UPDATED AND REVISED: Rod Rosenstein: Standup Guy

REVISED: On reflection, I believe Techno Fog is mistaken and that "Boss" is NOT Trump, but rather AG Sessions. Subject to correction.

EXPLANATION: I believe the time frame--time elapsed since the Comey firing--is too short for Rosenstein and Mueller to have fully developed their strategy with regard to meeting with Trump--whether to meet, how to script it, etc. So I think the assurances are that Mueller needn't worry that Sessions has learned of Rosenstein's plans and so needn't worry that Trump could learn about Mueller's involvement before they've got their plan formulated.

Any way you slice, it's apparent that Trump had a target on his back from the day he rode down the escalator. The Establishment was determined that he wouldn't be president, and if by some fluke (in their view) he became president he'd be run out of office in short order.

You have to click a few times and follow the tweet to get the full content. The meeting was a total setup. We don't know the details of it, but probably sounding Trump out, looking for admissions on "obstruction" by firing Comey.

5/12/2017: Rosenstein tells Mueller "The boss [Trump] and his staff do not know about our discussions."

5/16/2017: Mueller meets with Trump to discuss the FBI position.

HT for the FOIA docs @TomFitton pic.twitter.com/p9usBDpTgC

— Techno Fog (@Techno_Fog) October 2, 2019

UPDATE: Per Judicial Watch:

In a May 16, 2017 email, sent the day before Mueller’s appointment, Rosenstein emailed former Bush administration Deputy Attorney General and current Kirkland & Ellis Partner, Mark Filip stating, “I am with Mueller. He shares my views. Duty Calls. Sometimes the moment chooses us.”

Disagree with me if you will, but I take this to mean that Rosenstein and Mueller agree that Trump must be removed. Interesting that Mark Filip is a partner at Kirkland & Ellis. That means he'd be well known to Bill Barr.

Does The Flynn Case Lead To Obama?

In what follows I'll be proceeding at a deliberate pace, so you'll need to be patient.

While the internet has been consumed by the Dem House's impeachment theater, there was a development in the Flynn case. On September 30 Michael Flynn's new lawyer, Sidney Powell, filed a supplemental status report. The report itself is fairly brief--5 double spaced pages--and not difficult to follow. Much longer is the attached opinion in the Rafiekian case, in which Judge Trenga tossed the jury's guilty verdict, stating that no reasonable juror could have convicted on the facts presented. Bijan Rafiekian, of course, was Flynn's partner in Flynn Intelligence Group (FIG), and was charged with violating FARA, the Foreign Agents Registratin Act. You can read Powell's report here or defer to Margot Cleveland's lucid summary. Or you can have the best of it all by reading both. Cleveland's article is here:

New Evidence Suggests Prosecutors Pressured Michael Flynn To Lie

With each new court filing, the public learns more about the government’s manipulation of Trump’s former national security advisor, Michael Flynn.

What Powell does in the report is to trace the connection between the two cases--Rafiekian and Flynn--and the way that pressure was exerted on Flynn via the targeting of Flynn's son by Team Mueller (but authorized by Rod Rosenstein) to coerce a guilty plea from Flynn. Powell makes no bones about it. The plea was coerced. But she goes beyond that and argues for additional forms of prosecutorial misconduct by Team Mueller prosecutor Brandon van Grack--including outright lies to the court.

Of course, van Grack denies this, but Powell makes a plausible case. Cleveland has the details. Powell also points out the significance of this misconduct as a justification for Judge Sullivan to authorize her extremely wide ranging demands for document production from the government. The extraordinary scope of the document request doesn't actually constitute an argument against it. If your client has been framed by the government then any amount of document production necessary to prove what happened should be allowed--beginning with the inception of the case itself, all the way through its conclusion, if intervening events were influenced by the illegitimate inception. And that's exactly the extent of what Powell is demanding.

Hold that thought regarding the the illegitimate inception of the investigation into Flynn, because we'll be returning to it.

Trump And Impeachments Past--The Difference

Daniel McCarthy has a fascinating article at Spectator | USA today that examines the significance of the current Trump impeachment mania of the Dems by comparing it to past impeachments of the modern era. His conclusion is that, as recently as the Clinton impeachment, there was still what he terms a ruling class consensus regarding the fundamental legitimacy of "the system," or as I would say, the constitutional order. We can certainly see that in the attacks from the Left on basic constitutional principles such as the electoral process as it has been know up till now. McCarthy maintains that the consensus has thus vanished and, with it, the legitimacy of the ruling class. The ruling class is going through the forms of legitimate constitutionalism, but in reality they are exposing their own constitutional bankruptcy. What we are seeing now is, thus, tantamount to unthinking "regime suicide."

Impeachment is regime suicideThe ruling class still believes in a consensus that doesn’t exist. Their legitimacy is vanishing

What I present below is the last third or so of the much longer article--read it all. And then compare it with the views of Daniel Greenfield, Patrick Deneen, and Gary Saul Morson that we've examined recently.

To the extent that there was still a skeletal national consensus, it favored Clinton. Impeachment was a circus, but it wasn’t a national trauma. It cast no shadow over the next presidential election two years later. It was a dud that reaffirmed the stability of the American regime. 

With Trump, everything is different. The 2016 election was a referendum on the regime itself. Trump resurrected the populist attacks on the country’s political and economic establishment that Buchanan and Perot had battle-tested in the 1990s. 

Trump was no mere conventional Republican who happened to beat Hillary Clinton. He was a completely unconventional Republican who first beat the party’s own ideological standard-bearers during the primaries, in the course of which he often said things that no Republican had said for a generation or more. Trump’s message in the primaries and general election boiled down to: they screwed you. ‘They’ being the Bushes, the Clintons, the establishment in both parties, the warmongers, the trade-deal architects, the communist Chinese, free-riding allies, and more. 

Trump is no ideologue or political theorist, but he launched a comprehensive attack on the domestic and international liberal order. He campaigned against the system as it has existed since the Cold War ended.​ 

Ukraine Corruption Backgrounder

Yesterday Gateway Pundit ran a blog that provided an overview of Ukraine's corruption problem, while pointing out that, so far, with the Biden and Kerry cases, we've still only seen the tip of the Ukraine corruption iceberg--and, in all probability, the US connection. As I've said before, the likelihood is that there are Republicans involved as well as Democrats--Manafort certainly comes to mind, but we're also learning about Romney and his Deep State adviser. Nevertheless, to this point the Democrat involvement seems overwhelmingly dominant, if party affiliation can be construed as a real factor:

Ukraine Burisma Story is Massive – Involves BILLIONS of IMF and US Funds Looted and Lost by Bank Connected to Burisma Holdings!

Here's GP's capsule version of the issues that the Ukraine Hoax has brought to public view:

The Biden (and now Kerry) scandal in the Ukraine is much more than about the money paid to Hunter Biden for being a Board member at the largest gas producer in the Ukraine, Burisma Holdings.  The real scandal involves billions in funds from the IMF and US in aid that has gone missing. 

Burisma (Ukraine’s largest oil and gas provider) has been the subject of many recent news articles because of its scandalous close-knit ties with President Obama’s Vice President Biden and Secretary of State Kerry.  (Yes, Kerry is involved here too) 

... 

Where are the billions of dollars that went missing in the Ukraine?  What do Obama, Biden and Kerry and their children know about where the money is and are they connected?

There's lots more. However, fascinatingly, GP links to a 2015 article by old line Lefty Alexander Cockburn--Undelivered Goods: How $1.8 billion in aid to Ukraine was funneled to the outposts of the international finance galaxy. I'll quote the final paragraph first, in which Cockburn warns against the Washington Establishment consensus on Ukraine--Ukraine good and and vital to US national interests, Putin bad. End of story--but, says Cockburn, we make that the end of the story at great risk:

Are The Dems Now Trying To Do A Deal?

And if so, what's behind it?

That's one of the questions posed in an interesting Lou Dobbs segment with Stephen Miller. The Youtube title is, Stephen Miller: The Democrat Party Is a Socialist Marxist Party. To be honest, although Miller does say that, I think sundance captures the tenor of the interview a bit better: Stephen Miller: “The Deep State is Terrified of Being Exposed”. Is that what we're seeing now, at the end of an almost non-stop news day that saw the whole Ukraine Hoax unraveling before our eyes?

Dobbs starts by setting the "backdrop":

Suddenly we are hearing from Schumer and Pelosi and several others that they want to negotiate with the President and are ready to sit down and talk about USMCA, gun control--you name it, apparently. They seem to think they suddenly have the upper hand with the President. Your reaction?

My take is far more in line with Miller's. I think the Dems are dealing from a position of weakness--and they finally know it. They realize that impeachment madness is a loser and are trying to do a volte face move, a remake of themselves, to try to persuade the American people that--after three years of doing NOTHING--they can now be reasonable. Come, let us reason together! They just want to get along. Miller's response?

Well, I do agree that Senate Democrats are probably terrified about the cliff they're being driven over by Pelosi and the radical election-nullifying Democrats in the House of Representatives. And so I don't doubt that's the case. But let's also be clear about what the even deeper fear is. The deepest fear of all is that the Deep State is terrified of being exposed, Lou. What we have right now is a situation in which the Attorney General of the United States and John Durham are gonna get to the bottom of what really happened in 2016. And we're gonna find out what went on. What was done to try and sabotage this president and try to sabotage this administration. And THAT has the Deep State and their Democrat allies TERRIFIED.

If Miller is right--and I think he is--then Trump is in control.

It's a nine and a half minute interview in total:

Should Be Interesting--Mueller Dossier Doc Dumps Coming!

I don't want to complain, but the pace of news today is breathtaking. For the record:

DOJ To Declassify 'The Backbone' Of Mueller Investigation With Monthly Document Dumps
The Department of Justice will release to the public approximately 500 pages of FBI '302' witness interview forms per month, according to CNN - which sued the DOJ along with co-plaintiff BuzzFeed News under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). 

Worst Possible Choice Of A Lawyer For A Whistleblower

A correspondent whom I'll call Incognito Emailer sent me a link to an article by John Kiriakou, a CIA whistleblower, as it happens. This is Kiriakou:

John Kiriakou is a former CIA counterterrorism officer and a former senior investigator with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. John became the sixth whistleblower indicted by the Obama administration under the Espionage Act—a law designed to punish spies. He served 23 months in prison as a result of his attempts to oppose the Bush administration’s torture program.

Kiriakou writes at Consortium News regarding the RumorBlower's choice of legal representation--Mark Zaid: What was this CIA Officer Thinking? Money quote:

"Zaid is literally the worst possible choice for any whistleblower in national security ... impulsive, unnecessarily confrontational and untrustworthy."

That sounds promising.

Will Impeachment By Innuendo Work?

This evening sundance identifies Pelosi's impeachment strategy as "impeachment by innuendo." I agree that that's a pretty good description. The proof, as always, is in the pudding--will it work? Here is sundance's description:

Both Trump-Russia (obstruction) and Trump-Ukraine (corruption) have similar footprints because they both held the same end-goal purpose, impeachment. 

Trump was framed for stealing a horse; Trump was subsequently accused of trying too hard to avoid hanging for it. Mueller eventually conceded that Trump didn’t steal the horse; however, by then the focus was on his efforts to avoid hanging.  Eventually Mueller testified; it surfaced there was never a horse to begin with… Impeachment was stalled.

I luv that metaphor!

We would be well served to avoid focusing on the Trump-Zelenskyy phone call, and subsequent anonymous whistle-blower complaint narrative, to understand their objective. 

The background facts are not the priority for those who are constructing the impeachment articles.  Like the Russian horse, the Ukraine horse never existed. Pelosi’s political committee needs center around exploiting a manufactured corruption narrative. 

The primary objective of Speaker Pelosi, Adam Schiff, Elijah Cummings and Eliot Engel is not the material within the anonymous CIA ‘whistle-blower’ complaint.  The priority is the use of the complaint as a vehicle. The complaint was fabricated to deliver an outcome in the same way the Steele Dossier was fabricated to deliver an outcome.

I believe this strategy will not work. The reason is related to sundance's comparison of the Ukraine Hoax to the Steele Dossier hoax. The Steele Dossier based impeachment effort came, in my opinion, dangerously close to succeeding. The near success had nothing to do with the actual non-factual narrative propagated through the Steele Dossier. Rather, the near success was based on Trump's supposed obstruction of a non-factual narrative--as sundance puts it, the horse that never existed!

That lynching was definitvely put down by Bill Barr.

Oh My! Michael K. Atkinson, ICIG

With a h/t to Gateway Pundit ...

Julie Kelly at American Greatness reveals who Michael K. Atkinson really is in a brilliant article. He's strictly Deep State: Inspector General’s Ties Suggest Ukraine ‘Scandal’ is Just More Collusion Hoax.

Kelly begins by rehearsing the usual hagiography that has been quickly deployed to defend Atkinson:

Atkinson, we are told, is a truth-seeker with no partisan agenda or political grudge. “The intelligence community’s chief watchdog, Michael Atkinson, is known to his peers and colleagues as a highly cautious ‘straight shooter’ who tends to keep his head down,” cooed Politico reporter Natasha Bertrand on September 23. 

... 

Atkinson is “a no-nonsense, serious and nonpartisan career prosecutor who showed a strong commitment to the law throughout his nearly two-decade career at the Department of Justice,” insisted a puff piece in The Hill on September 26.

Who but mean spirited conspiracy theorists could possibly question Atkinson's motives in sidestepping the regulatory revision process by slyly coming out with a new "whistleblower" complaint form?

Kelly proceeds to enlighten us:

Game Changer? ICIG Admits Rules Changed For Whistleblower.

Sean Davis at The Federalist has been doing the important reporting on the ICIG/"Whistleblower" scame, and I won't try to steal his thunder. Thunder? Well, I think this is pretty important. Follow the link for his full article. I will add that the reason this development may be especially important is that Trump took the drastic step of releasing the call transcript. If not for that, the cries of "coverup" might have drowned this out. So, Sean Davis:

Intel Community Admission Of Whistleblower Changes Raises Explosive New Questions 

In a press release issued late Monday, the intelligence community inspector general admitted it changed its policy and its whistleblower form after an anti-Trump complainant alleged that Trump broke the law during a phone call with the Ukrainian president. 

 By Sean Davis
OCTOBER 1, 2019 

On Monday, the intelligence community inspector general (ICIG) admitted that it did alter its forms and policies governing whistleblower complaints, and that it did so in response to the anti-Trump complaint filed on Aug. 12, 2019. The Federalist first reported the sudden changes last Friday. While many in the media falsely claimed the ICIG’s stunning admission debunked The Federalist’s report, the admission from the ICIG completely affirmed the reporting on the secretive change to whistleblower rules following the filing of an anti-Trump complaint in August. 

The ICIG also disclosed for the first time that the anti-Trump complainant filed his complaint using the previously authorized form, the guidance for which explicitly stated the ICIG’s previous requirement for firsthand evidence for credible complaints.

There are two important points here.

"They Still Don't Understand Trump"

Rush Limbaugh nails it, IMO. This is from yesterday. What Trump did was very important. Of course it's very unfortunate that a transcript of a call with a foreign leader had to be released. Still, don't waste a lot of time worrying about the corrupt Ukrainians, who've been playing a double game throughout. By releasing the transcript Trump upset the Dem impeachment applecart and has bought valuable time for conservatives to muster their forces. Lindsey Graham's interview on Hannity was an important indication of that. Now we're learning more and more about two important things:

1) Dem corrupt connections to Ukraine; and 

2) Deep State chicanery in the "whistleblower" Ukraine Hoax.

A few excerpts from Rush's monologue:

Stop Barr!

Yesterday in Our Globe Trotting AG Bill Barr we outlined the emerging narrative that is being deployed by media surrogates of the Deep State media in a desperate attempt to smear Barr and get him to back off his investigations into the Russia Hoax. The Ukraine Hoax and Impeachment Madness are a part of that effort to prevent Barr from exposing Deep State collusion with foreign intelligence services and governments to prevent Donald Trump's election as POTUS and, when that failed, to essentially stage a lawfare coup to depose Trump by fraud and deceit. The Ukraine Hoax is intended to prevent exposure of the full extent of the Russia Hoax by removing Trump and forcing the removal of Barr. Barr is an existential threat to the Liberal political order and its effort to install One Party Government in the United States. And he's super competent. As I keep saying: The Left's fear of Barr is absolutely visceral. He's not going to back off.

It appears that Republicans were initially taken by surprise by these developments--perhaps due to the very desperation of the assault on our consitutional order, especially on the presidency. Last night Lindsey Graham appeared with Sean Hannity. Graham accomplishes three important things in the interview, which I've excerpted below. Those three things:

1. Graham signals Senate GOP support for Barr, urging (if that were necessary) to continue on course with his Russia Hoax investigation.

2. Graham signals to conservative supporters that dramatic developments are coming--soon, in a couple of weeks.

3. Graham explicitly ties the Ukraine Hoax to the Russia Hoax, suggesting that the "whistleblower" is connected to the "corrupt as hell" Brennan and Clapper.

With that, here is the interview: