President 'The Donald' Trump and Surprising Consequences - Mod warning in OP

Water John

Well, to ask your AG to step out would be a red flag. Nothing the President wants to say to the Head of FBI should be outside the remit of the AG.
This would indicate the President's intent and that he knew the boundaries.
Doubtless the Republicans will argue the ignorance get out clause.

Professor Moriarty

Water John wrote: »

Well, to ask your AG to step out would be a red flag. Nothing the President wants to say to the Head of FBI should be outside the remit of the AG.
This would indicate the President's intent and that he knew the boundaries.
Doubtless the Republicans will argue the ignorance get out clause.

POTUS blatantly asked the head of the FBI to drop an independent investigation into one of his appointees. That's very serious. Ignorance of the law isn't a defence. Stupidity isn't a defence either, though Trump has my sympathy on that score.

namloc1980

Professor Moriarty wrote: »

POTUS blatantly asked the head of the FBI to drop an independent investigation into one of his appointees. That's very serious. Ignorance of the law isn't a defence. Stupidity isn't a defence either, though Trump has my sympathy on that score.

The thing is this info has been out there for weeks now and the GOP dismissed it. Unless they have a dramatic change of heart the GOP leadership look like they're going to back Trump through this.

CMOTDibbler

namloc1980 wrote: »

The thing is this info has been out there for weeks now and the GOP dismissed it. Unless they have a dramatic change of heart the GOP leadership look like they're going to back Trump through this.

It's been out in newspaper reports, not confirmed directly until now afaik.

ECO_Mental

namloc1980 wrote: »

The thing is this info has been out there for weeks now and the GOP dismissed it. Unless they have a dramatic change of heart the GOP leadership look like they're going to back Trump through this.

Yes this been out there but it was only as a leak and wasn't confirmed. So the GOP and Trumpski could deny it. But it is CONFIRMED now that POTUS tried to block an investigation. This is a big problem for him, Comey is smart enough to write notes straight away after every meeting with Trump and to discuss with senior management within the FBI so the record is as good as a recording.

namloc1980

CMOTDibbler wrote: »

It's been out in newspaper reports, not confirmed directly until now afaik.

I don't think this is enough for the GOP to pull the plug on Trump. Let's see what they say but anyone expecting Ryan and McConnell to suddenly throw Trump under the bus will be disappointed.

Professor Moriarty

namloc1980 wrote: »

The thing is this info has been out there for weeks now and the GOP dismissed it. Unless they have a dramatic change of heart the GOP leadership look like they're going to back Trump through this.

Yes, but watching Comey say it on national TV will be very powerful. The craven GOP may still choose to ignore it but the middle ground voters are watching.

CMOTDibbler

namloc1980 wrote: »

I don't think this is enough for the GOP to pull the plug on Trump. Let's see what they say but anyone expecting Ryan and McConnell to suddenly throw Trump under the bus will be disappointed.

It's not. They have to stand by their man. It'll just be incremental damage without being fatal.

The constant waiting for the other shoe to drop will be tiring though.

namloc1980

Professor Moriarty wrote: »

Yes, but watching Comey say it on national TV will be very powerful. The craven GOP may still choose to ignore it but the middle ground voters are watching.

This is the official GOP Twitter account. They're sticking by their man.

.

Professor Moriarty

namloc1980 wrote: »

This is the official GOP Twitter account. They're sticking by their man.

.

So far. Will be great to see GOP politicians defending Trump's interference after Comey's testimony. Imagine video of Comey's testimony being shown and then being asked if you think this isn't interference in an FBI investigation.

They may try to discredit Comey or simply lie and say that black is white, but I suspect many will just be unavailable.

Water John

Oh the spinners will be readily available and on air. Elected Reps might be more difficult to pin down.
BTW with that GOP tweet. I thought adding, like, ad the end of a sentence was a Cork thing?

CMOTDibbler

Water John wrote: »

Oh the spinners will be readily available and on air. Elected Reps might be more difficult to pin down.
BTW with that GOP tweet. I thought adding, like, ad the end of a sentence was a Cork thing?

Nah. The normal twitter vernacular for such tweets is "blah blah blah, be like" and the accompanying pic or gif is what that is.

Clearly the GOP tweeter couldn't carry off that kind of edgy youth speak.

Professor Moriarty

CMOTDibbler wrote: »

Nah. The normal twitter vernacular for such tweets is "blah blah blah, be like" and the accompanying pic or gif is what that is.

Clearly the GOP tweeter couldn't carry off that kind of edgy youth speak.

The GOP were never down with the young people. Just not groovy enough.

namloc1980

CMOTDibbler wrote: »

It's been out in newspaper reports, not confirmed directly until now afaik.

Paul Ryan on NBC now basically came out and said "nothing to see here". Brushed it off saying this is old info already reported.

StringerBell

namloc1980 wrote: »

Paul Ryan on NBC now basically came out and said "nothing to see here". Brushed it off saying this is old info already reported.

You wouldn't have expected any different from him would you?

Professor Moriarty

Interesting and diverse perspectives here on possible indictment of Trump for obstruction of justice.

aloyisious

Time-line of events:

Don meets Dir Comey at an Oval Office public event, shakes his hand, hugs him, expresses admiration" I have great trust in FBI Dir Comey.

Don meets Comey in W/House, instructs the others [Dir Comey's boss the AG and his son-in-law cum-advisor] in the room to leave them alone together, then expresses concern for his recently fired Nat Sec Adv Gen Flynn [he's a great guy] before he "suggests" to Dir Comey to, if he could, leave Flynn out of the Russian Intelligence collusion investigation.

Don. I fired Dir Comey because I felt he was not capable of conducting the Clinton investigation.

The only segment missing is Don saying he fired Dir Comey because he felt he could not rely on Dir Comey's honest loyalty in respect of the investigation into collusion between Don's electoral team and Russian Intelligence, the same in respect of the team members now in the Trump Administration top level jobs [if Dir Comey won't do me a favour and leave Gen Flynn out of the investigation, then he won't do so when the investigation comes closer to home and I want him to do me another favour, ala Gen Flynn - and I can't blackmail him by threatening to reveal his previous co-operation in respect of Gen Flynn].

It seems to me that one way of getting that segment out of Don is to goad him so badly that he fess up on a "yes. I did it" 3AM tweet. No one else in the Admin is going to stand up and memo-prove it,,,,,, unless it comes near a shove off the boat by Don time.

CMOTDibbler

aloyisious wrote: »

Time-line of events:

Don meets Dir Comey at an Oval Office public event, shakes his hand, hugs him, expresses admiration" I have great trust in FBI Dir Comey.

Don meets Comey in W/House, instructs the others [Dir Comey's boss the AG and his son-in-law cum-advisor] in the room to leave them alone together, then expresses concern for his recently fired Nat Sec Adv Gen Flynn [he's a great guy] before he "suggests" to Dir Comey to, if he could, leave Flynn out of the Russian Intelligence collusion investigation.

Don. I fired Dir Comey because I felt he was not capable of conducting the Clinton investigation.

The only segment missing is Don saying he fired Dir Comey because he felt he could not rely on Dir Comey's honest loyalty in respect of the investigation into collusion between Don's electoral team and Russian Intelligence, the same in respect of the team members now in the Trump Administration top level jobs [if Dir Comey won't do me a favour and leave Gen Flynn out of the investigation, then he won't do so when the investigation comes closer to home and I want him to do me another favour, ala Gen Flynn - and I can't blackmail him by threatening to reveal his previous co-operation in respect of Gen Flynn].

It seems to me that one way of getting that segment out of Don is to goad him so badly that he fess up on a "yes. I did it" 3AM tweet. No one else in the Admin is going to stand up and memo-prove it,,,,,, unless it comes near a shove off the boat by Don time.

I don't think so. The Flynn thing was brought up only once and never broached again according to Comey's notes.

The thing that seemed to dwell most on what Donald is pleased to call his mind is the Russian 'kompromat' and his desire to have the FBI announce that they weren't investigating him and/or investigate it to prove it false. By my count, this was brought up three times and was the subject of the last conversation Trump had with Comey a month before he fired him.

PopePalpatine

CMOTDibbler wrote: »

Nah. The normal twitter vernacular for such tweets is "blah blah blah, be like" and the accompanying pic or gif is what that is.

Clearly the GOP tweeter couldn't carry off that kind of edgy youth speak.

The first thing that came to mind when I saw that @GOP tweet was this:

:pac:

mcmoustache

CMOTDibbler wrote: »

I don't think so. The Flynn thing was brought up only once and never broached again according to Comey's notes.

It was brought up once in the 4 conversations that are described in the opening statement.

EDIT. There were 5 conversations.

I can recall nine one-on-one conversations with President Trump in four months – three in person and six on the phone.

Creating written records immediately after one-on-one conversations with Mr. Trump was my practice from that point forward.

The other 5 conversations might well be nothing but it's worth remembering that the opening statement is just that - an opening statement. It's not the entire content of Comey's testimony.

CMOTDibbler

mcmoustache wrote: »

It was brought up once in the 4 conversations that are described in the opening statement.

Five by my count:
Jan 6th Trump Tower
Jan 27th Green Room Dinner
Feb 14th Oval Office
Mar 30th Phone Call
Apr 11th Phone Call
So that's all the one on one conversations and two of the six phone calls.

mcmoustache wrote: »

The other 5 conversations might well be nothing but it's worth remembering that the opening statement is just that - an opening statement. It's not the entire content of Comey's testimony.

The remaining phone calls may be either too mundane to be included or contain classified information that can't be published; which would mean they won't be divulged at the open session either, or contain revelations that are best kept for the open session.

Hard to know until he starts the session.

mcmoustache

CMOTDibbler wrote: »

Five by my count:
Jan 6th Trump Tower
Jan 27th Green Room Dinner
Feb 14th Oval Office
Mar 30th Phone Call
Apr 11th Phone Call

Thanks for the correction. On second count it was clear as day that there were 5. I need more coffee.

Leroy42

Another question that should be asked is why was Trump meeting and having so many conversations with the head of the FBI? these were not operational meetings, ie a meeting with all the IA to review and plan.

These were essentially private meetings. Is it normal for the POTUS to meet so regularly with the head of the FBI. My understanding is that the FBI is 'independent', and apart from overall direction POTUS should have little involvement

Christy42

Leroy42 wrote: »

Another question that should be asked is why was Trump meeting and having so many conversations with the head of the FBI? these were not operational meetings, ie a meeting with all the IA to review and plan.

These were essentially private meetings. Is it normal for the POTUS to meet so regularly with the head of the FBI. My understanding is that the FBI is 'independent', and apart from overall direction POTUS should have little involvement

I am unsure about other presidents but I saw Obama had two private meetings over 8 years.

CMOTDibbler

Christy42 wrote: »

I am unsure about other presidents but I saw Obama had two private meetings over 8 years.

The second one being to say good-bye.

Sam Russell

CMOTDibbler wrote: »

The second one being to say good-bye.

And the first, at Comey's appointment, to say he would not be seeing him again after the appointment until he left office.

Leroy42

Christy42 wrote: »

I am unsure about other presidents but I saw Obama had two private meetings over 8 years.

That was my understanding as well, but wasn't sure.

But even if you raise it to once a year (8 in total) Trump is way off that. The question has to be asked as to why?

What is Trump trying to achieve with all these meetings? Has he some overall plan, one that he has never actually mentioned, as to the reorganisation of the FBI and others? It seems that the narrative from Trump supporters is that he is unaware of the usual rules, he is not a politician etc. It makes the man sound like a child. You don't get to be in his position by being naive. As Trump himself says, its all about the deal. Every interaction is about deals.

Surely, this is the first question that should be out to the WH. They keep saying they didn't discuss this, of that wasn't said, but have not (that I know of) ever been asked why the meeting was held in the first place.

Like in lots of the issues with Trump, people are trying to be too clever and get the smoking gun, be the journalist that lands the knockout blow. But it is actually much easier than that. Simply ask him why.

Because Trump has shown time and again that he can't answer that question, certainly not on a consistent basis. Why did you have a private dinner with the head of the FBI? You have limited time and are supposed to be working on MAGA, so there must be a reason why you met with Comey rather than say the Coal Miners Union etc.

aloyisious

Where did Don's W/H recordings of conversations go to? As some-one else said, wait for the tweeting to begin once Jim starts talking to the committee.

Overheal

Yesterday's testimony is also worth a look

http://bit.ly/2sGHEYg

Maddow makes some interesting suggestions but the meat of the matter is Trump's folks went under oath to tell the truth (the whole truth) but to repeated questioning from the Senate, they refused to answer questions about conversations they had with the President or if anyone had obstructed justice in any way.

As one senator pointed out, any of these men at any time could have simply said "no." But they didn't. Maybe they didn't want to perjure themselves. Dan Coats, Admiral Rogers and others all refused to answer the question. All of them denied that it was due to Executive Privilege. All of them said it would be in appropriate to answer in a public forum. Even Senator Rubio had to remind them they weren't being asked for any information that was inappropriate or classified. They still refused to answer. When asked, under oath, if he had any legal basis for refusing to answer these questions about talks with Trump or obstruction of the FBI, Coats even offered that he had no legal basis for doing so. They refused to invoke executive privilege, the fifth amendment, or anything else for that matter. I wonder if they can be charged with contempt

Leroy42

It was an astounding session all right. I always though the committees had more power than to let that happen. To refuse to answer, based on nothing more than a personal opinion is unbelievable.

But as pointed out, the key question was why they didn't simply say no, if that was the truth. If a cop asks you if you robbed the store you don't say that it is inappropriate to answer, you say no (if thats true!). Why would they be hedging their bets?