Now to the meat. The gears of Washington D.C. are many and move slowly. The events of the past week will go a long way to greasing those gears to move more quickly, but I still do not expect our trump woes to be resolved for quite some time. A review of the craziness has been helpful to me to get a better handle on where we are in this tragic saga in our country's history.
Here's a timeline as best as I can piece together, although I know there is missing information:
- 5/9:
- Late in the afternoon - trump fires Comey and claims that the reason was a result of "letters from the Attorney General and Deputy Attorney General of the United States recommending your dismissal". The Deputy Attorney General's letter concluded that "[t]he way the Director handled the conclusion of the [Hillary Clinton] email investigation was wrong. As a result, the FBI is unlikely to regain public and congressional trust until it has a Director who understands the gravity of the mistakes and pledges never to repeat them. Having refused to admit his errors, the Director cannot be expected to implement the necessary corrective actions."
- 5/10:
- During photo opp with Henry Kissinger, trump says in reference to the firing, "he wasn't doing a good job"
- The White House released a statement claiming that Comey "lost the support" of "rank and file" FBI employees
- 5/11:
- The White House released a statement claiming that Comey "lost the support" of "rank and file" FBI employees
- 5/11:
- At a Senate hearing - Andrew McCabe, the current acting FBI director and a career FBI agent, contradicted the White House's claim that Comey had lost the confidence of the rank-and-file."No, that is not accurate. [Comey had] broad support, the majority, the vast majority of FBI employees enjoyed a deep, positive connection to Director Comey,"
- trump said he had intended all along to fire Comey, regardless of any recommendation, calling it his own decision
- White House officially stated that firing Comey was a step in letting the probe into Russian election interference "come to its conclusion with integrity"
- trump told NBC's Lester Holt: "And in fact when I decided to just do it, I said to myself, I said 'you know, this Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made-up story, it's an excuse by the Democrats for having lost an election that they should have won'."
- 5/12:
- trump on press briefings:
Donald J. Trump ✔@realDonaldTrump
As a very active President with lots of things happening, it is not possible for my surrogates to stand at podium with perfect accuracy!....
7:59 AM - 12 May 2017
- trump said he had intended all along to fire Comey, regardless of any recommendation, calling it his own decision
- White House officially stated that firing Comey was a step in letting the probe into Russian election interference "come to its conclusion with integrity"
- trump told NBC's Lester Holt: "And in fact when I decided to just do it, I said to myself, I said 'you know, this Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made-up story, it's an excuse by the Democrats for having lost an election that they should have won'."
- 5/12:
- trump on press briefings:
Donald J. Trump ✔@realDonaldTrump
As a very active President with lots of things happening, it is not possible for my surrogates to stand at podium with perfect accuracy!....
7:59 AM - 12 May 2017
Donald J. Trump
✔@realDonaldTrump
...Maybe the best thing to do would be to cancel all future "press briefings" and hand out written responses for the sake of accuracy???
✔@realDonaldTrump
...Maybe the best thing to do would be to cancel all future "press briefings" and hand out written responses for the sake of accuracy???
- In a Fox News interview with Jeanine Pirro, Trump stands by his tweet:
“We don’t have press conferences, we just don’t have them, unless I have them every two weeks and I do them myself. I think it’s a good idea.”
- trump threatens Comey:
Donald J. Trump
✔@realDonaldTrump
James Comey better hope that there are no "tapes" of our conversations before he starts leaking to the press!
8:26 AM - 12 May 2017 [who frickin' cares and once he opens that can of worms, he'd better hope he doesn't have any recordings, because all recordings can then be subpoenaed]
- A law firm employed by trump, Morgan, Lewis & Bockius releases a statement that reads
Trump's last 10 years of tax returns do not reveal "any income of any type from Russian sources"
And then added:
"with a few exceptions"
At the risk of offending some of you.......JESUS H. F*@ING CHRIST. And I'm not even bringing in all the silliness from puppet-spicer & sarah hucka by baby-sanders. I'm going to rip this apart, step by step.
The law firm that trump used to write the letter regarding his financial dealings with Russia, Morgan, Lewis & Bockius, was named by Chambers & Partners, a London-based legal research publication, “Russia Law Firm of the Year”, in 2016. According to the firm’s website, they have an office in Moscow with over forty lawyers and staff and claim to be “well known in the Russian market, and have a deep familiarity with the local legislation, practices, and key players [and is] particularly adept [at advising clients on] sanction matters." So trump is flaunting his Russian connection while denying it. Nice! And furthermore, this is a law firm, they're supposed to be extremely careful with anything they put in writing. So how do they square using the superlative phrase, "any income of any type from Russian sources" with the negating phrase, "with a few exceptions". That's simply and incredibly stupid!!
The second really egregious action is that jeff sessions recussed himself from any investigations regarding trump and Russia. He ostensibly passes on Rosenstein's letter under cover of his own letter to trump supporting Rosenstein's letter, to fire Comey. This of course is done under the guise that they are recommending the firing due to mishandling the Clinton email investigation and its conclusion. But then, trump comes out two days latter and claims that the firing was because of the FBI's investigation into the trump / Russia issues. Oh! All of the sudden sessions is now touching the investigation or trump lied or both. The communications between trump and rosenstein should have been between the two of them and sessions should have been nowhere near them. Period!
As we have all heard, there have been loud and repeated calls for an independent prosecutor from top ranking republicans and Democrats alike, this past week. Of course the two toadies, mumble mouth mcconnell and number two puppet......paul ryan will not support such legislation. This, for now leaves it up to Rosenstein. CNN and the Washington Post show these opinions on line:
And to that end, I reprint a portion of the Post's opinion article by Dana Milbank:
In that case, Rosenstein needs to wake up to the reality that he has been — and continues to be — used by [t]rump and his defenders to provide a veneer of legitimacy to the [trump]’s decision to eliminate the head of the Russia probe.
trump may now say he would have fired Comey anyway, but everybody else has used Rosenstein, and his three-page memo justifying Comey’s dismissal, as cover.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) : “Mr. Rosenstein recommended Mr. Comey’s removal.”
Spicer: “It was all him. . . . No one from the White House. That was a DOJ decision.”
Senate Republican Conference Chairman John Thune (S.D.): “They decided to take this action, based upon a recommendation from Rob [note that this schmuck doesn't get his name correct] Rosenstein, who was just confirmed by the Senate, 94-6, a couple of weeks ago, and a man who people have a tremendous amount of confidence in.”
Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn (R-Tex.): “Democrats who were praising Rod Rosenstein and saying he was exactly the kind of person we needed . . . seem to forget their very own conviction and vote on Rod Rosenstein and say he can’t be fair.”
Rosenstein now makes Comey look like Solomon. If he cares at all about rehabilitating the reputation he built, Rosenstein has one option: He can appoint a serious, independent and above-reproach special counsel — the sort of person Rosenstein was seen as, until this week — to continue the Russia probe.
Rosenstein may never recover his honor. But this is his only chance.
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