Special Counsel

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Robert Swan Mueller III – special counsel. Big news, y’all.

Big Red Car here on power washing day. Two power washers hitting the paint and the stone in anticipation of a new exterior paint job. It is crazy loud here.

So, the Acting Attorney General invoked the provisions of 28 CFR 600.1 – Grounds for appointing a Special Counsel. This is exactly the situation for which that statute was written.

There is a criminal investigation and the objectivity of the Department of Justice staff may have a conflict of interest. Bingo!

So, they pick Robert Swan Mueller III to run the show. Would you please join the BRC in a short round of applause?

Mueller — Big Red Car, who is this guy?

This Mueller guy is a solid citizen. Let me give you the short description:

 1. Princeton undergrad

 2. Marine combat vet with service running a rifle platoon as a platoon commander in Vietnam.

 3. Awarded the Bronze Star with “V” device for valor and a Purple Heart meaning he bled for the Nation.

 4. University of Virginia law school grad — not an Ivy League pinhead

 5. Tried cases as a US Attorney against drug lords and the Mafia. Knows his way around a courtroom and what does and does not constitute evidence.

 6. Served as Director of the FBI under both Clinton and Bush for twelve years — second only to J Edgar. Took it on the chin for the FBI’s failure to heed 9-11 warnings. Retooled the FBI to focus more on counter terrorism.

 7. During his tenure dealt with some dicey issues and didn’t go drama queen on any of them.

 8. Worked with Comey for a decade in various places.

 9. Defended US surveillance policies in front of the Congress

 10. Was critical of Dir Comey’s handling of the HRC matter

 11. Was a registered Republican (reported by the WaPo in 2011) though both sides of the aisle consider him to be “apolitical”

Seems a little too good to be true. The guy is 72 and is neither a bomb thrower nor an inventor of evidence. He is not a CNN legal analyst who twists the law to serve his political purpose. The guy is a solid Old School guy. The only thing I have ever heard that might be critical is he has a bit of an ego. Who wouldn’t with his accomplishments?

So, this looks like a good thing to a Big Red Car.

The Stakes

Special Counsel Mueller is deputized to follow the facts of his original charge — to investigate allegations of collusion between the Trump Campaign and Russia — wherever those facts take him. He gets unlimited power plus staff, offices, budget to conduct the investigation.

This is an FBI investigation which has been ongoing since June 2016. The campaign, of course, is over and, thus, the investigation is about a historic matter. It is a short period of time — 6 June 2016 to 8 November 2016 (maybe to 20 January 2017?).

There are exquisite records to delve into. The Special Counsel has subpoena power. He can interview anybody he wants.

One has to believe that all the raw evidence exists and that this will be an exercise in analyzing unchanging facts. Again, the campaign is over and whatever happened happened.

Where does this go, Big Red Car?

The following areas are likely to be reviewed:

 1. Was there collusion between the Trump Campaign and the Russians? Did it rise to a level of criminality and did it violate any statutes?

 2. Did President Trump attempt to obstruct justice in any of his dealings with former Director of the FBI Comey?

 3. Who’s been leaking classified information to the press?

 4. What happened in the Hillary email investigation? Did the FBI act properly?

As you can see, there is likely to be a bit of unexpected blow back from this investigation.

Discuss this, Big Red Car

The Big Red Car doesn’t think the following exchange (the day after Gen Flynn was canned) amounts to a fart in a thunderstorm:

President Trump: “He’s a good guy. I hope you can let this go.”

Director Comey: “I agree. He is a good guy.”

President Trump said the exact same thing in public numerous times.

Both the Director and Assistant Director of the FBI testified under oath to Congress that they had NOT been pressured in any manner to influence the investigation.

As to campaign collusion, give the Big Red Car a second to stop laughing.

This has been investigated since June 2016. There has not been an iota of evidence suggesting it is true. It is not even clear what statute this would violate or that it is a crime.

The contents of the former FBI Director’s “secret memo” (post the above exchange with President Trump) was leaked to the NYT and WaPo and you don’t think there would have been a leak if there was something there?

I think the issue of who leaked what is going to be huge. Folks forget the Scooter Libby – Richard Armitrage matter in which Patrick Fitzpatrick (Valerie Plame Special Counsel) “outed” Armitrage (Deputy Secretary of State to Secretary of State Colin Powell) as the leaker of the CIA status of Valerie Plame.

In that matter, Libby was prosecuted for perjury but Armitrage wasn’t prosecuted because the statute did not apply as Plame was not undercover. Long story.

At the end, when this investigation reveals nothing of substance, there is the very real possibility that Donald J Trump emerges victorious, validated, vindicated, and all powerful. It is also possible that some leakers — a felony — end up in a very difficult predicament.

How do the secret notes of an FBI Director end up in the institutional memory of the WaPo and NYT — in real time right after the guy gets canned — without someone in the FBI leaking them? Without someone named Jim leaking them?

Bottom line it, Big Red Car

Bottom line — the Big Red Car is a law & order convertible. Wherever the evidence takes Special Counsel Mueller, the Big Red Car is with him. If anybody did wrong, then they need to be punished. Anybody. No sacred cows here. No politics. Anybody.

But, hey, what the Hell do I really know anyway? I’m just a Big Red Car. Have a nice damn day. You deserve it. Rest easy — Robert Swan Mueller III is on the job.cropped-LTFD-illust_300.png

 

 

 

11 thoughts on “Special Counsel”

  2. He seems like the man to do the job, what is the job is the question. History says the job is to provide full long term employment for lawyers in the District, Perhaps he can change the mold and investigate rapidly, close doors publicly, Out leakers sending the worst of them to the public square for trail, and lastly the leakers who were self serving with miss information or no real information publicly flogged.

    Go beyond the Russia questions to the unmasking because in there lies the seed of this entire hoax on the people. Mostly do this in months not years or the liars win in 2018.

    • .
      He handled the Ray Rice NFL investigation an did a thorough job.

      The time period is quite short — June 2016 to 8 November 2016 or, maybe, to 20 January 2017.

      The FBI has been on it for a while, so there must be a ton of data already cataloged.

      As long as he gets done in a year, it will inure to the benefit of Pres Trump if he isn’t somehow tainted.

      It is very difficult — given the magnitude of leaks and manufactured fantasy — to see how Pres Trump get hurt in this.

      BRC
      http://www.themusingsofthebigrredcar.com

  3. > The only thing I have ever heard that might be critical is he has a bit of an ego.

    Maybe the standard explanation for that is, toot your own horn because no one else will.

    Really good article, BRC: On the subject of the article, you just blew the doors off any other news source I can think of and shown, “No worries, Mate,” that even if the NYT and WaPo go down the Hudson and the Potomac then hand in hand out to the Mid Atlantic Ridge and sink, lost for a billion years, we can still get good news reporting! Still no worries even if the rest of the MSM — I know, too much to hope for — follows those two highly self-esteemed, former pillars of professional whatever, out to the Big Sink.

    • In the end, the dems throw as much shit as they can against the wall as it’s a free ride.

      The special counsel could backfire on them but they know that the media will cover it up. They are in the sweet spot.

      Even if nothing is found re: Russia, which of course their is nothing, they will just keep printing stories about it.

      Oh, and some special counsel collusion stories will erupt.

      And I thought that Billy doing group hugs with the AG on the tarmac was collusion. Silly me!

      It is a funny world that we live in.

      • .
        Robert Swan Mueller III is the real deal and he isn’t going to be manipulated in any manner. A solid Old School former Marine platoon commander with a Bronze Star w/ V for valor and a Purple Heart.

        This guy will get the job done and put a ribbon on it.

        If he said tomorrow is Easter, I’d be home dying eggs.

        JLM
        https://www.themusingsofthebigredcar.com

      • I confess, I get worried:

        1.0 Threats

        1.1 From the Propaganda Media

        The Hillary, DNC, propaganda mainstream media (MSM) is at war with Trump and wants to do anything they can, and can hope to get away with, to destroy Trump and his Administration, whatever harm to the country, and to this end is eager just to make stuff up, just make it up: That way they can have an unlimited supply of stories such as

        “A high White House official has just confirmed that Trump has been colluding with little green men from Mars”

        publish it, and just keep doing more and more of that.

        Net, that’s much of what they have been doing so far.

        1.2 From Democrat Politicians

        For politicians, Chucky (needs to dry his eyes, wash and raise his glasses, and see much more clearly) Schumer wants to lead irrational, hysterical, separated from reality, highly partisan Nasty (the San Francisco Treat) Nancy, Elizabeth (Pocahontas — but an insult to the real Pocahontas) Warren, Maxine (impeachment, always impeachment) Waters, Michael (Beautiful Eden Cuba) Moore, Al (Frankenstein monster) Franken, Mika (news porn) Brzezinski-Scarborough, The (always screaming) View, etc.

        Net, that’s funny farm stuff.

        1.3 Surrender or Fight

        An e-mail today from Newt Gingrich regards these threats as so serious that Trump and the RNC must “surrender or fight”.

        Gingrich claimed that in Europe lots of people have swallowed whole the NYT-CNN sewage and are worried.

        Net, I won’t say that Gingrich is wrong, but as below I’m concluding that the fight, the war, is actually not very serious because the 1.1. and 1.2 side is basically just standing at the base of the Washington Monument and throwing spitballs at the Truman Balcony.

        2.0 On Trump’s Side

        In the war with the media in 1.1 and the politicians in 1.2, Trump and the RNC have a lot of advantages that should constitute a winning team:

        2.1 White House Power

        There’s a LOT of power, raw, legal, money power, in the White House. Quite broadly, attacks on the White House are not easy, tend to be like throwing those spitballs mentioned above.

        Net, tough to have spitballs win against White House power.

        2.2 Serious Supporters

        Trump has a LOT of darned serious supporters, people highly concerned about jobs, the economy, paying the mortgage, keeping a 5+ year old car running, college tuition, costs of health care, and any financial emergency of $500 or more.

        To these people, Nasty Nancy, Pocahontas, Maxine Waters, Al Franken, Mika Brzezinski-Scarborough, etc. are no more serious than some outrageous tabloid or some late night comedy show.

        Net, the serious voters are in line just to flush the nonsense.

        2.3 Midterm Seats and Noses

        Gingrich is really good at counting seats and noses, winning on those numbers is a HUUUUUGE advantage in the war, and Gingrich is already outlining where the RNC can win in the 2018 Midterms. I’m sure that Trump, the White House, and the RNC have good people working on winning seats and noses in 2018.

        Net, which side to bet on in the 2018 Midterms, Trump or the 1.1, 1.2, Hildabeast, etc.?

        2.4 Facts, Rationality, Accomplishments

        In this war, Trump is awash in facts, rationality, and accomplishments on his side — DHS deportations, getting the real job done at the southern border, the pipeline deals, the big progress to US crude oil and natural gas independence, the coal deals, the rising stock market, the progress on repeal and replace Obamacare, opening US exports to China, etc. — and is building more.

        To Trump supporters and, really, nearly all the low and middle class and much of the upper class, this progress is very welcome stuff where the printed NYT can’t compete with Charmin and the Web NYT can’t be used to wrap dead fish heads.

        Net, this war is in front of a lot of darned serious voters where Hollywood La La Land fantasy nonsense stands to lose badly against facts, rationality, and accomplishments

        2.5 Trump’s Warnings about the Media

        From nearly the beginning of his campaign, Trump has repeatedly warned his audiences that the media lies, has some of the worst people, etc. So, Trump has done a lot to destroy the credibility of the media. Result: The media swords are dull, wet cardboard.

        Net, the media is left with their hysterical screaming, and, really, that’s fairly easy to ignore.

        2.6 Trump’s Circumvention of the Media

        With Twitter, his weekly reports to the nation on YouTube, his many speeches, interviews, White House events, etc., the Trump publicity machine roars ahead 24 x 7.

        Net, that the media and politicians have only hysterical screaming of total nonsense in a sense shows that Trump has successfully pushed his opponents off the playing field of reality out to the parking lot of far out fantasy weird-os.

        2.7 Reputation of the Media

        Trump has done a LOT to destroy the reputation of the media, but for hundreds of years the media has done much more:

        (A) There is a 1930s Andy Hardy movie where Andy is laughing at any idea that anyone should believe anything in a newspaper — the movie audiences of the 1930s clearly understood the printed sewage.

        (B) Jefferson just excoriated the press in his

        http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/amendI_speechs29.html

        (C) FDR, right away early in his first term saw the threat of the press and established rules that severely throttled the nonsense.

        Net, the reputation of the media has been junk since Jefferson.

        2.8 Influence of the Media

        For all the highly self-esteemed posturing of the NYT and WaPo, away from Manhattan and the Washington Monument, their influence with serious people falls off faster than a low variance Gaussian bell curve.

        Their best hope is that when and if the 1.1 media have some real and serious content their audiences will forget the sewage published in the past. Well, before the Internet, people didn’t have an easy way to remember the details of the past sewage, but now they do.

        E.g., I have plenty of copies of the 1.1 sewage so that I won’t forget. Similarly for the 1.2 sewage.

        The NYT and WaPo, ABC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC, NBC, The AP, Reuters, Politico, Bloomberg, Time, Newsweek, and more are “dead to me” and just will NOT return to life — ever.

        None of those sewage generators are doing well financially, and with the Internet their future is worse. Let them all just go the heck out of business, kaput, bankrupt, dead.

        E.g., since I’m in NY, I have faxed some letters to Chucky Schumer with details of some of his sewage, still have copies of the letters, and rereading them recently was shocked at how bad the old sewage is.

        Net, now with the Internet and computing, the stench of old sewage lasts; people REMEMBER. The 1.1 gang is DEAD and just not quite yet buried.

        2.9 Means to Fight

        Trump and the White House have very powerful means to fight back against the attacks from the 1.1 media and 1.2 politicians:

        The media can be throttled, e.g., denied access.

        The White House pulpit is higher and its sound level louder than that of any of the 1.2 politicians.

        The White House is very powerful; the POTUS “the most powerful person in the world”; Trump can destroy the 1.1 media and 1.2 politicians faster and worse than Schwarzkopf destroyed Saddam’s army.

        Again, that 1.1. and 1.2 have retreated to fantasy, Hollywood La La Land, with stars like Maxine Waters, shows that they have already given up on winning with reality. In that important sense, Trump has already won.

        Trump has a big staff and can assign a group to fight the 1.1 and 1.2 attacks: Trump is fighting lots of battles each day — in the courts, in Congress, in foreign policy, and much more — and can easily have a group fighting the wars of 1.1. and 1.2 with little more direct effort from Trump than mowing the grass on the south lawn of the White House.

        Net, Trump stands to win this war.

        2.10 Pissed off Readers and Voters

        The 1.1 media have totally entertained themselves that what they publish is really important, necessary, has no replacement, and is eagerly consumed by their audiences. BS. Maybe some of what they tell themselves was true 80 years ago, but none of it is significantly true now.

        Similarly for Chucky Schumer.

        The attacks of 1.1 and 1.2 are well in line totally just to PISS OFF a huge fraction of the population outside Manhattan and outside 100 miles of the Washington Monument.

        Tough to be respected, coveted, endearing, liked, loved, and smelling like roses when spreading reeking, fuming, bubbling, toxic waste sewage.

        Net, the 1.1 and 1.2 attackers stand to lose and Trump to win HUUUUUGE.

        2.11 The Legal System

        Some of the war is in the legal system, and hysterical screaming doesn’t work very well in a courtroom.

        Some of the legal cases will go to the SCOTUS which will slap down the nonsense in strong terms. The SCOTUS is not into fantasy land hysteria.

        There can be grand juries, subpoenas, testimony under oath, threats of jail terms, etc.

        Net, much of the nonsense can fail at the courthouse.

        2.12 The Impeachment Process

        Yes, lots of 1.1 and 1.2 are screaming “impeachment”. Well, that would take a majority of the House to bring a bill and a majority of the Senate to find guilty, but the Republicans have majorities in both houses. So, the calls for impeachment are hysterical, fantasy land nonsense.

        The calls for impeachment are useless noise and evidence that all the 1.1 and 1.2 stuff is just useless noise.

        3.0 My Conclusions

        No worries, Mate.

        Trump will continue doing good stuff using if only just the considerable powers he has in his office. For draining the swamp, Trump has all the power in the world, just cut a narrow channel to the Potomac River and let the sewage flow out with “You’re fired!”.

        The 1.1 and 1.2 attacks will just piss off a big majority of the voters, lose, and die out. Trump will have less support from Congress than he deserves, but still he can get a lot, e.g., on tax policy.

        Net, for me, for the attacks of 1.1 and 1.2 and that whole war, just leave it to Trump and otherwise f’get about it. E.g., no more e-mails to the Publisher of the NYT; no more letters to Chucky Schumer.

        No more worries!

        • .
          Brilliant analysis, as usual.

          Four observations:

          1. How much of what you write would have happened or has happened because Hillary lost and her supporters are pissed?

          All of that is natural. None of that is situational. They cannot help themselves.

          The media and the pundit class got the election wrong and they have this wrong.

          2. There is a finite life to the Mueller investigation. There will be written findings. If Trump is found to have done no wrong, then it will be a fatal blow to his opponents. That is what will happen.

          His victory will make EVERYTHING he has asserted the truth.

          3. Trump must perform and he is. I could go on for a long time about jobs and the economy and the VA and other things which are real.

          The economy gets better? Wages go up? Jobs continue to flood back?

          Total Trump vindication.

          4. The world has given Trump a chance to get lucky. In North Korea, Syria, in A’stan, in the Middle East, in Europe with NATO. In the war v ISIS and Al Qaeda.

          I see an increasing likelihood the US – China/Russia relationship will arrive at a better place.

          If these things happen, it is game, set, match Trump.

          There can even be some spotty performance and he wins.

          This was always going to be a war, but Trump is a warrior.

          It is going to be fine.

          BRC
          https://www.themusingsofthebigredcar.com

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