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Mueller report finding on obstruction confusing to everyone but a lawyer!

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independentusa

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From what I understand is that Mueller report says first that he sent the report for the congress to decide on if the evidence was sufficient for a finding of obstruction. OKay, understand that. His reasoning for doing that seems convoluted or at least lawyer talk. He says he is following the DOJ directive that he can not indict a sitting president. So yo come to the conclusion that the evidence was sufficient to say the president was guilty of obstruction would put the president in the position of not being able to defend himself, as the only way the president could do so would be in a court of law and since the president can not be indicted, that is not open to the president. So it seems that Mueller left it up to the congress to make that decision, or in this case it seems the DOJ, who said a president could not ever be guilty of obstruction as he is the president. I think everyone was hoping that Mueller would be more forthcoming and either let Trump off the hook entirely or find him guilty.
 
independentusa said:
From what I understand is that Mueller report says first that he sent the report for the congress to decide on if the evidence was sufficient for a finding of obstruction. OKay, understand that. His reasoning for doing that seems convoluted or at least lawyer talk. He says he is following the DOJ directive that he can not indict a sitting president. So yo come to the conclusion that the evidence was sufficient to say the president was guilty of obstruction would put the president in the position of not being able to defend himself, as the only way the president could do so would be in a court of law and since the president can not be indicted, that is not open to the president. So it seems that Mueller left it up to the congress to make that decision, or in this case it seems the DOJ, who said a president could not ever be guilty of obstruction as he is the president. I think everyone was hoping that Mueller would be more forthcoming and either let Trump off the hook entirely or find him guilty.
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And the founding fathers created impeachment for this very reason. Trump did everything he could to stop the investigation because he feared it would uncover other criminal activity not related to Russian collusion. He already has serious problems in the Southern District of New York.

Democrats should grow a pair and impeach him.
 
SonOfDaedalus said:
And the founding fathers created impeachment for this very reason. Trump did everything he could to stop the investigation because he feared it would uncover other criminal activity not related to Russian collusion. He already has serious problems in the Southern District of New York.

Democrats should grow a pair and impeach him.
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Agreed. PLEEEEEEEEEASE DEMAND that the House IDIOT-O-CRATS start impeachment proceedings!!

PLEEEEEEEEEEEEASE.....
 
independentusa said:
From what I understand is that Mueller report says first that he sent the report for the congress to decide on if the evidence was sufficient for a finding of obstruction. OKay, understand that. His reasoning for doing that seems convoluted or at least lawyer talk. He says he is following the DOJ directive that he can not indict a sitting president. So yo come to the conclusion that the evidence was sufficient to say the president was guilty of obstruction would put the president in the position of not being able to defend himself, as the only way the president could do so would be in a court of law and since the president can not be indicted, that is not open to the president. So it seems that Mueller left it up to the congress to make that decision, or in this case it seems the DOJ, who said a president could not ever be guilty of obstruction as he is the president. I think everyone was hoping that Mueller would be more forthcoming and either let Trump off the hook entirely or find him guilty.
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It is available to BE READ YOURSELF....but firing Comey CAN NOT BE OBSTRUCTION, because NOTHING WAS OBSTRUCTED...and any President can fire any FBI Director for ANY REASON, or NO REASON.

TALKING ABOUT FIRING Mueller, Rosenstein, WHOEVER, is NOT "Obstruction" either.



https://www.justice.gov/storage/report.pdf
 
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Grokmaster said:
Agreed. PLEEEEEEEEEASE DEMAND that the House IDIOT-O-CRATS start impeachment proceedings!!

PLEEEEEEEEEEEEASE.....
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Be careful what you ask for. If it turns out that the only way to get to the full report for Congress is to subpoena under the auspices of Impeachment, then Impeachment may not be the political hurdle that the Dems think it is. Most of the Country wants Congress to get a full report that has not been redacted.

In addition, I don't think the Dems have been calculating the political impact from an Impeachment effort correctly.

Their entire opinion is based on the Bill Clinton Impeachment. I never thought that looking for and finding some "strange" in the form of a WH Intern and then lying about it in testimony was an Impeachable offense that would bear out well for the GOP.....not in the "its a man's world" environment of that time and likely not even THIS time. If Hilary had not stood by her man....MAYBE....MAYBE.

This is a whole different animal and if in fact the only way to get Congress a complete report in light of the fact that what we are really talking about here is Russian Election Interference, I don't think its near the political minefield for the Dems that the Clinton Impeachment was for the GOP.
 
jnug said:
Be careful what you ask for. If it turns out that the only way to get to the full report for Congress is to subpoena under the auspices of Impeachment, then Impeachment may not be the political hurdle that the Dems think it is. Most of the Country wants Congress to get a full report that has not been redacted.

In addition, I don't think the Dems have been calculating the political impact from an Impeachment effort correctly.

Their entire opinion is based on the Bill Clinton Impeachment. I never thought that looking for and finding some "strange" in the form of a WH Intern and then lying about it in testimony was an Impeachable offense that would bear out well for the GOP.....not in the "its a man's world" environment of that time and likely not even THIS time. If Hilary had not stood by her man....MAYBE....MAYBE.

This is a whole different animal and if in fact the only way to get Congress a complete report in light of the fact that what we are really talking about here is Russian Election Interference, I don't think its near the political minefield for the Dems that the Clinton Impeachment was for the GOP.
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Why? I would WELCOME SUCH DEMIDIOCY...as would the White House.

ESPECIALLY as the "Origins of the Witch Hunt" DOJ probe gets going....
 
Grokmaster said:
It is available to BE READ YOURSELF....but firing Comey CAN NOT BE OBSTRUCTION, because NOTHING WAS OBSTRUCTED...and any President can fire any FBI Director for ANY REASON, or NO REASON.

TALKING ABOUT FIRING Mueller,, Rosenstein, WHOEVER, is NOT "Obstruction" either.
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Mueller hadn't the means to prove State of Mind. He needed to Interview Trump for that and he didn't get that opportunity. That is one of the key standards for Obstruction as a crime. The Prosecutor has to have some evidence of State of Mind. Mueller had none.

Plus Mueller has made it clear that he did not think he could or should breach the Justice Dept Policy on Indicting a sitting President (in contradiction to Barr's lie on that very topic).

The House does not need State of Mind for an Impeachment proceeding.
 
Grokmaster said:
Why? I would WELCOME SUCH DEMIDIOCY...as would the White House.

ESPECIALLY as the "Origins of the Witch Hunt" DOJ probe gets going....
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Good for you...you keep wishing for it. You might get just what you wish for if Impeachment is the only way for Congress to get a Mueller Report that is not redacted. Frankly given the mood of the country if that IS the only way....there is no way this Impeachment circumstance and the Bill Clinton Impeachment end up having the same political outcome IMO.
 
jnug said:
Mueller hadn't the means to prove State of Mind. He needed to Interview Trump for that and he didn't get that opportunity. That is one of the key standards for Obstruction as a crime. The Prosecutor has to have some evidence of State of Mind. Mueller had none.

Plus Mueller has made it clear that he did not think he could or should breach the Justice Dept Policy on Indicting a sitting President (in contradiction to Barr's lie on that very topic).

The House does not need State of Mind for an Impeachment proceeding.
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NO ONE "has the means to prove state of mind". Making up more of your silliass NON-EXISTENT legal claims we see.


TALK is NOT "OBSTRUCTION"...of ANYTHING..ACTIONS ARE.


The DOJ , INCLUDING MUELLER's BOSS , ROSENSTEIN (remember him? ) FOUND NO CASE FOR OBSTRUCTION.

Try to get your mind around it ; your level of continued DENIAL JUST CAN'T BE HEALTHY..... :lamo
 
Grokmaster said:
NO ONE "has the means to prove state of mind". Making up more of your silliass NON-EXISTENT legal claims we see.


TALK is NOT "OBSTRUCTION"...of ANYTHING..ACTIONS ARE.


The DOJ , INCLUDING MUELLER's BOSS , ROSENSTEIN (remember him? ) FOUND NO CASE FOR OBSTRUCTION.

Try to get your mind around it ; your level of continued DENIAL JUST CAN'T BE HEALTHY..... :lamo
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He could have found evidence for State of Mind if he could have interviewed Trump. The entire purpose for interviewing Trump would have been to delve into State of Mind as all of us with a brain knew. I am sure he asked other witnesses about Trump's State of Mind. Whatever they told Mueller which might have been nothing was not enough.

"Declaration of State of Mind Law and Legal Definition. Declaration of state of mind refers to an out of court statement of a person concerning his/ her state of mind. Usually, courts allow the admission of declaration of state of mind when state of mind itself is an issue. It is an exception to hearsay evidence."

It is a critical element when trying to determine the genesis of a President's actions or the genesis of any actions by an Executive who may be simply executing his executive authority legitimately as opposed to corruptly or criminally.

Keep it up. You apparently think you know what you are talking about.
 
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Among the serious findings in the Mueller Report are

*** a finding that the Trump team did not play fair nor honest with the Mueller probe. Muller cited witnesses who openly and repeatedly lied to his team, kept encrypted rotes that they would not translate, and histories of deleted evidence. It seem the Trump team are corrupt and criminal by nature and are pretty good at it.

*** Mueller did not charge Trump with a crime because of the long standing Justice department edict that you could not do so. Muller did not want to say Trump committed a crime when he would not have his day in court to defend himself.

*** Mueller presented at least ten different instances where Trump attempted to ostrich justice but failed because others failed to carry out his orders.
But Mueller could not determine intent because Trump would not answer any question about obstruction. His stonewalling benefitted him.

*** Trump did answer written questions on collusion and conspiracy but some 36 times said he could not remember. This is the same Trump who boasted to the nation he has an excellent memory.

*** The Trump White House looks defiant and incompetent as subordinates refused his orders and would not carry out his "crazy s**t" that they were ordered to do by Trump and that helped save him.

*** People on the Trump team were repeatedly urged to not cooperate and not tell the truth with the clear implication and promise that they would be "taken care of" down the road.

*** Trump was concerned that any investigation would uncover other crimes he had committed. "I am f****d"" was his reaction when he found out about the investigation.

Hopefully Congress will have the guts to do what Mueller would not do.

Finally, on a related issue, AG Barr repeatedly lied at this presser this morning and is unfit to hold his high office.
 
independentusa said:
From what I understand is that Mueller report says first that he sent the report for the congress to decide on if the evidence was sufficient for a finding of obstruction. OKay, understand that. His reasoning for doing that seems convoluted or at least lawyer talk. He says he is following the DOJ directive that he can not indict a sitting president. So yo come to the conclusion that the evidence was sufficient to say the president was guilty of obstruction would put the president in the position of not being able to defend himself, as the only way the president could do so would be in a court of law and since the president can not be indicted, that is not open to the president. So it seems that Mueller left it up to the congress to make that decision, or in this case it seems the DOJ, who said a president could not ever be guilty of obstruction as he is the president. I think everyone was hoping that Mueller would be more forthcoming and either let Trump off the hook entirely or find him guilty.
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  1. No prosecutor can find any defendant or would-be defendant guilty of anything. All prosecutors can do is present an argument for one's being guilty of having committed one or more criminal acts.
  2. The bit about the OLC presidential-non-prosecutability isn't "lawyer talk." It's an acknowledgement that as things currently sit, a sitting POTUS is literally above the law, which is the only thing one can call it when a person, on account of his or her position, cannot be charged in a court of law and made to stand trial.
  3. Because of the OLC opinion and that the DoJ's prosecutors, one of whom is/was Mueller, being currently bound by it, the only option available to a prosecutor who's collected evidence s/he thinks, were the defendant (POTUS) charged criminally, would be probative for obtaining a guilty verdict is to forward the matter to Congress, thus making it a political matter (impeach and remove from office) before it can be handled in a criminal court of law. The only public official for whom that -- exempt from criminal prosecution -- is the situation is the POTUS.

    Case in point: Were Trump not the POTUS, he would be facing, or already convicted of, a felony conspiracy charge, the very same one of which he's been named an unindicted co-conspirator.
  4. Unless Mueller were of a mind to violate current DoJ policy, the only option he had is to leave it to Congress to decide. Should Congress impeach and remove the POTUS from office, the DoJ could then proceed along the standard course to prosecute the defendant, provided the statute of limitations hasn't expired or the DoJ hasn't submitted a sealed indictment to "stay" the statute of limitation's potential for expiring.
 
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haymarket said:
*** People on the Trump team were repeatedly urged to not cooperate and not tell the truth with the clear implication and promise that they would be "taken care of" down the road.
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They didn’t name who promised Gates that he’d be taken care of if he didn’t cooperate.

This is impeachment stuff. Bribing witnesses to remain silent.


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SonOfDaedalus said:
They didn’t name who promised Gates that he’d be taken care of if he didn’t cooperate.

This is impeachment stuff. Bribing witnesses to remain silent.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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It gets worse. He attempted to bribe KT McFarland with an ambassadorship to Singapore in exchange for a false witness statement saying that he did not order Flynn to discuss sanctions with the Russian Ambassador. Fortunately she knew better and took it up with the White House Counsel.
 
The funny thing is it looks like some of the orders Trump gave that WOULD have probably crossed the line into obstruction were disobeyed by his underlings. It looks like their disobedience might have saved Trump’s ass.
 
Skeptic Bob said:
The funny thing is it looks like some of the orders Trump gave that WOULD have probably crossed the line into obstruction were disobeyed by his underlings. It looks like their disobedience might have saved Trump’s ass.
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Isn’t the very fact that the orders were given an offense in of itself?
 
Napoleon said:
It gets worse. He attempted to bribe KT McFarland with an ambassadorship to Singapore in exchange for a false witness statement saying that he did not order Flynn to discuss sanctions with the Russian Ambassador. Fortunately she knew better and took it up with the White House Counsel.
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Wow, another attempted crime by the corrupt president. The impeachment should be interesting.


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Skeptic Bob said:
The funny thing is it looks like some of the orders Trump gave that WOULD have probably crossed the line into obstruction were disobeyed by his underlings. It looks like their disobedience might have saved Trump’s ass.
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At least it’s nice to know that there are still some people in positions of power and authority who recognize that unlawful orders don’t have to be obeyed.
 
Xelor said:
  1. No prosecutor can find any defendant or would-be defendant guilty of anything. All prosecutors can do is present an argument for one's being guilty of having committed one or more criminal acts.
  2. The bit about the OLC presidential-non-prosecutability isn't "lawyer talk." It's an acknowledgement that as things currently sit, a sittin POTUS is literally above the law, which is the only thing one can call it when a person, on account of his or her position, cannot/won't be charged in a court of law and made to stand trial.
  3. Because of the OLC opinion and that the DoJ's prosecutors, one of whom is/was Mueller, being currently bound by it, the only option available to a prosecutor who's collected evidence s/he thinks, were the defendant charged criminally, would probative for obtaining a guilty verdict is to forward the matter to Congress, thus making it a political matter (impeach and remove from office) before it can be handled in a criminal court of law. The only public official for whom that -- exempt from criminal prosecution -- is the situation is the POTUS.
  4. Unless Mueller were of a mind to violate current DoJ policy, the only option he had is to leave it to Congress to decide. Should Congress impeach and remove the POTUS from office, the DoJ could then proceed along the standard course to prosecute the defendant, provided the statute of limitations hasn't expired or the DoJ hasn't submitted a sealed indictment to "stay" the statute of limitation's potential for expiring.
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You bring up good reason why this must be handled by Congress and Muellers hands were tied in large respect.

One other thing I personally found extremely disturbing was Barr claiming that Trump was angry and upset and he felt under attack so that excuses all his efforts at public obstruction. Barr completely destroyed any shred of credibility. Every mass killer who butchered people probably was angry and upset and felt like society was attacking him - and that does not give them a legal excuse any more than it does for Trump. It was disgraceful and disgusting.
 
jnug said:
He could have found evidence for State of Mind if he could have interviewed Trump. The entire purpose for interviewing Trump would have been to delve into State of Mind as all of us with a brain knew. I am sure he asked other witnesses about Trump's State of Mind. Whatever they told Mueller which might have been nothing was not enough.

"Declaration of State of Mind Law and Legal Definition. Declaration of state of mind refers to an out of court statement of a person concerning his/ her state of mind. Usually, courts allow the admission of declaration of state of mind when state of mind itself is an issue. It is an exception to hearsay evidence."

It is a critical element when trying to determine the genesis of a President's actions or the genesis of any actions by an Executive who may be simply executing his executive authority legitimately as opposed to corruptly or criminally.

Keep it up. You apparently think you know what you are talking about.
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from what I am reading Mueller accepted written testimony and stated no evidence of collusion was found. he wasn't entirely happy about it BUT he DECIDED NOT to press for face to face testimony in the interest of not prolonging the end of the investigation. are you stating he was incompetent in his actions?
 
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Skeptic Bob said:
The funny thing is it looks like some of the orders Trump gave that WOULD have probably crossed the line into obstruction were disobeyed by his underlings. It looks like their disobedience might have saved Trump’s ass.
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They are babysitters like Flake said. They saved the baby.


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Unitedwestand13 said:
Isn’t the very fact that the orders were given an offense in of itself?
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Theoretically. But the feds also look at their odds of getting a conviction. In this case you are talking about Trump giving an unfollowed order to someone that would potentially interfere with an investigation into a crime that the investigation found no compelling evidence for. It isn’t the kind of thing that goes the distance in court, especially if there isn’t any audio recording evidence.

But personally, if Obama did that I would call it obstruction so I call it obstruction now as well.
 
Napoleon said:
At least it’s nice to know that there are still some people in positions of power and authority who recognize that unlawful orders don’t have to be obeyed.
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That’s the deep state preventing Trump from making America corrupt...I mean great again.


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Skeptic Bob said:
Theoretically. But the feds also look at their odds of getting a conviction. In this case you are talking about Trump giving an unfollowed order to someone that would potentially interfere with an investigation into a crime that the investigation found no compelling evidence for. It isn’t the kind of thing that goes the distance in court, especially if there isn’t any audio recording evidence.

But personally, if Obama did that I would call it obstruction so I call it obstruction now as well.
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which order or orders are we talking about?

I know what the report outlines.. I want to know which specific ones you think were cases of obstruction.
 
Hypothetical said:
which order or orders are we talking about?

I know what the report outlines.. I want to know which specific ones you think were cases of obstruction.
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I’ll wait until I read the whole report before I comment much on specifics but from pg 256 of the report:

White House counsel Don McGahn received a phone call at home from Trump on June 17, 2017. Trump directed McGahn to call Rosenstein and tell him Mueller "had conflicts of interest and must be removed. McGahn refused and said he would "rather resign than trigger what he regarded as a potential Saturday Night Massacre."

If Obama had passed along an order to have someone appointed to investigate him removed I would call that obstruction of justice. Whether it should lead to impeachment is a separate question.
 
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