Mueller has submitted his report and apparently has indicated there are no more indictments to come.
Sigh. We shall have to do it the old fashioned way, by winning the election.
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A Commentary on the Passing Scene by Robert Paul Wolff rwolff@afroam.umass.edu
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The following books by Robert Paul Wolff are available on Amazon.com as e-books: KANT'S THEORY OF MENTAL ACTIVITY, THE AUTONOMY OF REASON, UNDERSTANDING MARX, UNDERSTANDING RAWLS, THE POVERTY OF LIBERALISM, A LIFE IN THE ACADEMY, MONEYBAGS MUST BE SO LUCKY, AN INTRODUCTION TO THE USE OF FORMAL METHODS IN POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY.
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14 comments:
Not only is no one else to be indicted, but no one was indicted for conspiring with Russia.
So glad the Democratic party and their media wings (MSNBC, CNN, NPR) strung everyone along for two years with this, as Trump rightfully called it, witch hunt. Mueller's findings only empower Trump going forward, and makes the Democratic party look foolish. Instead of fighting Trump on policy principles, they fought him on speculation of spurious criminal activity, ignoring all his actual criminal activity as POTUS.
Jerry, should we feel good or bad about being proven right in our warnings? You're older, wiser, calmer, and more affable. I defer to you.
*should we feel good...
Sorry for double posting. I've made up my mind. I don't feel good. Just between pissed and annoyed my fellow lefties wasted 2 years on this nonsense.
I believe all Republicans and Democrats, should make it a point, this new presidential campaign run, on how anyone running for President of the United States, must make a campaign promise that they will never touch, or motion to repeal, the 22nd Amendment on pain of getting immediately kicked out of office. And if not they should promise to resign their presidency automatically.
Could a President usurp power in the United States in the 21st century? The first stepping stone for this is eliminating the 22nd Amendment. More nefarious things have happened in Italy and Germany starting around FOURSCORE AND NINE YEARS ago. However, if this amendment were to be repealed, it would probably only be first done (as a precedent) by a president in his/her second term.
I'm less affable and calm than Jerry (that's for sure), but if I were you, Chris, I'd feel good about myself because in spite of lots of pressure from fellow lefties (and the media pundits) to conform to the established wisdom, you had the intellectual courage to stand by your hypothesis or your intuition and you were proved right in the end.
Of course you can't win them all, and this probably tends to show not that you are incredibly gifted, but that the established wisdom is generally intellectually dishonest and slothful.
Glenn Greenwald is perhaps the most publicly exposed of the lefties-who-didn't-conform crowd, among whom I include myself. I respect his thinking, because I sense that he really isn't very much interested in "winning" or calling the horse race. He looks ahead to how the principles we so vocally proclaim today in the name of seeking an outcome we desire will most definitely bite us in our butts when the tables are turned. He doesn't rely merely on intuition, but on the firm acknowledgement of a likelihood that tactics we successfully wage today could eventually and legitimately be deployed against us.
I think it’s a little early to conclude that Mueller’s investigation was a bust. We don’t know what’s in his report. With regard to Trump himself, Mueller would follow DOJ policy that a sitting president can’t be indicted. Scholars may disagree, but DOJ is going to follow its policy.
I was expecting (hoping would be more accurate) for an indictment of Donald Jr. for what appeared to be his statements concerning meetings with the Russians at Trump Tower. But in the end, I’ve doubted that there was much, if any, “collusion” between Trump and the Russians. What’s clear is that Putin detests Hillary, and the Russians were out to defeat her, long before the Republican nominee was selected. They could not have imagined Trump being nominated any more than anyone else could. Their effort didn’t depend on who the Republican nominee was. They didn’t need any help from that nominee. To the contrary, any collusion with that person’s campaign would greatly increase the likelihood that US intelligence services would find out about Russia’s activities. I think, from the Russian point of view, Trump was a late in the game, and very pleasant, surprise--not because they needed his help to defeat Hillary, but that he would President of the US for the next four years.
Other commentators have suggested that Trump’s greatest vulnerability lies not with collusion with the Russians but with his business dealings. I agree. These issues would be the responsibility of the Southern District of NY and the NY State AG’s office, not Mueller.
Finally, it wasn’t a witch hunt, even if nothing further comes from it. Kenneth Starr’s five year investigation of Bill Clinton was a witch hunt. Mueller and his team have been exemplary. Can anyone recall a single leak that’s come from his office? They were given a job--investigate Russian interference in the election and any possible collusion between the Russians and US citizens, prepare a report of what they found, and provide an evaluation of the evidence in light of Federal law. So far as we know, that’s exactly what they did. Not a witch hunt. To the contrary, it’s what DOJ prosecutors and the FBI are supposed to do.
How lovely that some people never fail to perform to type.
Chris,
It's not right to suggest that Dems haven't fought Trump on policy. Many of them have, and it's also worth noting that substantial parts of Trump's policy agenda have hit obstacles in federal courts, and not only at the hands of Dem-appointed judges.
It is indeed a sad day. The Trump people will gleefully claim that Trump was right all along and in some respects he was. His re-election chances may have been bolstered. But there is another shoe to drop - the full disclosure of the report itself.
I don't understand the extent of the dejection being expressed. As David Palmeter says, we have no idea what the report contains. Apparently, it is supposed to specify persons who were subject to investigation but not charged, as well as to explain why not. That could be an interesting section, if we ever get to see it.
LFC,
Maybe I should have been more clear instead of frustrated. Of course there are policy differences. But - and there is no doubt this is factually true - 'liberal'/establishment media, and major players across the party, have insisted that a primary cause, if not THE primary cause, of Clinton's loss, was due to foreign machinations tantamount to a Hollywood spy thriller (which makes sense when people can't read or think anymore except through the prism of screens). It is now clear, despite the 'hopes and prayers' of some liberals, that that was not the case. That needs to be recognized even if it is a hard pill to swallow. As some of us lefties have been arguing for years, 2016 was an anti-establishment election. The establishment lost. Instead of looking in the mirror (I won't call out names) establishment proponents sought out a miracle for an explanation. That explanation has officially failed them. If Trump is to lose again, he must lose to an equally anti-establishment candidate. Which means defeating him on claims of anti-establishment policy, not claims that he's somehow more cunning than Kevin Spacey in House of Cards.
Weird my whole post didn't go through. Here's the rest of it.
Wallerstein,
"Of course you can't win them all, and this probably tends to show not that you are incredibly gifted, but that the established wisdom is generally intellectually dishonest and slothful."
Haha, you're exactly right. I don't consider being correct an indication that I have superior intellectual skills (I don't), only that, as you rightfully say, the establishment nexus between parties and media platforms is at best a spectacle of horse shit covered in glitter and failing libidos!
Talha,
Yes. Oh yes.
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