RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2019/07/

There’s an old saying in newsrooms: News is stuff that people have forgotten. Robert Mueller’s dramatic appearance before the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday morning was a striking reminder of this adage. The former special counsel did not drop any new revelations about the Trump-Russia affair. Yet in a simple but important manner, he reiterated the basics of this scandal—perhaps the most consequential political scandal in American history. These are the fundamentals that have often been subsumed by all the never-ending partisan squabbling and by the ongoing crusade mounted by Donald Trump and his defenders to distract from his perfidy. These are the facts that Trump has refused to acknowledge, and they are the facts that taint his presidency and undermine its legitimacy.

https://amgreatness.com/2019/07/24/this-was-the-most-powerful-man-in-america-for-two-years

For two years, Robert Mueller was the most powerful man in America. Since May 2017, he has ruled the media, the government, and the public discourse. Elusive by design, Mueller, along with his team of partisan prosecutors, operated in a rarified sphere exempt from the normal political constraints of scrutiny and accountability.

Americans repeatedly were assured that Robert Mueller possessed superhuman faculties. His integrity is unimpeachable, his professional track record is flawless—or so we were told. A war hero and former FBI Director, appointed by Republicans doncha know, Robert Mueller was the man, the patriot, who would get to the bottom of how Donald Trump and his corrupt campaign associates colluded with the Russians to throw the 2016 election in Trump’s favor.

Leaders on both sides of the aisle assured us that Mueller would act in a fair manner, that he would oversee every detail, and that any case against the president would be rock solid. Any tepid criticism of the special counsel was the equivalence of treachery, an attempt to subvert the rule of law; any Trump tweet aimed at the man in charge of a politically-motivated investigation intended to take down his presidency was proof of his criminality.

For two years, Congress, mostly led by Republicans during that time, cowered in the powerful shadow of Robert Mueller. Governance ground to a halt as our country’s legitimate challenges, including a porous southern border, were ignored. Conservative commentators piled on, working with the Left to attack anyone who dared to challenge Mueller’s power. Americans repeatedly were warned that “the end is near,” “the walls are closing in,” “Trump’s days are numbered,” as Mueller’s team notched one indictment after another, although none was related to election collusion. Americans braced for the worst, or the best depending on one’s political affiliation, as we became convinced Donald Trump would be hauled out of the Oval Office by the Messianic Mueller.

https://spectator.us/democrats-events-mueller-trump-2020/

Lights! Camera! Inaction!

The hearing, pushed hard by House Democrats, was supposed to be a major public event, designed to highlight allegations against President Trump in the report by special counsel Robert Mueller. It was always about convincing the public that the report was far more damning than the public initially thought. It was never about new evidence — only about putting the existing report up in lights.

It failed in that theatrical goal. The phrase of the day is a stumbling Mueller asking, time and again, ‘Can you repeat that?’

For Democrats: the hearing was all about revving up public support for impeachment. That meant building enthusiasm well beyond their base. The key was to highlight President Trump’s alleged obstruction of justice in a convincing, gripping fashion.

For Republicans, the hearing was all about stopping that and defending the president. Their party cannot retake the House and retain the Senate if the top of the ticket is badly damaged.

Given these political stakes, the Democrats needed to ‘win’ the hearing outright, to show that they need to keep investigating the president, even if that prevents them from advancing other legislation. The Republicans had an easier task. They merely had to stop the Democrats from using the Mueller report to fuel impeachment. That’s exactly what they did. They succeeded not by winning outright but by blocking a Democratic victory.

As political theater, the hearing was a dud. The five-minute question periods, alternating between parties, made it hard for Democrats to build a convincing narrative. Even worse, the Democrats’ star witness was a visibly aged special prosecutor. Robert Mueller capped a distinguished career of public service with an undistinguished performance. He looked weak and sometimes befuddled, repeatedly asking for questions to be repeated. He refused the Democrats’ invitation to do a ‘show and tell,’ in which he would read his report aloud and embellish its findings. He essentially told the country, ‘I have nothing to say beyond the report itself. Please move along.’

https://issuesinsights.com/2019/07/24/

How big a nothingburger was Robert Mueller’s testimony on Wednesday? Within thirty minutes of the end of his sad, near-senile performance lasting over six hours, MSNBC’s out-for-Trump’s-blood commentators had turned to asking defeated Missouri Democrat ex-Sen. Claire McCaskill to describe to viewers how the Russians are promoting the anti-vaccine movement.

Americans wouldn’t read the book, i.e,. Mueller’s report, but they’ll watch the movie. That was the Democrats’ bet in forcing Mueller to appear before the House Judiciary and Intelligence committees. But they lost big, and Mueller’s appearance on screen is a shoe-in for the Golden Raspberry Award, right down there with the very worst investments Hollywood has ever made, like “Heaven’s Gate,” “Ishtar,” and “Leonard Part 6.”

Mueller was “exactly the right kind of individual for this job,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said when he was appointed special counsel in 2017. We’ve been told for over two years now that the former FBI director is a lion, a dogged crusader for the truth, a national treasure within the law enforcement establishment. But on Wednesday he was a shell of a man; he stammered, sat open-mouthed, gawking, endlessly asked for questions to be repeated and rephrased, and failed to remember what was contained in his own 448-page report — strongly indicating that it was not Mueller, but his team of left-leaning, Democrat-contributing prosecutors, like Andrew Weissman, who actually penned the document bearing his name.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/death-of-the-impeachment-dream-11563999203?mod=cx_picks&cx_navSource=cx_picks&cx_tag=collabctx&cx_artPos=1#cxrecs_s

House Democrats hoped that Wednesday’s hearings would allow them to highlight their favorite portions of the Mueller report for people who haven’t read it. Democrats didn’t expect this segment of Americans to include the author.

Largely unwilling to promote, defend or elaborate on a document with which he seemed strangely unfamiliar, former Justice Department Special Counsel Robert Mueller let stand the report’s finding of no Trump-Russia collusion and, intentionally or not, ensured that his work will not be used to drive a duly-elected President from office.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-mueller-show-goes-bust-11564003715

The only person in Washington happier than Donald Trump about Robert Mueller’s Wednesday appearance before Congress is Nancy Pelosi. The House Speaker’s impeachment caucus had hoped the hearing would mobilize new public support despite her opposition, but it was more likely their last gasp.

Mr. Mueller provided little news during his many hours before the House Judiciary and Intelligence Committees. Democrats strained to place their obstruction of justice and Russia collusion theories in his mouth, but Mr. Mueller stuck to the script of his 448-page report. He even refused to read aloud from that document—denying Democrats an audio version for their TV ads.

Democrat Ted Lieu (California) sought to lure Mr. Mueller into saying he would have indicted Mr. Trump for obstruction if he weren’t a sitting President. “That is not the correct way to say it,” Mr. Mueller said. “As we say in the report and as I said at the opening, we did not reach a determination as to whether the President committed a crime.”

Mr. Mueller also refused to answer Republican queries about why he didn’t fully explore the origins of the Russia-Trump conspiracy story, including the Steele dossier that was used to gain a warrant to spy on a Trump campaign adviser. Mr. Mueller said those issues were “beyond” his “purview,” though Russia’s election interference was central to his mandate. Mr. Mueller probably didn’t want to question the performance of the FBI he led for more than a decade.