Friday, December 15, 2017

It's Mueller Time, Con't

Robert Mueller is getting closer to the smoking gun in the Trump/Russia collusion matter, and that path goes through the data analytics firm that Trump was using in order to launder Russian intelligence.

Special Counsel Robert Mueller is investigating the Trump campaign’s data operation in the months leading up to the election
, The Wall Street Journal reporter Friday. 
Mueller reportedly asked the data firm, Cambridge Analytica, to provide his investigative team with emails of employees who worked with the Trump campaign, according to sources familiar with the matter who spoke with the WSJ. 
The House Intelligence Committee, which is also probing Russian interference in the 2016 election and whether the Trump campaign colluded with the foreign power, also requested similar documents from the data firm earlier this year. Cambridge Analytica’s CEO Alexander Nix was interviewed by the House Intelligence Committee on Thursday, the people familiar with the investigation told WSJ. 
Mueller’s request for the emails was earlier this year, before it was widely reported that Nix was in contact with WikiLeaks co-founder Julian Assange in 2016. 
Cambridge Analytica began working for the Trump campaign in mid-May 2016 after former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon introduced Nix to then-candidate Trump. The firm provided the campaign with data, polling and research, WSJ reported.

With Mueller now investigating Trump Organization money laundering of Russian cash and data laundering of Russian intelligence, it's no wonder that the false attacks on the FBI and Mueller as "biased" and "compromised" are coming in hard and fast this week.

The Republican Party has spent the last two days in a frenzy of indignation over the disclosure that an FBI agent who worked on the Clinton and Trump investigations (and has since been removed) sent texts to another agent, whom he was reportedly dating, criticizing Trump. The story was driven by the curious decision by Trump’s Department of Justice to leak partial excerpts of the texts. It produced sensational headlines like, “In texts, FBI agents on Russia probe called Trump an ‘idiot’; Messages could fuel GOP claims that bias tainted Clinton and Trump investigations,” (Politico) and “In Texts, F.B.I. Officials in Russia Inquiry Said Clinton ‘Just Has to Win’” (New York Times). 
The main problem with this pseudo-scandal is that nobody has ever previously expected FBI agents not to privately express political viewpoints. Indeed, to prosecute liberal bias at agencies that lean rightward and kept the Republican nominee’s very serious investigation private while publicizing the trivial investigation into the Democratic nominee is perverse in the extreme. 
There turns out to be another flaw in the “scandal.” The main agent in question also wrote text messages criticizing Democrats, reports Del Quentin Wilber. His messages included calling Chelsea Clinton “self-entitled,” and mocking Eric Holder. He wrote, “I’m worried about what happens if HRC is elected.” Of course, we don’t know the context of that any more than we know it for the other texts. If the administration had leaked these texts instead or in addition, the narrative would have been completely different.

So it's smoke and mirrors as with HILLARY'S EMAIL SERVER SCANDAL™ but the con is starting to work on the American people.

A majority of polled voters say special counsel Robert Mueller has a conflict of interest because of his past ties to former FBI Director James Comey, according to the latest Harvard CAPS-Harris survey
When asked if Mueller has a conflict of interest “as the former head of the FBI and a friend of James Comey,” 54 percent responded that the “relationship” between the two amounts to a conflict of interest, including 70 percent of Republicans, 53 percent of independents and 40 percent of Democrats. 
Comey succeeded Mueller as FBI director and the two have been described as “brothers in arms” for their working relationship, which dates back to the early 2000s, although the extent of their personal relationship is unclear.

The Republicans have been wrking very hard this week to destroy Robert Mueller's credibility.  Indeed, the person who appointed Mueller to the post, current DoJ Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein, testified this week before Congress that Mueller has Rosenstein's full confidence, but that story has been drowned by the noise machine.

Deputy Atty. Gen. Rod Rosenstein, who oversees the investigation into whether President Trump’s team assisted Russian meddling in last year’s campaign, pushed back strongly Wednesday against Republican accusations that the probe is infected with partisan bias and steadfastly defended special counsel Robert S. Mueller III
“The special counsel’s investigation is not a witch hunt,” Rosenstein told a heated House Judiciary Committee hearing, specifically rejecting the phrase that President Trump has used to denounce the case. He said Mueller has managed the case “appropriately.” 
Rosenstein also said he would not fire Mueller unless the former FBI director had violated Justice Department guidelines or the law. “If there were good cause, I would act,” he said. “If there were no good cause, I would not.”

The Trump regime continues to set up the possible firing of Mueller.  This week has been the clearest evidence yet that such an attempt to undermine Mueller to the point where he "has" to be fired is underway.  Don't buy the nonsense, and spread the word that this is going on.
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