Why is Trump picking a trade fight with our best friend Canada?

MSNBC's Ari Belcher did a segment on the trade fight that President Trump has picked with Canada.   The question is:  Why is he doing it?

We share the longest common border of any two countries in the world.   We have a long history of close friendship and common cause.  Canadian military have fought alongside ours in numerous wars, including Afghanistan.

When it comes to trade, the bridge between Detroit and Windsor, Ontario carries more exchange of goods between our countries than any other one portal in the world.

So Trump began this debacle by proclaiming that Canada "treats us very unfairly" in trade.  He claims that we have a huge trade deficit with them.   And he slapped tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminum.

No only is this untrue -- Trump is cherry-picking his figures -- but it was a big insult to our best friends.  Here are the facts on the numbers:

If goods alone are considered, we do have a $17.5 billion deficit in a $600 billion trade package.   But, if you consider both goods and services, we have an $8.4 billion trade surplus.   And if you look at individual products, we have a trade surplus in agricultural products and in steel.

So what's the big deal that you want to not only start a trade war, but also insult our best friends?   And Canadians have taken it as an insult and are reacting strongly, though with typical Canadian restraint and decorum, unlike the rude, vulgarian from Queens.

Ari interviewed Bruce Heyman, U.S. ambassador to Canada from 2014 through the end of Obama's term.   He had this to say:

"If you look at this in the larger context of our relationship with Canada, the differences are small.   What the president did with tariffs on steel and aluminum is just like you're sitting with your best friend, and you just punched him in the face while you're having a discussion about who's going to pick up the check or where you're going afterwards."

It just doesn't make any sense.   But then does anything Donald Trump does make sense to us?    He may be following some "gut" feeling that this will be good.    But it's often nonsense to others.

Canadians, being generally polite people, have tempered their outrage.  But there is no question they are upset, angry, and hurt.   Even while being more outspoken than usual in self-defense, their action is to say they will impose targeted sanctions on U.S. products, using specific congressional districts, etc. to put pressure on specific politicians   But they also said they would postpone implementing it for period of time to allow for a negotiated compromise.

Could we please trade Donald Trump for Justin Trudeau as our president?  I abhor what he represents -- and, like it or not, he represents me, and you, and all of us when he acts as president of the United States.   Every day he does something that makes me want to leap up and shout:   "Hell, no!   Not in my name."

Ralph

Trump in fight with G-7 allies

President Trump goes to Quebec City for a meeting tomorrow of the G-7 leaders of the world's industrial democracies (who are also our allies).  Typically, he is fighting with our friends, while cozying up to leaders of our adversaries.   Here's a portion of what reporter Damian Paletta wrote for the Washington Post:

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"QUEBEC CITY — French President Emmanuel Macron on Thursday threatened to join with other world leaders to issue a rare rebuke of the United States at a global summit here this weekend, drawing immediate and sharp replies from President Trump.

"Macron threatened to exclude the United States from the joint statement issued every year at the end of the Group of Seven summit of industrial democracies, as part of an international pushback against Trump’s efforts to change trade rules. 

“'The American President may not mind being isolated, but neither do we mind signing a 6 country agreement if need be,' Macron wrote on Twitter. 'Because these 6 countries represent values, they represent an economic market which has the weight of history behind it and which is now a true international force.' 

"Trump responded by accusing Macron and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau of hurting the United States with unfair trade practices. Trump also said Trudeau is 'being so indignant,' an unusually personal attack aimed at one of the U.S.’s closest allies. 

"'Please tell Prime Minister Trudeau and President Macron that they are charging the U.S. massive tariffs and create nonmonetary barriers. The EU trade surplus with the U.S. is $151 Billion, and Canada keeps our farmers and others out. Look forward to seeing them tomorrow,' Trump wrote. . . . 

"The exchange highlighted President Trump’s contrasting negotiating approaches to allies and adversaries. The president traded barbs with the French president just hours after his administration relaxed its punishment of the Chinese telecom company ZTE, a concession that could pave the way for a trade deal with China.

"Leaders in Europe, Canada and Mexico are furious over Trump’s invocation of national security to justify tariffs on their exports of steel and aluminum to the United States. When the president arrives Friday in Quebec, he will find U.S. alliances badly frayed, turning Trump’s tariffs into the focus of the G-7 summit.

"Those tensions boiled over in recent days during testy presidential phone calls with British Prime Minister Theresa May, Trudeau and Macron.  In contrast, Trump has shown a willingness to conciliate China in hopes of a trade deal he can bill as a major achievement. 

“'The traditional definition of allies is certainly being called into question,' said Douglas Rediker, executive chairman of International Capital Strategies, a financial advisory firm.  'If you look at it holistically, then it doesn’t make sense. But it’s consistent with the purely transactional nature of this president and the political imperative of being seen as cutting a big deal on a big issue. . . .” 

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There's more, but this captures the essence of Trump's brutish behavior with our closest allies and friends.   It's embarrassing.   I hope they call him on his factual inaccuracies.   It'll be interesting to see if he is any more conciliatory and diplomatic and collegial in person.   Let's hope so.   This is not a group that usually fights;  we share common interests for the most part, and differences are worked out in non-hostile ways.

Ralph

Friday morning addition:  As he was leaving Washington to travel to the G-7 meeting, President Trump made a statement saying that Russia should be readmitted to the G-7 meeting.    The group expelled Russia after its annexation of Crimea.   This introduces even more tension and divisiveness in the group, which sees as one of its goals the fostering world order.   Invasion and takeover of another country does not fit that goal.   And, once again, here is Trump siding with Russia against our allies.

Reading the primary election tea leaves

Vox.com's Matthew Yglesias looked at results from Tuesday's primary elections and came up with the prediction that Democrats will have a narrow lead in November -- but enough to take control of the House of Representatives.    Read it in his own words:

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"Tuesday night's California primary election results confirm that, as best we can tell, Democrats are on track to secure a narrow House majority in the 21018 midterms.    Here's how we know.

"Under California's "top two" primary system, it's possible to look at any given district and see the total number of votes for the Republican candidates and for the Democratic candidates.   [In this system, all candidates, regardless of party, compete in one primary;  the top two finishers then are on the general election ballot, even if they are from the same political party].  In the crowded CA-49 primary, for example, Republican candidates as a whole netted 48% of the vote to Democrats 51%. . . .

"We know from history that there's a systematic relationship between the cumulative primary ballot performance and general election performance in November, with Democrats usually doing a percentage point or two better in the general election because that's when more young people vote.

"Based on how Democrats performed overall in the primary, we can project what California's general election results will probably look like.  And even though California is obviously not a microcosm of the entire United States, there is a systematic relationship between the state's election results and national results.

"The way Nate Cohn calculated it for the Upshot:   'Democrats would be favored to win control of the House if they could gain an average of 4.5 points across the country, according to our estimates.   A 3.5 point improvement between the 2016 general election and the California top-two primary results might put them on track to do so.'

"And guess what?   Across the seven key targeted races, Democrats secured an average swing of 5 points -- enough to be favored for the majority.

"Now, to be clear, using results in seven seats to project the outcome in 435 seats is a dangerous business.   There's a lot of uncertainty here, and while the odds favor the Democrats, they do not do so overwhelmingly.

"But this is about as good a method as looking at generic ballot polling.  It's significant that generic ballot polling also tells roughly the same story.   Democrats are more likely than not to secure a narrow House majority, but the odds are not overwhelming.

"Special election results, again, tell a similar story.  Democrats have, on average, made big gains here (though with a lot of variance from state to state).   But in special elections, they have the luxury, by definition, of running in an open seat.  Accounting for incumbency effects, the large Democratic edge in special elections translates to a small edge in the overall race."

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So, the word is:   the results from this week's primaries in eight states are favorable for Democrats' winning back control of the House -- but it's not a blue wave.    So don't get complacent.   Get to work.   It's do-able, but it could easily slip through our fingers.

And with Donald Trump as president, who knows what will happen?   On the other hand, there's Bob Mueller and his dogged investigation.  We don't know what will happen there this summer.

The other factor -- which is often the biggest electoral factor -- is the economy.   Right now, it's good.    Unemployment is at near record lows;   stocks at record highs.   Trump will trumpet "his" success;   but it just follows the steady economic growth and jobs picture that began under President Obama eight years ago.   And, most important, worker's wages have not kept pace with the economic boom for the wealthy and the corporations.

Ralph

Bake me a cake . . . as slow as you can.

On Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court gave its decision on an appeal from a Colorado baker who had refused to make a wedding cake for a gay couple based on his own religious views that oppose gay marriage.

The two men had appealed to the Colorado Civil Rights Commission (CCRC), which decided in favor of the gay couple, saying that the baker had violated the Colorado anti-discrimination law that bars businesses from refusing service based on race, sex, marital status or sexual orientation.

SCOTUS reversed that decision by 7 to 2, finding that the commission had not given the baker a fair, unbiased hearing due to the very hostile views toward the baker's religious beliefs expressed by one commissioner in the hearing -- who had likened his religious views to slavery and the Holocaust.   In addition, the opinion cited the fact that the commission had ordered the baker to undergo anti-discrimination training.

What this seems to say is that, in arguing against anti-gay discrimination, at least one CCRC commissioner had exhibited anti-religious bias, i.e., had violated the baker's 1st amendment rights.

The SCOTUS opinion made it clear, however, that other similar cases that test the wider principle -- the one that arises when religious freedom of expression collides with anti-gay discrimination in the world of commerce -- "must await further elaboration" in other cases.

While not spelled out explicitly, I believe the justices were struggling with the fact that this is a very poor case upon which to make a decision that would bring sweeping social change.    The baker made it clear that he was not opposed to selling to gay people and would have sold them any ready-made cake he had.

Second, the Civil Rights Commission hearing sounds like a travesty of respectful discourse about clashing ideals.   Justice Kennedy says, in effect, please, let's find a better case in which to  move this clash of major principles forward.   And treat each other with respect.

I believe the justices are trying to go slowly on a very controversial clash between two principles important in our society.   Justice Kennedy, who wrote the majority opinion, found a narrow but decisive aspect of this particular case that allowed him to forge a large majority.     This is part of the inside SCOTUS thinking about decisions that will bring sweeping changes in society.

It keeps the issue alive, to be decided another day in another case, meanwhile allowing public opinion to evolve.  And it does explicitly affirm the right of states to protect gay citizens from discrimination.  The opinion states:  "gay persons and gay couples cannot be treated as social outcasts or as inferior in dignity and worth."

But, once again, it tells gay people they have to wait for full equality in our society.   On the other hand, some religious groups have also been told for centuries that they are not acceptable in our society:  in our country alone, that has applied at times to Jews, to Catholics, to Muslims, as well as other smaller groups.

Here is part of Kennedy's opinion, which was joined by conservatives Roberts, Thomas, Alito,  and Gorsuch;   and by liberals Breyer and Kagan.   Justices Ginsberg and Sotomayor dissented.

"The outcome of cases like this in other circumstances must await further elaboration in the courts, all in the context of recognizing that these disputes must be resolved with tolerance, without undue disrespect to sincere religious beliefs, and without subjecting gay persons to indignities when they seek goods and services in an open market."

In other words, we have to find a way to balance these two, sometimes, conflicting principles.  Obviously, different people, different justices, are going to find that balance line as either closer to one principle or to the other principle.    It is changing over time toward non-discrimination; but that is a slow process, unacceptable to most people who are subject to the discrimination.  It's also true that more and more religious people are themselves opposing such discrimination.

What isn't being much discussed yet in this case -- as must be in such clashes of principles -- is the relative degree of harm or deprivation between the two principles.    In my view, there's no room for equivocation at all when it comes to slavery -- pitting "property rights" against a human being's basic freedom and control of his own person.

I'd also be suspicious of any argument against selling a ready-made cake to a gay person.    The decorating of a cake puts a wrinkle in it, moreso when the baker considers himself a creative artist, and therefore the product is a expression of himself in some way.

It seems fatuous to many of us that the religious right is now trying to cast their case as one of "anti-religious discrimination," claiming that their rights to expression of their religious beliefs are being curtailed -- when it's only the right to discriminate and hurt others that is being curtailed.

What about the principle that "your rights end where my nose begins"?   We'd all probably agree on that when it comes to violent acts.   It's trickier when it comes to things like opinions and identity. What about when your "right" means I can't freely be who I am?   Or can't have what others have because of who I am?

OK, but the baker isn't saying you can't have a wedding cake;  he's just saying he can chose whether to make it specifically for you, decorated to express something for you that he does not endorse.  Even so, the baker is not stopping you from getting someone else to make it.

It seems to me that the line has to take into account whether the artist is engaged in a creative, unique endeavor, involving his own feelings.  Is so, you may be near the permissible line for him to say whether he will do the job for a particular person.    You can require that any generic cake be for sale to anyone.   But can you require an artist to generate, using his own feelings, something he does not, cannot, feel?   Or toward which he has negative feelings that would interfere with his ability to do the creative work that you want?

A significant ancillary fact is that gay people don't get a level playing field.  Colorado is one of only 21 states with a law that forbids discrimination in public accommodates based on sexual orientation.  Only 20 states prohibit anti-gay discrimination in employment.   And the federal government does neither.

Let's clarify what this SCOTUS decision did NOT do, because some people are seeing it as more negative than it is.    It does not take away anything that we already have.   It is disappointing because it did not bring the positive change we hoped for;  and, at best, in its opinions, it moves a little bit forward, but very slowly.  It left the big question yet to be answered -- even though I think it implies that the opinion writer expects that it will be answered in a satisfactory way . . . in time.

As Emory University law professor was quoted on CNN:  "The Supreme Court (respectfully) kicked the can down the road."

Ralph

Renowned Columbia Univ. economist says Trump's erratic trade decisions show him mentally unfit; should invoke the 25th.

Jeffrery Sachs is a renowned Columbia University professor of economics who heads its Center for Sustainable Development and serves as a senior adviser at the United Nations.

According to Mary Papenfuss, reporter for HuttPost, Sachs "has criticized Trump’s economic actions several times. Earlier this year, he said the president’s tariffs prove he 'flunked economics' and makes 'primitive errors because he hasn't a clue as to how the world economy works.'" 

Papenfuss also quotes Sachs from previous criticisms of Trump, saying: "whatever US steel producers might gain from a trade war would be offset by the losses to steel users and consumers, plus the social costs of protecting uncompetitive jobs."

Sachs has labeled the massive tax cuts and budget deficits as part of the war of rich Americans on the poor that he describes as "unbelievable in any serious country."

So Jeffrey Sachs has long been a critic of President Trump. Now he has written a piece for CNN's web site that is extremely sobering. We've been hearing this from others; but now it's coming from a renowned economist saying that Trump is unfit to be president, based on the area in which Sachs himself is a world-recognized expert: world economic factors. Here is Jeffrey Sach's recommendation:

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"Maybe Donald Trump really is the Manchurian Candidate, a stooge of some foreign potentate. Much more likely, Trump is just mentally unstable and narcissistic.

"Whichever it is, Trump is rapidly destroying American global leadership, alliances, and interests. Wednesday's announcement of new tariffs on steel and aluminum exports from Canada, Mexico, and the European Union is the latest bizarre and self-destructive move.

"I have just returned from a trip to Europe. Across Europe, there was not a single word of respect for Trump. The constant refrain was extreme puzzlement and deep consternation. How did America fall so far so fast? What do we need to do to survive?

"Trump's so-called policies are not really policies. Trade wars are on, off, on hold, on again, within the span of days. Summits are on, canceled, or maybe on. Foreign companies are sanctioned today and rescued the next. He says one day he would like to see overseas troops called home soon, and tells them to stay the next. Global agreements and rules are ripped to shreds. Trump's garbled syntax and disorganized thoughts are impossible to follow.

"The US has probably never before had a delusional President, one who speaks gibberish, insults those around him including his closest associates, and baffles the world. By instinct, we strive to make sense of Trump's nonsense, inplicitly assuming some hidden strategy. There is none.

"Trump's trade actions are blatantly illegal. They are flimsily justified as an act of national security, but this is sheer nonsense. They are also fatuous in terms of US economic and geopolitical interests. Harming our closest allies, raising the prices on key intermediate products, and provoking retaliation cannot possibly deliver higher wages, better jobs, or an improved trade balance. Trump's latest notion to slap tariffs on German automobiles would be even more damaging geopolitically.

"Trump creates chaos for no reason other than his own flagrant inability to follow rules or respect the interests of others. His is a psychopath's trade war. The result will be to undermine the long-term role of the dollar, ratchet up the public debt, and undermine the current expansion through a spiral of protectionist measures and rising uncertainties for business.

"Trump's casual threats of a hot war with Iran or North Korea if his various demands are not met are of course even more dangerous.

"The real answer to Trump's trade (and other) policies is the 25th Amendment. Trump is unwell and unfit to be President. He is a growing threat to the nation and the world.

"The emperor had no clothes. This President has no sense."

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Although they have not yet spoken out publicly about it, word has leaked out that both Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan -- as well as many Republicans in Congress -- are quite concerned about these latest tariffs on our allies.

Of course, since Trump is so easy with reversing what he did or said yesterday, he can respond simply by lifting the tariffs even before they go into effect. That won't solve the larger problem or the larger threat of having an unfit president.

Sachs doesn't mention two other recent actions by Trump that could be added to his case. Perhaps his article was written before these occurred. In trying to justify his tariff on Canadian steel, Trump repeated what he's said before: that they're taking advantage of us in trade and we have this big trade deficit with Canada. In fact, it's a simple fact that we have a rather large trade surplus with Canada. So that was either an outright lie, or ignorance that's incompatible with being fit to handle our trade policy.

The other fact was Trump's violation of the rule that, when new economic data, like the unemployment/new jobs report is due, the administration does not speak about it for at least an hour after the report is released. This is to avoid any political influence on the markets, which respond, often dramatically, to such reports.

But, as president, Trump was briefed on the report the night before. So at 7:31 am he tweeted out: "Looking forward to the new jobs report at 8:30." And the markets responded, inferring from Trump's tone that the report would be good. That is exactly why we have the rule not to do that.

It makes little difference whether he did it our of ignorance or willfully to benefit his wealthy friends -- that is a forbidden act and for good reason. It's a form of insider trading. People go to jail for it.

Ralph

". . . bordering on presidential."

Comedian Bill Maher, referring to the tweet Rosanne Barr sent out with a racial slur against Valerie Jarrett that was so vile that it got Rosanne fired and her show cancelled.

Maher described the tweet as:   "so full of racism, conspiracy theories and personal attacks they were described as abhorrent, bordering on presidential."

Trump's legal memo a recipe for tyranny

The memo in question is really two separate memos:   one was written last June 2017;  the later one was in January 2018.   The lawyers signing the memo are Jay Sekulow and John Dowd -- so it doesn't involve his current two leading lawyers:    Emmett Flood and Rudy Giuliani, which raises the question of why release it now?   And does it still represent the team's legal thinking?

For what it's worth, though, here are some main points from the combined memos, which may or may not still be considered significant by the Trump team.   Conventional wisdom among journalists following this closely seems to be coming down in favor of it having been leaked by the Trump team itself because they want to put these issues out there in the "court of public opinion."

That fits with what seems to be Giuliani's role:   going on TV and spinning the news to sway public opinion to discredit the Mueller investigation and question any report that results from the investigation.

As one tv commentator said on Sunday:  the purpose seems to be to get this all out into the public arena;   get any anger about it out now, so that when something big happens later on, people will already be fed up with the controversy and won't care.

So what are the take-away points from the memo?    This is based on MSNBC news programs with various legal guests who gave opinions about legal questions.

1.    The document acknowledges that President Trump played a major part in crafting the press release put out as he was flying back from Europe just after the story had broken about the June 2016 meeting in Trump Tower with the Russians promising "dirt on Hillary Clinton."   The PR release was put out in Don, Jr.'s name, and it said that the meeting was primarily about adoption of Russian children.
     Thus, we have an admission of an untruth being told by the president, although experts think there may be wiggle room, given that he was not in the room and was going on what others told him.    But then he throws them under the bus if they lied to him.

2.  The document, according to a range of legal expertsd, including Lawrence Tribe, is written in language and using such specious argument that it obviously was not written by top legal thinkers.   For example, it asserts outmoded interpretations of some issues that have since been overruled by the courts.
     My thought about that is that, yes, they many not be the top legal minds;  but it also may be true that, in this case, there just is not a good legal case to be made, so they fall back on half-baked, outmoded reasoning.

3.  The overall thrust of the argument is a very expansive presidential power that would essentially make the president a king.    This includes:
     a.  The assertion that a president cannot commit obstruction of justice because he has the power to put an end to any case, for any reason or for no reason, since he is in charge of the entire justice system.
     b.  The assertion that a president cannot be forced to testify under subpoena because he can just put an end to the case (see a).
     c.  Rudy Giuliani has added to these his own interpretation that asserts that the president "probably" could pardon himself.  He did acknowledge that it would probably lead to impeachment if he did;  and, by the way, he's not going to do that.
      So the sum and substance of the Trump team's interpretation is that he has no legal jeopardy, because essentially the president is above the law.   In fact, it's only a small stretch to say that he is the law.   If that's what the Founding Fathers intended, why did they bother to fight a war to become independent from King George III? 

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Here's how Matthew Iglesias reported the matter for Vox.com:
     "Essentially all presidents sooner or later end up commissioning lawyers to put forward an expansive view of presidential power, but those lawyers take pains to argue that they are not making the case for a totally unchecked executive whose existence would pose a fundamental threat to American values.

"Donald Trump, however, is a different kind of president.

"In a 20-page memo written by Trump's legal team . . . they make an unusually frank case for a tyrannical interpretation of presidential power.

"The key passage in the memo is one in which Trump's lawyers argue that not only was there nothing shady going on when FBI Director James Comey got fired, there isn't even any potential shadiness to investigate because the president is allowed to be as shady as he wants to be when it comes to overseeing federal law enforcement.   He can fire whoever he wants.   Shut down any investigation or open up a new one. . . . 

"This is a particularly extreme version of the "unitary executive" doctrine that conservative legal scholars sometimes appeal to . . . drawing on the notion that the executive branch of government -- including the federal police agencies and federal prosecutors -- are a single entity personified by the president.

"But to push that logic into this terrain would not only give the president casrte blanche to persecute his enemies but essentially vitiate the idea that there are any enforceable laws at all.

"Consider that if the memo is correct, there would be nothing wrong with Trump setting up a booth somewhere in Washington, DC where wealthy individuals could hand checks to Trump, and in exchange, Trump would make whatever federal legal trouble they are in go away.   You could call it 'The Trump Hotel' or maybe bundle a room to stay in along with the legal impunity.

"Having cut your check, you'd then have carte blanche to commit bank fraud or dump toxic waste in violation of the Clean Water Act or whatever else you want to do.  Tony Soprano could get the feds off his case, and so could the perpetrators of the next Enron fraud or whatever else.

"Perhaps most egregiously, since Washington, DC isn't a state, all criminal law here is federal criminal law, so the president could have his staff murder opposition party senators and inconvenient judges and then block any investigation into what's happening.

"Of course, as the memo notes, to an extent this kind of power to undermine the rule of law already exists in the form of the essentially unlimited pardon power. . . .  Trump has started using the power abusively and capriciously early in his tenure in office in a disturbing way, but has not yet tried to pardon his way out of the Russia investigation in part because there is one important limit on the pardon power -- you have to do it in public.   The only check on pardons is political, but the political check is quite real . . .  and the new theory that Trump can simply make whole investigations vanish would eliminate it.

"Much of the argument about Trump and the rule of law has focused rather narrowly on the particular case of Comey's firing and the potential future dismissal of Robert Mueller.

"These are important questions, in the sense that an FBI Director is an important person and a special counsel investigation is an important matter;  but the memo is a reminder that they offer much too narrow a view of what the real extent of the problem is here.

"One of the main purposes of the government is to protect the weak from exploitation at the hands of the strong by making certain forms of misconduct illegal.  Trump's assertion that he can simply waive-away investigations into misconduct because he is worried that the investigation might end badly for his friends or family members is toxic to the entire scheme.   Trump, like most presidents, has plenty of rich and powerful friends and a much longer list of rich and powerful people who would like to be his friends.

"If he really does have the power to just make anyone's legal trouble go away because he happens to feel likt it, then we're all in a world of trouble."

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All in all, the Trump lawyers' memo is a poorly reasoned, unlawyerly document.  But those aren't the lawyers in charge now.   It will probably become clear eventually why they leaked it now -- to get rid of it?   or to desensitize the public to its eventual use?    But that is really a more interesting question to me than the substance of the document, which seems patently unsupportable in a Supreme Court argument.

We don't know what position on any of this Trump's new lawyer Emmett Flood is taking, because he has made no public statements, either written or oral.   Giuliani's role has become clear;   he is the "tv lawyer" who goes on air daily to create chaos, give out mixed messages, and generally to keep people talking about it but without any clarity or closure.  If there is a strategy to this, they hope, by creating such confusion and doubt, that when Mueller's damning report comes out, people will not know whether to believe it and will just shrug it off.

Ralph