning him.

mockturtle said...

When you don't have a wartime consigliere, this is what happens.

Drago said...

Inga: "So the President admits he knew Flynn lied to the FBI, a crime, yet Trump claims Flynn did nothing unlawful??"
Lol

Uh, no.

mockturtle said...

OT but: I had to write my two Senators, McCain and Flake, to thank them for voting Yes on the Tax Reform bill. So ironic to hear all the nay-voting Dems suddenly becoming deficit hawks. Laughable.

Drago said...

I see that Inga has, by necessity and quite similar in tactics as LLR Chuck, retreated to the purposeful mistaking of basic facts to try and regain the very brief false euphoria of yesterday.

Unexpectedly.

wwww said...



Why would T. admit to obstruction of justice? He asked C. to drop the investigation of F. after he knew he lied? If M. can prove that, that's obstruction.

He's a billionaire and can afford excellent legal advice. He's not some normal off the street with minimal savings.

I do not understand his tweeting. Does he not understand how this works? A fellow New Yorker -- he knows Martha Stewart was put in jail because of actions she took after her investigation began.

Kevin said...

Why Flynn would lie to the FBI is a mystery.

Why did Martha Stewart lie? Because she thought what she did might have been illegal.

Why did she believe that? Because a bunch of FBI Agents were investigating her activities and therefore she must have done something improper.

I'll bet Flynn found himself in a similar situation - one where the FBI made him believe those conversations weren't legal when in fact they might all be on the up and up.

If they throw around a bunch of laws which you may or may not have broken, that's generally enough to get people to go along with them or deny that anything at all happened.

Even your lawyer can't tell you for sure. He can say that it's probably not illegal, or they'd have a hard time making their case, but the average American fears conviction and jail time much more than they feel like telling the cops they're probably overreaching.

It's how the cops get honest people to do their bidding and plead to lesser charges.

Hagar said...

Blogger Michael K said...
"Why Flynn would lie to the FBI is a mystery."

No mystery. In today's world, Flynn knew that anything he told the FBI, he might as well send The Washington Post a copy. It is a class war; not normal politics.

Kevin said...

This entire investigation is little more than the criminalization of political differences.

Trump's collusion with Russia must be investigated - our democracy depends on it!

Hillary's mishandling of classified intelligence must not be investigated - our democracy depends on it!

Inga...Allie Oop said...

At this point, I have to wonder at the competency of Trump’s lawyers, allowing him to continue tweeting and thereby implicating himself even further.

Darrell said...

If Inga sends $19.93 to Jill Stein, she can be her Press Secretary. And Aide d' Camp.

MayBee said...

In the meantime, Private Citizen Barack Obama is meeting with the heads of state of China and India. Is this a Logan Act violation, my friends? Is it collusion?

MayBee said...

There's a lot not to like about Flynn....buy why in the world would Trump have listened to Obama about him? Obama fired him because Flynn was right about ISIS when Obama was trying to pretend terrorism was on the run during the 2012 campaign. Do you lefties remember that? Does it make you mad?

Achilles said...

Inga said...
So the President admits he knew Flynn lied to the FBI, a crime, yet Trump claims Flynn did nothing unlawful?? Trump goes out of his way to shut down the Investigation Comey and the FBI was conducting? Trump contacts numerous Senators and Congressmen to tell them he hopes they will shut down their Senate and House investigations too? Why was Trump so desperate to shut down these investigations?

1. The people running the investigations are ignoring much worse crimes.

2. The people running the investigations are COMMITTING much worse crimes.

3. The goal of the investigation has nothing to do with justice or the law. The goal of the investigations is to undermine the results of a lawful election and the will of the people on a pretense and carry out an illegal and amoral coup.

4. Because at the core this is a stalinist style witch hunt looking for a crime in order to seize political power and destroy the foundations of our Republic.

Darrell said...

Obama is trying to start the Obama Foundation. That's going to end well. If he wants Chinese money, he should call it The Bumblefuck Foundation.

Michael said...

Alas, Flynn knows that the Federal conviction rate is in the high nineties. Close on the heels of China. Despicable in so many ways.

mockturtle said...

Kevin asserts: Why did Martha Stewart lie? Because she thought what she did might have been illegal.

Why did she believe that? Because a bunch of FBI Agents were investigating her activities and therefore she must have done something improper.


I'm still waiting for an FBI investigation of the Equifax execs and their insider trading.

Achilles said...

Inga said...
At this point, I have to wonder at the competency of Trump’s lawyers, allowing him to continue tweeting and thereby implicating himself even further.

The only reason a party as corrupt as the Democrat party and a swamp as disgusting as Washington DC can continue to exist is because of people this awful.

Gk1 said...

The dog barks and the caravan moves on. My FB feed this morning from my bay area friends are all about the tax bill that passed last night. Its particularly rich as they complain that no democrats had voted for it. Obamacare any one? As that is bill is signed into action we can move on from the most recent liberal trope that trump is "incompetent" to, "well, I don't like what he's doing"

dreams said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
mccullough said...

Pretty good tweet by Trump. The investigation into how Trump won and/or how Hillary lost seems to be going nowhere. Flynn, like Petraeus, lied to the FBI. People who rise to high levels commonly lie. It's how they rose to such high levels in the first place. I'm underwhelmed by these types of crimes.

Matt Sablan said...

O see no reason Flynn should be charged with anything given the precedents set the last seven or eight years.

Matt Sablan said...

What Manafort Libby and Flynn teach us alongside Mills Lerner Holder and Abedin is if you want to lie to the FBI, do it while working for Democrats.

Darrell said...

If Flynn had a hair on his ass, he would have had a pair of Quad 50s WWII anti-aircraft batteries in his bedroom when Mueller and his goon-squad SWAT team arrived, so that he and his wife could have given them the old whatfor.

Matt Sablan said...

Didn't one of Obama's intelligence guys perjury himself in front of Congress?

Matt Sablan said...

I'm fine with people going to jail for lying to investigators. Not when it is used as a partisan tool like this though. We either have rule of law or man. Right now we're teetering because the left thought they'd always be the man. Do you want Trump to have this kind of power? Because he'll get it if you let this stand.

Darrell said...

The View audience erupted in thunderous applause and howls when Joy Behar announced that Flynn pleaded guilty to lying and would be cooperating with prosecutors. They should make a movie--call Harvey!

Inga...Allie Oop said...

When you’ve lost The Daily Mail...

“'I had to fire General Flynn because he lied to the Vice President and the FBI. He has pled guilty to those lies. It is a shame because his actions during the transition were lawful. There was nothing to hide!' he said.

The tweet was published as the president was stuck in traffic in his motorcade while leaving a fundraising breakfast in New York City.

It has stunned Obama White House staffers responded and other critics who quickly linked it it to Trump's apparent request of former FBI Director James Comey to go 'easy' on Flynn the day after he was fired.

'The president asked his FBI Director to let his National Security Advisor off the hook for committing the crime of lying to the FBI.
'When Comey refused, he was fired. There's your obstruction case,' said Jon Favreau, one of Barack Obama's speech writers.

Political journalist Matthew Miller echoed his astonishment.

'Oh my god, he just admitted to obstruction of justice. If Trump knew Flynn lied to the FBI when he asked Comey to let it go, then there is your case.

'Never tweet.* *Especially if you’re going to tweet an admission to a crime,' he said.

President Trump has never admitted asking Comey to 'go easy' on Flynn.

In June, fired FBI Director James Comey testified that in regards to Flynn, Trump told him on February 14: 'I hope you can let this go.'
Comey said he was talking about Flynn, who he fired days earlier.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5139137/Trump-says-not-worried-Flynns-guilty-plea.html#ixzz508LhHcQf
Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

donald said...

I only learned in the last year or so that the FBI doesn’t film interviews and relies on those written forms. Blew my mind.

I can’t afford a big time defense lawyer, but even I know enough to tell anybody trying to implicate me in anything without basic modern technology to go fuck themselves. Prove it motherfuckers. You don’t get to fish in my pond.

Matt Sablan said...

The tweet does nothing like what people are implying. It doesn't admit any crime. Why do people keep insisting an obvious falsehood?

Matt Sablan said...

It was actually a deviation with Clinton to not keep records. They normally do.

Mark said...

Why Flynn would lie to the FBI is a mystery.

You are assuming that he did lie. Just because he pled guilty to it does not necessarily mean he did. He may very well have said something he believed to be true, but was actually false. He may have said something he believe to be true -- and was true, but the FBI insisted was false.

In these bogus charges, the government arbitrarily decides what is true and what is not true. And if you say something that they disagree with, even though it is 100 true, don't be surprised if they accuse you of lying. And sometimes, as we've seen in multiple cases now, they will question people just so they can trap them into saying something that the government can claim is false, just to charge you with that since the rest of their investigation is BS.

A little bit of advice here. NEVER SPEAK TO THE FBI -- ever. They will twist and distort and hang over your head whatever you say to them, no matter how innocent. Even if you think you are simply a witness, keep your mouth shut as if you were (and may very well be) the target. If this is how the game is played, then tell them to get lost.

He had to know that those calls were monitored by NSA and Obama had already weaponized the intelligence agencies.

If the only evidence of the falsity of his statements is derived from the electronic surveillance, whether warrantless or with a FISA warrant, then the evidence itself is ILLEGAL and cannot be used for criminal prosecution purposes.

Besides, there is ZERO basis for the underlying investigation. There was NO CRIME about which the government could be questioning people.

Flynn should have taken this to trial.

Bruce Hayden said...

“Why would T. admit to obstruction of justice? He asked C. to drop the investigation of F. after he knew he lied? If M. can prove that, that's obstruction. “

This is pretty silly. We have been through this repeatedly in the past. No, Trump didn’t ask Comey to drop the investigation, but if he had ordered such, after inauguration, it wouldn’t have been obstruction of justice. Investigating and not investigating potential (“investigatorial discretion”, akin to “prosecutorial discretion”, which is the decision whether and what to prosecute) is an Executive function, which, according to the first clause of Article II of our Constitution, belongs exclusively to the President. No one else. He can, and does, delegate this Power to the DoJ, FBI, etc, but it is still his exclusive power. If he had told Comey to drop it, Comey would have had no authority whatsoever to continue the investigation. None.

mccullough said...

How is it obstruction of justice for the president to say he doesn't want someone prosecuted? The decision is ultimately up to the president. The FBI and DOJ are within the executive branch.

Jim at said...

Bullshit Inga.

I like it.
It's catchy.

MayBee said...

Matthew Sablan said...
The tweet does nothing like what people are implying. It doesn't admit any crime. Why do people keep insisting an obvious falsehood?


These days I can't tell if people really believe what they are saying, really want to find the least flattering interpretation for the political foes, or if they just get a thrill finding new ways to outrage themselves and dream of spreading the outrage, no matter the cost.

mccullough said...

Comey deserved to be fired. He is a weasel.

Inga...Allie Oop said...

“A former government ethics official said Saturday that President Trump’s tweet about the firing of former national security adviser Michael Flynn could end his presidency.

“Are you ADMITTING you knew Flynn had lied to to the FBI when you asked Comey to back off Flynn?” Walter Shaub, the former director of the U.S. Office of Government Ethics, tweeted at Trump.

“Before we slipped into an alternate universe of unabashed corruption, this tweet alone might have ended a Presidential administration," he added.”

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/362942-former-ethics-director-trumps-tweet-on-flynn-may-end-his

mockturtle said...

Flynn should have taken this to trial.

Flynn stated that he and his wife simply couldn't afford the legal fees and might have to sell their house. I don't know if this is true but legal costs can be ridiculous.

Matt Sablan said...

For example, Comey kept better records if his meeting with Trump than he kept of his interview with Clinton.

Matt Sablan said...

Obama jailed a man he knew didn't cause the riots for political purposes. Trump doesn't have the FBIs reports. He's staring what we know now. Then he did not know.

Even if he did the FBI has a routine of not going after political actors who lie to them. So it wouldn't be odd to ask then to stick to the Lerner Holder Abedin Mills precedent.

Darrell said...

The Daily Mail has been moving to the Left for years now. When they expanded their US branch because of the popularity of the US page on their website, they wound up hiring a bunch of Lefty reporters out of US journalism schools. DM reporters following Trump are almost all Lefties. And they disallow so many words in their comment section that it's almost impossible to get an opposing point-of-view through the gatekeepers. You have to add spaces within a word and Capitalize random letters.

M Jordan said...

Trump will pardon him.

Ray - SoCal said...

Notice the political timing of this...

Just as trump is getting a big win with passage of the tax bill.

Coincidence?

Inga...Allie Oop said...

Trump’s in trouble.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2017/12/02/trumps-first-tweet-about-michael-flynns-guilty-plea-could-be-a-problem-for-him/?utm_term=.b2f4f023ee70

Others agreed, including Lawfare Executive Editor Susan Hennessey, who said Trump's tweet amounted to a "confession to essential knowledge elements of an obstruction of justice charge":

Susan Hennessey
Susan Hennessey
@Susan_Hennessey
This is a pretty substantial confession to essential knowledge elements of an obstruction of justice charge.
11:37 AM · Dec 2, 2017

Drago said...

Inga: "Trump’s in trouble."
Lol

FullMoon said...

For Inga and other morons:
NYT Feb 13 2017

Michael T. Flynn, the national security adviser, resigned on Monday night after it was revealed that he had misled Vice President Mike Pence and other top White House officials about his conversations with the Russian ambassador to the United States.


How stupid can they be? We will never know. They keep raising the bar.

Rusty said...

The usual suspectsare masturbating furiously.

Darrell said...

Susan Hennessey?
Not fucking Susan Hennessey!!!
Oh, my!

PoNyman said...

His #1 problem was probably opening his mouth. Never, ever, ever talk to the police (in whatever form they take) even when you have nothing to hide, want to be cooperative, and are trying to be honest when you are being investigated. You will eventually say something that is wrong and it will be considered lying. You are sunk at that point. Notice that a lot of these high profile targets end up with lying to federal investigators as their major charge. Get a lawyer.

Link to: Don't Talk to the Police

Link to: Police Interrogations

Drago said...

"Susan Hennessey?"

Not JUST Susan Hennessey, whom we all know to be infallible and utterly objective, but "OTHERS" as well!

I mean, none of them have the Credibility of Al Franken, Joy Behar or The Milwaukee Talk Radio Voice Who Speaks For Us All Charlie Sykes, but still...

Darrell said...

Somebody once said that Ted Kennedy never spoke a single word to police other than "Speak to my lawyer, He will be here soon." And "You guys are doing a great job."

Drago said...

Personally I'm still recovering from the Certain Knowledge (from Inga and her pal Chuck) that Trump was a sure election loser, followed by Ingas Certain Knowledge assertion that Trump would not even make it to the Inauguration, followed by Ingas and her pal Chucks Certain Knowledge the fake golden dossier spelled the end.

Once I finish internalizing all those other Certainties I will be able to entertain Inga and Chucks latest Certainty.

So many Certainties, so little time.

Heartless Aztec said...

Maybe his pants were on fire.

tim in vermont said...

The former top FBI official assigned to special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s probe of Russian interference in the 2016 election was taken off that job this past summer after his bosses discovered he and another member of Mueller’s team had exchanged politically charged texts disparaging President Trump and supporting Hillary Clinton, according to multiple people familiar with the matter.

Peter Strzok, as deputy head of counterintelligence at the FBI, was a key player in the investigation into Clinton’s use of a private email server to do government work as secretary of state, as well as the probe into possible coordination between the Trump campaign and Russia in the 2016 election.


Gee, it almost seems like it's a partisan witch hunt on one side, and on the other side a huge effort to not find any crimes.

Darrell said...

The FBI has never been the same since they let Fox Mulder have a basement office.

Jon Burack said...

Inga,

Regarding your long post here about something in the Daily Mail (I admit I could only barely understand your point about it), but you appear not to understand that the president is the head of the executive branch. It is absolutely not obstruction of justice for him to tell the FBI head, who reports to him, what he would like him to do. THAT is in fact his job. He can pardon Flynn tomorrow. He can fire Comey for any reason he feels justifies it. Ethical? Perhaps not always - though I see nothing unethical in this case. It's just not going anywhere near "obstruction of justice," so I think you are setting yourself up for disappointment.

narciso said...

Hennessey was a lawyer for the nsa, who should know the dissemination of previous confidential communication is a definite felony, so who is responsible.

Drago said...

"...so I think you are setting yourself up for disappointment."

Why should today be any different than any other day for Inga and Chuck?

Darrell said...

I'm pretty sure I gave Jill Hennessy (Crossing Jordan, Law and Order) a $20 bill when she was panhandling in Toronto as a teen, around a rapid transit station. She told me that I wasn't going to get anything for the $20, and I told her to be safe and not to use it for drugs or anything harmful. She said it was for her and her family--just food, clothing, and shelter. I wished her luck. She was around 17 or so. I recognized her on TV, but the clincher came when i read a GQ interview with her when I was waiting for a haircut. There she told about being the daughter of hippies and panhandling in Canada. They were living in a van.

I want to hear Jill Hennessy's legal take on Trump's Tweet.

Darrell said...

It might have been Vancouver. But it WAS a rapid transit station. Thank God I'm not be questioned by the FBI.

narciso said...

How about that film she did with Damon wayans and Jon voight, that was desperate.

https://mobile.twitter.com/Debradelai/status/936788621490774016

Darrell said...

Most Wanted (1997)? I think the $20 was gone by then.

People should read your link about Flynn, though. Good stuff!

narciso said...

Yes that's the one, it illustrates how crazy Hollywood screebwhriters are.

narciso said...

Oh it was keenan wayans who wrote it as well. Yikes.

mockturtle said...

Darrell sighs: Thank God I'm not be questioned by the FBI.

Yet.

Darrell said...

Jill has an identical twin sister, Jacqueline, too. I could have given the $20 to Jackie. That's cute in itself--Jackie and Jill. Since I'll never meet either again, I'll never know.

I do know this, though--
https://i.pinimg.com/736x/34/d8/e7/34d8e754d004baeac2e962faca759e9a--jill-hennessy-little-red-dress.jpg

Yowzaa!

MayBee said...

That's wild, Darrell!

Unknown said...

Darrell: great story.

When the rappers back in the day would go on about the Hennessy I would think of her.

- james james

Unknown said...

Now gather round, I'm the new fool in town
And my sound's laid down by the Underground
I drink up all the Hennessy ya got on ya shelf
So just let me introduce myself
My name is Humpty, pronounced with a "umpty"
Yo ladies, oh how I like to hump thee
And all the rappers in the top ten--please allow me to bump thee

Like that.

- james james

Darrell said...

Thanks, Laslo...I mean James James.
Stay thirsty.

wildswan said...

"Matthew Sablan said...
What Manafort Libby and Flynn teach us alongside Mills Lerner Holder and Abedin is if you want to lie to the FBI, do it while working for Democrats."

Sums it up. And I heard that Lieutenant-General Flynn who served his country for thirty years is broke thanks to Commissar Mueller and his team of stalinist lawyers. This is wrong.

And, PS, the stock market dropped when it seemed that something might happen to Trump. All the wealthy Dems got a chance to see what would happen if Trump weren't there.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

It's Illegal for Trump to talk to Russians. It's in the Constitution.

It's also illegal for Hillary to lose. Her hack press should sue the deplorables.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Scott Walker - indicted any second now.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Inga asks..
Why was Trump so desperate to shut down these investigations?

Because Trump and the Russians were in cahoots and they tricked the American people into not voting for the beloved Hillary. Duh.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Darrell @ 12:29 = yep.

Matthew S said..
What Manafort Libby and Flynn teach us alongside Mills Lerner Holder and Abedin is if you want to lie to the FBI, do it while working for Democrats.

Yes.

MayBee said...

IDK about you guys, but I saw a Russian Facebook ad that was a Bernie Coloring book and so I voted for Trump.

Dude1394 said...

Sessions is pathetic.

Birkel said...

The Russians are so amazing at everything that they lost the Cold War and bankrupted themselves. But now they are Wile E. Coyote supergeniuses who trick people like MayBee.

Q.E.D.

Chuck said...

If Trump is going to criticize the actions of a special counsel within the Justice Department, he should just be clear about it. If the special counsel is prosecuting legal activities, then Trump should demand the dismissal of the special counsel. And then see what happens.

Yancey Ward said...

Jim at said...
"Bullshit Inga.

I like it.
It's catchy"


I don't know- shouldn't Bullshit be Inga's last name?

Yancey Ward said...

Of course, Inga might be Chuck's sister.

Yancey Ward said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Yancey Ward said...

Chuck, we will see. I think there is about a 50% chance Mueller is going to use the Logan Act on Kushner, or threaten to. At that point, Mueller should be fired by Trump.

I write this because I think the Logan Act was exactly the statute the Obama DOJ used as justification to investigate Flynn last December- the ground was laid in the media at the same time the Kisylak intercepts were leaked to the press- the journalists aren't smart or informed enough to have thought up the Logan Act connection all by themselves- that had to come from the source, and the source had to be high up in the Obama Administration. Seriously, no one has been indicted under this act in 160 years, but all of a sudden journalists everywhere are experts on how Flynn could be tried under this act- and this was almost a year ago.

Bruce Hayden said...

@Yancey - Kushner is family, and a Logan Act prosecution, with its 0 for 2 record over the last 200+ years, is a BS charge, several steps down from the process crimes that they have gotten the Trump bit players like Flynn with so far. The Obama DoJ may have used it internally to justify investigating Trump people, but it never saw the light of public. Using something like that against the President’s trusted family member would be personal and political. I expect that Trump, with his thin skin and quick temper, would react accordingly, firing Mueller, maybe also Rosenstein and McCade, and maybe even ordering the AG to open an investigation of those three plus Comey and several others. We know that the entire crew there is a bit shady, given their top level involvement in so much over the last 5 or so years, which means that it is likely that they could at least be indicted for worse than Logan Act violations - such as leaking, lying to Congress and courts, and violation of DoJ regulations. Way too many shady operations by them that they couldn’t be shown to have crossed the line. Logan Act, esp against Trump family, would be one bridge too far. Which is why I don’t think Mueller is that stupid - though it wouldn’t surprise me if his cabal of Clinton campaign contributing prosecutors discuss it late at night, and maybe even get wet dreams about hitting Trump so close to home with it. But, it would be suicidal, with the Deep State and the Resistance coming out openly against Trump in his own Administration. There is a saying that if you try to kill the king, you had better succeed. Which is why I expect cooler heads (e.g. Mueller) to prevail.

Bruce Hayden said...

@Yancey - rereading your comment, it appears that we are mostly in agreement. I think that maybe our only disagreement is your “should” versus my “likely would” in regards to the firing of Mueller if Kushner were indicted under the Logan Act. And my thoughts that it would maybe be the empetus for (IMHO the long needed) cleaning house at the top of the DoJ.

Bruce Hayden said...

Let me add that while Mueller’s Clinton campaign donating prosecutors dream about taking down Trump, or at least his turncoat (because he is Jewish working for Trump) son-in-law, I think that there are plenty on the other side dreaming and fanticizing about the entire cabal being perp walked out of the Justice and FBI buildings. Or maybe some pre-dawn raids at their homes. Wishful thinking, I know, but attractive, none the less.

Leland said...

I'm trying to look at this from the view of LIV:

I can understand the process charge against Flynn, and it is difficult to explain why he lied to the FBI, even if the FBI knew he lied from a rather corrupt FISA request and unmasking. I don't think explaining the FISA and unmasking corruption is enough to do to help Flynn.

But why explain the rational behind Flynn's lies? He lied to the FBI. He lied to VP Pence. There seems to be even more things Flynn lied about in the past. The reality is Flynn seems to have a problem telling the truth, even when it matters to the point of being a detriment to himself.

That is where Trump's tweet is putting the focus. Flynn had no reason to lie. He was conducting the business Trump told him to do, which people can claim is a Logan Act violation, but voters are going to have a tough time swallowing that it is a high crime for
President-elect to do, which explains ABC News error in calling the situation candidate Trump. Yet Flynn lied to the FBI and Pence, and Trump, after investigating the matter shortly (NYT/CNN: It took him 17 days!!! Voters: How long has Mueller taken?), fired Flynn because he is untrustworthy.

Do I think the tweet will stop the investigation? Nah. It's real value is being a distraction.

Still, those thinking Flynn is a Christmas present ought to really consider the lump of coal they received.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

This tweet is causing problems for Trump.

link