RNC sets up "war room" to destroy Comey

James Comey's much anticipated book, A Higher Loyalty:   Truth, Lies, and Leadership, will not be officially published until next Tuesday.   But copies have been leaked to the media, and it has been a major topic of discussion already for two days now.

Not only that, the Republican National Committee, apparently designated to take the lead in trying to destroy Comey's credibility as the chief Republican defense, has set up a "war room," and a web site dedicated to slamming Comey through personal attacks.

President Trump jumped into the fray Friday morning with tweets, calling Comey a "weak and untruthful slime ball" and "a proven LEAKER and LIAR."   "Time has proven . . . that he was a terrible Director of the FBI.   His handling of the Crooked Hillary Clinton case .  . . will go down as one of the worst 'botch jobs' of history.  It was my great honor to fire James Comey."

In a sense, Comey set the tone with some of his language criticizing President Trump.   If you really want to have a book that takes the high road, worthy of your vaunted reputation for probity and integrity, you probably shouldn't say that the president reminds you of a mob boss in the way that he runs his organization.  Or comment about the size of his hands and the "realness" of his hair.

Remember that it was Comey who rushed to the hospital where his boss, Attorney General John Ashcroft, lay gravely ill and was about to be pressured by President George W. Bush's chief of staff and White House counsel, to sign off on a reauthorization of surveillance techniques that he and Ashcroft both felt were outside the law.   Comey's refusal, as Acting AG, to sign it led to a strong stand by top figures in the Justice Department joining him in threatening to resign -- and ultimately to Bush backing down and bucking Cheney himself.

When President Obama later (2013) appointed Comey to be FBI Director, I thought it was a great choice, based on the above proven principles of integrity and willingness to speak truth to power.

But in the whole episode involving Comey's handling the public statements about the Hillary Clinton email investigation -- while refraining from saying that Donald Trump was also under investigation -- showed another side to the man that is less attractive.

I do not think Comey is a bad guy.   I think his reputation for integrity is deserved.   But there is a streak of having his 'saintliness go to his head' that leads him to do things like the different handling of the Clinton and Trump investigations.

In his mind, he saw it that the Clinton investigation was already closed and had so told the congressional committee.   So when he reopened it on finding Anthony Wiener's computer with some of his wife's correspondence with Clinton (whom she worked for), he felt he had to "correct the record" of what he himself had told congress.   Otherwise, he might later be accused of covering up something.

It's that certainty that his integrity must remain so unblemished that it becomes more important than anything else, even if it means -- as Hillary Clinton put it --"changing the course of history."

That's the complex moral conundrum that is James Comey.   Of course that's much too subtle and complex for the Trump base, as well as not nearly damning enough.   So they're setting out to destroy his credibility and his integrity.

The James Comey that the RNC and the Trump White House have gone into full war to destroy is something else.  When asked about it this afternoon, press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders was well prepared.  She usually has notes she glances at from time to time in her press briefings.    But, when asked this, she read from a long written statement that had obviously been prepared with talking points -- the same that are coming from this RNC War Room.   It's obviously a coordinated, carefully crafted narrative.

Sanders accused Comey of leaking classified information [not true] and of lying to congress under oath [not sure what that is a reference to, but congress doesn't seem to think so.] . . .  "Instead of being remembered as a dedicated servant in the pursuit of justice . . . Comey will be forever known as a disgraced partisan hack that broke the sacred trust with the President of the United States . . . "  

She also said:   "One of the few areas of true bipartisan consensus in Washington is Comey has no credibility" [not true].   Kellyanne Conway added her talking point:  "We find Mr. Comey has a revisionist view of history and seems like a disgruntled ex-employee."   She followed this canned statement with that fake smile that says 'we both know I'm lying through my teeth;  just grin and bear it because I've got the upper hand here.'

Of course a lot of Democrats are angry at Comey for what they feel was his role in robbing Clinton of the election;   but their anger and the Republicans' anger are not exactly a consensus.   They're for entirely different reasons.

As reported by CNN, the RNC War Room has a "battle plan:"   They will brand him as "Lyin' Comey" using their website, digital advertising and talking points, which were to have been sent out to Republicans before the book's publication date.   Maybe the publisher got wind of it and leaked the book to get the jump on them.

No doubt they'll stoke up the base and maybe even cast doubts in many more about the veracity of Comey's book.    But their concerted, pre-planned efforts are pretty good evidence of how scared they are of the effect of this tell-all by the man at the center of obstruction of justice charges against the sitting president.
    And well they should be scared.  It's a strong case.   But even that may be overshadowed by the jeopardy for the president of Michael Cohen's records that the federal prosecutors in New York now have.   

Ralph

Max Boot:'What on Earth is Trump saying?'

Veteran Republican journalist, anti-Trump scourge, Max Boot, wrote in yesterday's Washington Post about the bewildering, contradictory messages coming out of Donald Trump's White House.   We can start with the late headline about Trump considering rejoining the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement.   Now there's a real U-turn.

But let's listen to Max Boot:

*     *     *     *     *

"There are few better examples of the terminal confusion gripping the Trtmp administration than the competing headlines published by The Post and The New York Times last Wednesday.   The Post:  'Trump instructs military to begin planning for withdrawal from Syria.'  The Times:  'Trump Drops Push for Immediate Withdrawal of Troops From Syria.'

"Both headline writers were trying in good faith to decipher the undecipherable -- the intentions of our mercurial president, which can change as rapidly as the weather in Rapid City, S.D.   Syrian President Bashar al-Assad may have believed that President Trump was really pulling out and thus felt free to apparently use chemical weapons against the city of Douma this past Saturday.   But after years spent criticizing President Barack Obama for sacrificing surprise in military strikes, Trump announced that U.S. missiles -- 'nice and new and smart!' -- would soon be striking Syria.

"If [Assad] can't figure out Trump, he is hardly alone.  It is not just that Trump changes his mind often, although he does.  It is also that, when he speaks his mind, it is often impossible to figure out what he's saying.   Here is Trump speaking last week:  'Nobody's been tougher on Russia than I have . . . And with that being said, I think I could have a very good relationship with President Putin . . . Getting along with Russia is a good thing. . .  And if I did that would be a great thing.   And there's also a possibility that that won't happen.   Who knows?  Okay?'   Who knows, indeed.

"Trump's ramblings about Vladimir Putin were positively pellucid in their clarity compared with his March 29 comments on the U.S.-South Korea trade deal:  'So we've redone it, and that's going to level the playing field on steel and cars and trucks coming into this country.   And I may hold it up till after a deal is made with North Korea.   Does everybody understand that?   You know why, right?  You know why?   Because it's a very strong card.'

"I have asked numerous Korea experts what this is supposed to mean, and no one has any idea.   Why would Trump want to hold up a trade deal with South Korea to gain leverage over North Korea?   Maybe he is planning to make such massive concessions to Kim Jong Un that he will need to bludgeon Seoul into acquiescing.  Or maybe he was simply confusing North and South Korea -- a mistake he has made before.  Who can keep all those Koreas straight?

"Most presidents enter office knowing relatively little about foreign policy and learn a lot on the job.  Trump knew less than any of his predecessors and has learned less than any of them.  The perpetual fog that clouds [Trump's] thinking has not lifted an inch;  if anything, it is becoming ever more impenetrable.

"This is what happens when you are functionally illiterate:   Trump can read in theory but chooses not to, and therefore he is incapable of sustained learning.  As The Post reported, 'He rarely if ever reads the President's Daily Brief, a document that lays out the most pressing information collected by U.S. intelligence agencies from hot spots around the world.'

"Instead of relying on the written word, Trump relies on the nitwits who opine on the Fox News channel.  I've previously suggested that Fox News is Trump's RT [the Russian government's propaganda tv station], but that's not quite right:   Putin is too smart to believe what his own propagandists say.   Not Trump.  If 'Fox and Friends' tells him that a 'caravan' of Central American refugees is about to invade the United States, Trump will faithfully echo their hysteria.  He even seeks out Sean Hannity and Lou Dobbs off air for their fortune-cookie insights.

"Trump is proud of his lack of 'book learnin'.'  During the 2016 campaign, he bragged . . . 'that he does not need to read extensively because he reaches the right decisions 'with very little knowledge other than the knowledge I [already] had, plus the words 'common sense.'  In practice Trump's policies defy any kind of sense, common or otherwise.

"He is trying to negotiate a nuclear deal with North Korea -- but at the same time he is threatening to tear up the one with Iran.   He has threatened a trade war against China -- but at the same time he needs China's help to coerce North Korea into making a deal.   He is intent on withdrawing from the Iran nuclear accord because he is so worried about Iran -- but at the same time he is handing Syria over to Iran on a silver platter.  Or at least he was before the latest apparent chemical attack.   Now he's preparing to bomb Syria as a prelude to either greater engagement or disengagement.  With the 'very stable genius' in charge, who knows what's going to happen next?

"Trump prides himself on unpredictability;  but, as the attack in Syria showed, there is a price to be paid for leaving allies and enemies alike guessing about your intentions."

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Well . . .  where does this leave us?   Being tossed about in a storm at sea, with no one manning the helm.   And that's the foreign policy arena.   At home?    Not much better.   

And overshadowing it all, at home and abroad, there's all the corruption, the incompetence, the absence of advisers in key positions.    And Mueller closing in.

And James Comey's book about to be released.

Ralph

Trump-world in a heap of trouble

Jane Coaston of Vox.com pointed out a single paragraph in a New York Times story by Matt Apuzzo that -- thoughtfully read -- is a shockingly revealing distillation of the breadth and depth of trouble the Trump World is in.

Here's that paragraph, which is from an article about the news of the FBI raid into the offices and home of Trump's personal lawyer and fixer, Michael Cohen.

"The searches open a new front for the Justice Department in its scrutiny of Mr. Trump and his associates.   His longtime lawyer is being investigated in Manhattan; his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, is facing scrutiny by prosecutors in Brooklyn;  his campaign chairman is under indictment;  his former national security adviser has pleaded guilty to lying;  and a pair of former campaign aides are cooperating with Mr. Mueller.   Mr. Mueller, meanwhile, wants to interview Mr. Trump about possible obstruction of justice."

Wow.

Ralph

News stomping out news

We had Scott Pruitt right in the crosshairs, where public opinion was beginning to shift from not caring to insisting that he must be fired.   And then . . .

We had the FBI raid of Michael Cohen's office and home.

We had the Trump meltdown over that and his increased threat to fire Mueller or Rosenstein . . . or maybe Sessions . . . or maybe all three.

We had the Syria crisis and the crisis in our confidence in the commander-in-chief.

We had the Mark Zuckerberg testimony before congressional committees.

And, finally, on Wednesday, we had the announcement from Paul Ryan that he will not seek re-election -- which has prompted tons of news time assessing his accomplishments and lack thereof.

Meanwhile, where is Scott Pruitt?

We MUST  NOT  LET  HIM  SLIP  AWAY under the cover of this avalanche of new news.   Trump doesn't care about the corruption, unless it makes headlines that either embarrass him or overshadow him.   Neither of which is happening right now with all this other news.    We can't let it end there.   Let's make Pruitt the poster boy for corruption.  

Ralph

The FBI raid on Trump lawyer's office; Trump's misconceptions corrected.

In a press opportunity during Trump's meeting with his top military advisers to discuss the Syrian crisis, Trump went on a prolonged rant about the FBI's raid on the office of his long-time personal lawyer and chief "fixer."    He blamed Mueller, Rosenstein, and Sessions, called it a constant witch hunt that he's had to endure since his nomination, and calling the raid "a disgrace," and "an attack on our country."

In doing so, Trump seemed not to grasp the facts of how this came about or who authorized and who actually conducted the raid -- and how the materials were handled.   Claiming that "lawyer-client privilege is dead," Trump's rambling rant had so many falsehoods and misconceptions that it's important to clarify.

1.  How it came about:   In the course of his investigation of Trump's lawyer, Michael Cohen, Mueller apparently came upon some indications of possible illegal activities involving bank fraud, wire fraud, and campaign finance violations -- which he took to Rod Rosenstein.   The decision was that the nature of these charges did not come within the purview of the Mueller mandate, so it was referred to the U.S. Attorney's Office in the Southern District of New York.

It was this US Attorney's office that took up the case, presented sufficient evidence to a magistrate judge to convince the judge to issue a subpoena and to authorize a raid on the offices and home of Michael Cohen.   Cohen's lawyer says this was unnecessary, because Cohen has been cooperating and supplying all the documents that Mueller has requested.

2.  Trump claims the FBI "broke into"Cohen's office:  This is misleading, at best.  "Breaking in" suggests an illegal activity.   They had a subpoena obtained legally after presenting evidence to convince a magistrate judge of the necessity.

Legal analysts suggest that the seriousness of such an action by FBI protocols -- not just raiding a lawyer's office when you're investigating his client, but the client being the president of the United States -- suggests that they had very credible evidence of crime and that it was serious enough, and that perhaps they had some indication that Cohen had not in fact been turning over all his records but holding some things back.

The important thing here is that the FBI and the U.S. Attorneys are serious, non-partisan in their execution of duties -- and that no judge is going to rubber-stamp such a request without very solid reasons.

3.  Trump's claim of a partisan witch hunt:  In his rant, Trump accused them of partisan bias, claiming that "all . .  . or most" of Mueller's team are Democrats.  Yes, in Trump's world, that would probably make a difference.   But not here.  Besides:   Mueller, Rosenstein, and Sessions are all Republicans.   Further, the  U.S. Attorney in the New York office that the case was turned over to was appointed by Trump's Attorney General . . . after an interview with Trump himself (highly unusual) in the Oval Office.

4.  Trump's claim that lawyer-client privilege is dead:   First, there is no lawyer-client privilege when current or future criminal activity is being discussed.   Second, the FBI is scrupulous is such cases to keep non-germane, lawyer-client communications separate and unread by the investigators.    Otherwise, they lose their case in court.

How they handle this is to have two teams in the raid.   One team is the "taint team," which looks at each document to determine whether it pertains to what the warrant authorizes them to take.   Documents are separated into two piles.  Those that have lawyer-client privilege and are not related to the subpoened charges are not seen by the other team or the investigators.  The taint team then has nothing further to do with the case.

5.  Trump's assumption he can end the investigation by firing Mueller:   Naturally, Trump is feeling like a trapped animal at this point.   Michael Cohen has been his fixer who took care of all the messes for him, both personal and in business.   All of this seems threatened to exposure -- and to a lot of legal liability that Trump hoped he had dodged.   He hasn't.   Firing the investigators won't end this.  The evidence doesn't go away.   It would only add to the obstruction of justice charges -- and severe political damage in congress.

Republican Chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee Chuck Grassley said that "It would be suicide" for Trump to fire Mueller.  He advised that "the less the President says about the whole thing, the better off he will be."

6.  Trump is probably right about one thing:   It seems likely to me and to some legal commenters on TV that this is bigger than it might first appear.    I doubt that this is only about the payment to Stormy Daniels.   It seems a good bit of overkill for that.

Michael Cohen was involved in attempts to arrange business deals for Trump in Russia.    The first listed charge category is "bank fraud," which could include money laundering.  It's been long suspected that Trump's real estate empire -- with all his properties for sale, like expensive condos in New York -- is a good place for money launderers to park their money.   To what extent was Trump himself involved in  shady financial dealings?   We don't know.   But Michael Cohen likely knew.

7.  Firing Mueller or Rosenstein won't stop this:   Trump seemed to take this as a new justification for firing Mueller and Rosenstein.    That's the beauty of fielding it out to the U.S,. Attorney's office in New York.   Firing Mueller and Rosenstein would have no effect on this part of their investigation.   It's in other hands -- in fact, as noted above -- in the hands of a Trump-approved appointee.

8.  Michael Cohen's response:  In contrast to President Trump's angry tirade of misinformation and blame, Michael Cohen responded by telling the media that the FBI agents who carried out the raid "were extremely professional, courteous and respectful.  And I thanked them at the conclusion."   He added that the raid "was upsetting to say the least," but he did not fault the agents.  He made no comments about those who ordered it or approved it.

We live in interesting, often exhausting, times.

Ralph

Eclipsed by another breaking news story

And, of course, as is now commonplace in the era of Trump, the story that I worked on to be the blog for today (below) got eclipsed by breaking news of the FBI raid of the home and offices of Donald Trump's personal lawyer/fixer, Michael Cohen.

Undoubtedly, a lot of the records they took will involve Donald Trump -- the business deals Cohen has worked on for him, maybe money laundering, paying women for their silence, etc.  To get warrants to do this, the FBI had to have very strong evidence of criminal activity to convince a judge to issue a subpoena to raid the lawyer for the president of the United States.   Stay tuned.

EPA Inspector General has multiple investigations into Scott Pruitt's activities

The corruption in Scott Pruitt's short term as head of the Environmental Protection Agency sort of boggles my mind.   After President Trump's praise for the man and the "job he's doing," I was relieved to learn that the Inspector General of the EPA has at least five investigations ongoing into its chief.

According to an Associated Press report, IG Arthur Elkins "is now conducting at least five investigative audits related to Pruitt, including a previously undisclosed probe into outsized spending and alleged timesheet abuse by his swollen security detail."

Far more than other cabinet secretaries, and with no greater security reason than what appears to be a paranoid character, Pruitt has a full-time, 20 member security force to provide day and night protection.   The tab to the taxpayers for this alone in his first year amounted to close to $3 million.  A separate report said his predecessor had four or five, part-time security people.

Elkins has also opened an audit into whether Pruitt improperly used authority to grant massive pay raises to two of his closest staff aides.   There are also ongoing investigations into his infamous $43,000 soundproof phone booth, installed in his own office.   (Paranoia doesn't come cheap, when it's somebody else's money, like taxpayers.)

All of this is plenty to get him fired, but what I'm more interested in having examined are his multiple corrupt uses of his office to do business favors for the lobbyist who rented him that single room for $50/night.

The townhome that is the subject of this little scandal is owned by the wife of a lobbyist who represents major natural gas interests.   Two examples of returned favors:

1.  Pruitt approved the extension of a natural gas pipeline (I suppose the EPA had to approve it from the environmental impact standpoint), the owner of which is represented by the lobbyist whose wife owns the famous $50/night condo room.

2.  Somewhat later on, Pruitt took a lavish trip to Morocco with a staff of seven (and an unspecified number of security detail) -- all travelling first class.   They had a layover in Paris and spent a great night on the town.   Then missed their flight to Morocco the next morning and, darn it, had to spend another night in Paris.    What was supposed to have been a four day stay in Morocco got shortened to two;  but the business got done, even though it doesn't sound like government business that taxpayers should have funded.

What was the business?   A major lobbying effort with the head of the Moroccan government to strike a business deal for natural gas with a United States private company.  Now why was the EPA head doing international lobbying to promote natural gas sales?   That is not in his job description, for sure.   He's supposed to be more concerned with how we get it out of the ground and what we do with it then -- and how that affects the environment.   Not selling it to foreign investors to benefit private corporations.

Well, it turns out that there were two connections for Pruitt.   First, Carl Icahn, the iconic hedge fund manager, whom Trump idealizes and who, briefly, was a member of the Trump White House as some sort of regulatory consultant, got the final approval say-so in Trump's hiring of Pruitt for the EPA job.   In other words, as it has been reliably reported, Trump was ready to hire Pruitt but told him he needed to have one more meeting.  And it was with Icahn, who gave his approval, and then Pruitt was hired.  So Pruitt owes his hiring to Icahn.

Second, who owned what was at the time the only company that had the ability to convert natural gas to the form it could be shipped overseas?    Carl Icahn is the major stockholder in the only such company.

Third,  who  was the lobbyist who represented this same natural gas company?   You guessed it.    The husband of the owner of the condo where Pruitt got his sweetheart pad.

I suspect a deep discount on a bedroom was not the only perk that Pruitt got out of this deal.  More likely to be revealed later.

Is this not a corrupt individual who should have no place in our government?   And this doesn't even begin to address what Pruitt is doing to kill every environmental protection regulation he can.   Pruitt's got to go.

Ralph

PS:  Late yesterday, the New York Times learned that the Acting Head of the Office of Government Ethics, David Apol, has called on the EPA's top ethics official to investigate Pruitt's activities.   His letter states:  "The success of our government depends on maintaining the trust of the people we serve. . . .  The American public needs to have confidence that ethics violations, as well as the appearance of ethics violations, are investigated and appropriately addressed.'

Cambridge Analytica whistleblower to cooperate with investigation. Is it the hub linking the Trump campaign and Russia?

The pink-haired computer expert, who has been appearing all over TV in the past few weeks, spilling the beans about Cambridge Analytica, has told the Associated Press that he will cooperate with a Justice Department investigation.

What he can attest to is the plan and circumstances under which the data mining and manipulating company swiped the individual data from 50 million Facebook users -- and then how they used this data in selective ads to influence the 2016 election.

Christopher Wylie is the whistleblower and a former employee of Cambridge Analytica.   Robert Mueller, as well as the Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee, are very interested in anything that might help them determine whether there was any link, through them, between the Trump campaign and Russia.

The billionaire father-daughter Mercers have been major stockholders in Cambridge Analytica, and Steve Bannon was at one time a member of the board.   The Mercers were the chief financiers of Bannon and Breitbart News -- until they cut Bannon loose, when he turned on Trump after his firing from the White House position.

What a tangled mess.   There's got to be a hub in there somewhere -- and once that hub is teased out, then we should find the thread that links the Trump campaign and Russia.   So is there a connection between Cambridge Analytica and all those Russian bots that "bought" those Facebook ads?    Let's hope Christopher Wylie can back up what he's been hinting at on TV.

A note of caution;   The TV appearances I have seen present Wylie as someone who was well-positioned to have behind-the-scenes knowledge of what went on.  However, HuffPost's article on it referred to him as having "helped found" the Cambridge Analytica company and "worked for them until 2014."

That suggests he was not on the inside during the run-up to the 2016 election.  I'd like to get some clarification on this point before we get too excited about this.  None of what I've found thus far mentions when or why he left Cambridge Analytica, where he had been Director of Research.

On the other hand, Wylie has already testified before the British Parliament, which felt he had useful information to share about influence on the Brexit vote.  And he is now scheduled to meet with the US House Intelligence Committee.   He apparently has some documentary evidence, not just his word, about all of this.

So, stay tuned.

Ralph

Trans bathroom choice upheld in Alaska

German Lopez of Vox.com reports that "voters in Anchorage, Alaska, have defeated an anti-transgender bathroom measure.

"Proposition 1 would have required everyone in Anchorage public spaces to use the locker room and bathroom that aligns with the gender they were assigned at birth -- effectively barring trans people from using the facility that matches their gender identity."

Voters defeated the measure 53%-47% according to the Anchorage Daily News -- which leaves in place existing protections that were approved by the Anchorage Assembly in 2015.

Brava/Bravo to Alaska . . .  well, to the city of Anchorage, Alaska anyway.