RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://thefederalist.com/2019/11/04/bureaucrats-hurt-feelings-on-foreign-policy-dont-justify-impeachment/

Privileged bureaucrats are so high on their self-righteousness that they actually think they’re protecting the Constitution by obstructing the foreign policy of the elected president.

In recent testimony during his confirmation hearing, the nominee to be U.S. ambassador to Russia said, “Soliciting investigations into a domestic political opponent — I don’t think that would be in accord with our values.”

Never? Let’s do a quick thought experiment. Remember when Donald Trump said he could shoot somebody on 5th Avenue and still maintain his support? Suppose a candidate for office did shoot somebody and the only witness was a Russian national who then hopped a plane back to Moscow.

Now suppose that the only way to prosecute this candidate would be for his political rival (the incumbent president) to request cooperation from Russia to extradite this material witness back to the United States to participate in a trial. Should he do it?

Partisanship Is the Deciding Factor

Obviously, in today’s climate, the answer depends on one critical fact: Whose side is the candidate on? If the candidate aligns with the left, then investigating a political opponent would be totally beyond the norms established by our cherished traditions. But if the candidate opposes the left, then the deep state will step in “to protect the country from that menace.”

You see, it’s perfectly fine for Hillary Clinton to use her campaign funds to hire foreign national Christopher Steele to investigate Trump using (probably made-up) Russian sources. And there’s nothing wrong with the FBI using those partisan Steele smears to investigate the Obama administration’s political opponent.

Crossfire Hurricane, the official operational title for the investigation, employed assistance from the British government and an Australian diplomat. So the left believes there’s nothing wrong with asking a foreign government for help to investigate a domestic political opponent — so long as that opponent is Trump. After all, “Nobody is above the law, not even Donald Trump.” But if the shoe ends up on the other foot and Trump is the one investigating, it’s a constitutional crisis!

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/dow-poised-to-mark-its-first-record-in-about-four-months-mcdonalds-shares-set-to-fall-2019-11-04?mod=home-page

The Dow Jones Industrial Average joined other major indexes in record territory Monday, with stocks propelled higher as optimism about a near-term U.S.-China trade resolution and a third-quarter earnings season that has been better than feared buoyed sentiment on Wall Street.

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/11/john-durham-last-trusted-prosecutor-in-washington/

John Durham is the legendary lawman digging into how the intelligence probe of Donald Trump started.

John Durham may be the most consequential and least known figure in Washington right now.

In May, U.S. attorney general William Barr selected Durham, a longtime prosecutor with a résumé so sterling it nearly glows, to investigate the origins of the special counsel’s probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election, and whether it was properly predicated. Some Trump fans believe there was a vast effort by a “deep state” of high-ranking intelligence and law-enforcement officials to smear Trump or hinder his campaign by creating a perception of corrupt ties to Russia. In late October, the New York Times quoted unnamed sources who said that Durham’s probe had officially become a criminal investigation, meaning he now has the power to subpoena for witness testimony and documents, to convene a grand jury, and to file criminal charges.

Since he is an attorney general appointed by President Trump, almost every decision from William Barr is criticized by Democrats as a partisan abuse of law-enforcement powers. But the appointment of Durham received no backlash, and in fact received praise far and wide.

Who is Durham, this rare-as-a-unicorn figure who can reassure lawmakers, talking heads, and court-watchers on both sides of the aisle, in an era when everything seems destined to turn into a loud partisan food fight?

To say Durham is tight-lipped is an understatement; he lets his courtroom arguments speak for him and rarely talks to reporters at all. Those who have covered him for years — or, more accurately, tried to cover him — say that when he does run into reporters, he is cordial but uninformative, and almost never on the record. In Durham’s questionnaire for the Senate while awaiting confirmation to be a U.S. Attorney, he was asked to list his written work. He answered that he had never written or published any books, articles, reports, or letters to the editor. (The Senate confirmed him unanimously, with home-state senator Richard Blumenthal (D., Conn.) calling him “a fierce, fair prosecutor” who “dedicated his life to public service and the pursuit of justice.”) Durham is nicknamed, inevitably, “the Bull,” and his reputation makes clear he doesn’t take any of it from anyone.

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/11/trump-tax-returns-second-circuit-rules-against-president/

No Surprise: The Second Circuit in NYC clears the way for the president’s accountants to turn over records relating to his dealings more than a decade ago.

Today’s Trump v. Vance decision by the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan, holding that President Trump’s tax-return information must be turned over to state prosecutors, is no surprise.

As the court relates, a New York State grand jury is investigating the circumstances surrounding the “‘hush money’ payments made to two women” — a reference, no doubt, to former Playboy model Karen McDougal and porn star Stefanie Clifford (a.k.a. “Stormy Daniels”), who claim to have had flings with Donald Trump a decade before he was elected president. In the course of the investigation, a subpoena was issued to the Trump organization for related “documents and communications.” Prosecutors interpreted this subpoena to cover the president’s personal tax returns from the relevant period (June 2015 through mid-September 2018). The president’s private counsel objected, and the Trump organization (which is wholly owned by the Donald J. Trump Revocable Trust, of which the president is grantor and beneficiary) has not produced any such tax documents.

Meanwhile, prosecutors served another subpoena, this time on Mazars USA LLP. That is the accounting firm that possesses financial records pertaining to the president’s personal and business dealings. The Mazars subpoena covers a period stretching back to 2011. It explicitly demands production of any “tax returns and related schedules, in draft, as-filed, and amended form.”

The president discouraged Mazars from complying. He claimed sweeping immunity from state criminal process while he is in office, and thus sought a declaratory judgment that the subpoena was invalid, along with an injunction barring the district attorney from taking any action to enforce the subpoena.

That was the claim rejected today by the unanimous three-judge panel.