1. Bess Levin: Shorter Mueller: Just Impeach This Guy Already

When William Barr released his four-page summary of the special counsel’s report, he took it upon himself to to clear Donald Trump of obstructing justice, despite the fact that Robert Mueller himself had done no such thing. In fact, Mueller found numerous instances of obstruction that, were his hands not tied by Justice Department guidelines that say you can’t indict the president, could have resulted in Trump being charged with a crime. has repeatedly attempted to obfuscate that essential point in his defense of the president. So on Wednesday, Mueller himself went on the record, speaking publicly for the first time since being appointed as special counsel, to make things crystal clear for everyone who didn’t actually read the report.

Addressing reporters, Mueller effectively objected to the Attorney General’s description of his findings, specifically Barr’s characterization of the report as exonerating Trump on obstruction. “If we had confidence after a thorough investigation of the facts that the president clearly did not commit obstruction of justice, we would so state,” Mueller said Wednesday. “Based on the facts and the applicable legal standards, however, we are unable to reach that judgment.” In other words, it’s very possible Trump committed a crime. Mueller went on to note that it was the Justice Department’s legal guidance, which prohibits the indictment of a sitting president, that prevented him from accusing Trump as such. He went on to shame the president, though not by name, noting that “When a subject of an investigation obstructs that investigation or lies to investigators, it strikes at the core of their government’s effort to find the the truth and hold wrongdoers accountable.”

Perhaps most important, Mueller suggested that if Trump is to be held to account, it must be Congress that takes up the case. “The Constitution requires a process other than the criminal justice system to formally accuse a sitting president of wrongdoing,” he said. In other words: Congress, do your job and impeach. https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2019/05/robert-mueller-statement

2. David Frum: What the Mueller Report Actually Said

The full report is rich with details. But that’s the essence. A foreign power interfered in the U.S. election to help the Trump campaign. The Trump campaign welcomed the help and repeatedly lied about it. The lying successfully obscured some questions the investigation sought to answer; in the end, it found insufficient evidence to charge a broader conspiracy. President Trump, in public and in private, worked to stop the investigation.

Those are the facts. What are the remedies? Mueller underscored at his press statement: He did not exonerate the president. Under the Department of Justice rules he was subject to, he lacked the power to act.

Meanwhile, the Trump administration refuses to take steps to secure the next presidential election against the interference that swayed the last. The question of why Russia so strongly wished to help Trump remains as mysterious as ever. In particular, if you wish to understand the breadth and depth of Trump’s Russian business connections before he declared for president in 2015, Mueller’s report will not help you.

Mueller says he can do no more. The rest, Congress, is up to you. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/05/mueller/590467/

3. Rick Hasen: Robert Mueller Was Telling Nancy Pelosi to Begin Impeachment Proceedings

With the Department of Justice and Mueller taking the position that indicting the president for crimes is off the table, an impeachment inquiry is the only way the American people will know that Trump’s potential crimes have been fully investigated and appropriate punishment considered.

No one knows if a fairly done impeachment inquiry will hurt Democrats politically. No one knows if failing to seriously pursue an impeachment inquiry will hurt Democrats more. So it makes sense to do what is constitutionally required. After all, it is not as though Pelosi is saying she doesn’t believe Trump obstructed justice or that these are not serious enough charges to merit impeachment. It seems a pure political calculation, which is arguably a dereliction of Congress’ responsibility to investigate.

If the House impeaches Trump though a fair process based on strong evidence of obstruction of justice, let the American people watch Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell run a sham Senate trial—with Chief Justice John Roberts presiding—and let Republican senators vote against conviction in the face of that evidence.

Even if McConnell runs no trial, every senator will be asked her position on whether or not the evidence adduced by the House merits removing the president from office.

Sure that’s a political risk for Democrats, but so is doing nothing. More importantly, it’s the right thing to do as a matter of constitutional responsibility. Mueller was saying no less.  https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/05/robert-mueller-to-nancy-pelosi-begin-impeachment-proceedings.html

4. Farhad Manjoo: Worry About Facebook. Rip Your Hair Out in Screaming Terror About Fox News

I understand the fear about digital fakery. But to focus on Facebook instead of Fox News is to mistake the symptom for the disease.

The disease is an entrenched, well-funded, decades-in-the-making, right-wing propaganda network, one that exists to turn faintly sourced rumors into full-blown, politically convenient narratives. The propaganda network’s tentacles now infiltrate every form of media — magazines, books, talk radio, social networks — but it still finds its most profitable and effective outlet in the Murdochs’ cable empire.

And it is devastatingly effective: Just about every political lie that has dominated American discourse in the past two decades — the Swift Boaters and the birthers, death panels, the idea that undocumented immigrants pose an existential threat but climate change does not — depended, for its mainstream dissemination, on the Fox News machine. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/29/opinion/fox-news-facebook-pelosi.html

5. Jonathan Chait: Trump Staff Dreads Traveling Overseas With Toddler President

Traditionally, White House staffers cherish the opportunity to travel with the president overseas on Air Force One as a perk of their service. But traditionally, the president they are traveling with is not Donald Trump. CNN reports on the dread and horror that has overtaken the White House staff when duty calls upon them to accompany the 45th president. “It’s like being held captive,” one source reports.

The experience of overseas travel with Trump is almost exactly like traveling overseas with a poorly behaved toddler:

Trump won’t stop watching television. The screen-addicted president just keeps doing what he does at home, which is binge-watch TV for hours and get angry. The difference is that, on the plane, they can’t get away:

Trump will spend hours reviewing cable news coverage recorded on a TiVo-like device or sifting through cardboard boxes of newspapers and magazines that have been lugged aboard. He’ll summon sleeping staffers to his office at moments the rest of the plane is dark, impatient to discuss his upcoming meetings or devise a response to something he saw in the media.

Like at home, Trump’s method of governing is to see things on television that anger him and order his staffers to make them go away: “Trump has long insisted that he is treated unfairly by the news media, and if he sees something on television that bothers him — ‘which he invariably will,’ one official quipped — he instructs his staff to fix it, no matter if they are at the White House or flying over the Atlantic Ocean,” according to CNN.

On Trump’s Air Force One, the overnight is dark and full of terrors. http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/05/trump-staff-dreads-flying-air-force-one-with-toddler-president.html

6. Maureen Dowd: Crazy Is as Crazy Does

“He does outrageous, nasty, destructive things, knowing full well he’s crossing a line, and then he pretends he didn’t,” said Trump biographer Tim O’Brien. “He has spent five decades going to gossip columnists, radio shows, TV interviews and newspapers to stick a knife into almost anybody who crosses his path that he doesn’t like and he revels in it. There is something amazing in the Energizer Bunny aspect of his nastiness and his ignorance. He doesn’t care what people think about how mean or dumb he is. He just keeps going.”

O’Brien said Pelosi “hit on something that is core to his con. His whole life is about the cover-up. He has covered up his academic record, his health reports, his dalliances with women, his finances, his family history. Even while he was saying he was the most transparent president in history, his Treasury secretary was across town telling Congress, ‘I’m not giving you the president’s tax returns.’

“One of the biggest motivating factors in Trump’s life — other than food, greed, sex and revenge — is mythmaking. Deep down, he knows he’s a pathological liar and he’s not the person he says he is. But any time anyone pierces that veil, it sends him into a rage.”

It’s wearing, not letting this petulant man wear us all out.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/25/opinion/sunday/donald-trump-nancy-pelosi.html

7.  Eric Lutz: Trump Gives His Attorney General New Powers To Prove His “Witch Hunt” Theory

The president granted William Barr “full and complete authority” to declassify materials related to the origins of the Russia probe.

Trump has been claiming for a while now that he’s the victim of a political “witch hunt” that began with what he says was the illegal and undeserved surveillance of his campaign by the F.B.I., the C.I.A., and the Obama administration. With his new mandate, Barr is in a position to selectively release materials that could back the president up. Trump was poised last year to declassify materials related to an application to monitor Carter Page, a former Trump campaign aide, and other aspects of the Russia probe, but backpedaled amid concerns that doing so could jeopardize the investigation and reveal intelligence sources and methods. With the probe over, though, and with the Roy Cohn he’s always wanted as attorney general, Trump is plunging ahead.

His announcement came hours after he accused several former federal law-enforcement officials — including James Comey and Andrew McCabe, two of his favorite targets on Twitter—of “treason.” “They have unsuccessfully tried to take down the wrong person,” he said in a surreal press conference in which he called upon aides to vouch for his mental stability. Democrats are looking for a “do-over,” he’s whined, and he has stonewalled them at every turn. Still, the president is now demanding that U.S. intelligence officials comply with a probe no doubt intended to tarnish them. It’s not unreasonable for intelligence decisions to be reviewed, especially in such a high-stakes investigation involving the sitting president. But based on Barr’s actions so far, the public has no reason to trust that his probe will be impartial. https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2019/05/trump-gives-barr-new-powers-to-prove-witch-hunt-theory-russia-declassify

8. Karen Tumulty: Pelosi is a dangerous foil for a president who operates on impulse

So far, her strategy of keeping one foot on the congressional oversight accelerator while tapping the brakes on impeachment is winning.

The prospect of unending scrutiny is getting to Trump. On Wednesday, he abruptly blew up a meeting that had been scheduled with Pelosi and other congressional leaders to negotiate an infrastructure package and stalked out to the Rose Garden to whine that he could not work with Democrats unless they drop what he called “these phony investigations.”

Even more bizarre was a scene a day later when, during an appearance with farmers, the president bristled at Pelosi’s characterization of that aborted infrastructure meeting as a “temper tantrum,” and pressed five different White House aides to attest he had been “calm” in his three-minute session with the lawmakers.

By Thursday night, Trump and his allies were reduced to the shameless gambit of circulating doctored and heavily edited videos suggesting it was the speaker’s mental stability that should be questioned. “I’ve been watching her for a long period of time. She’s not the same person,” Trump said.

But that’s the thing. Pelosi is exactly who she has always been. What’s changed is that Trump is beginning to understand what that means. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/pelosi-is-a-dangerous-foil-for-a-president-who-operates-on-impulse/2019/05/24/ecfe2ea2-7e34-11e9-a5b3-34f3edf1351e_story.html

9. Paul Waldman: How do we avoid another ‘But her emails’ in 2020?

The reason I raise is because we’re headed into another election in which they’re going to do the same thing they did in 2016: take some trivial matter about the Democratic presidential nominee, and try to turn it into The Most Shocking Scandal Ever, the thing the entire campaign should be about. And they’re counting on the media to fall for it.

Let’s not forget that Hillary Clinton’s emails got more coverage than any other topic during the 2016 campaign. As one study found, “In just six days, The New York Times ran as many cover stories about Hillary Clinton’s emails as they did about all policy issues combined in the 69 days leading up to the election.”

That, like everything else journalists do, was a choice. Every day, they chose to write about her emails and not, say, health-care policy or climate change or the fact that the Republican nominee was an obvious con artist.

And we can already say what will happen in 2020. At some point in the campaign — more likely at multiple points — Trump will make some kind of incendiary charge about the Democratic nominee, with no evidence to support it. He will count on the media doing what they almost always do: treating the charge itself as the primary news, and determining the truth of the charge as a secondary task, thereby amplifying and spreading the allegation.

He will do this because he is utterly unconstrained by any sense of propriety or desire to hold to a standard of honesty. He knows he can do it because he does it all the time, and it always works. The headlines (“Trump Says Opioid Epidemic is Warren’s Fault,” or “Trump Charges Biden With Taking Payoffs from Mafia,” or “Trump Claims Harris Is Member of Violent Sex Cult”) will do their work before voters have time to read the fact-check, if they ever bother at all.

We also know that when he makes those scurrilous charges, every Republican in sight will rush to the cameras to repeat them, and Fox News will quickly devote hours of time to conservatives saying how deeply troubling “it” is. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/05/21/how-do-we-avoid-another-her-emails/

10. Jonathan Bernstein: Where Does Trump Get His Odd Ideas?

Trump doesn't read briefings, on politics or anything else. He doesn't appear to have absorbed the basics of public policy, whether on health care or national security or even issues, like trade, that he cares about. Instead, he seems to pick up fragments of information in conversation or, more often, from cable television. Often, it's partisan talking points, which isn't surprising since much of what airs on Fox News, CNN and MSNBC consists of partisan talking points. 

Trump then extracts some fact or detail he finds useful from that input, and comes up with his own way of expressing it. Usually, he pretties it up, smooths out any nuances and exaggerates significantly. Then he tests it out, on Twitter and especially at his rallies, working for the wording that gets the biggest reaction.

And then? As far as I can tell, Trump winds up believing the final version of whatever it is he has produced. Once it's in there, it seems to stick, although sometimes the original "fact" winds up growing more distorted over time.This works on just about everything. For example, the facts contained in special counsel Robert Mueller's report were in fact devastating for Trump, especially on obstruction of justice. But for the president, it's simply become “No Collusion. No Obstruction.” https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2019-05-28/where-does-donald-trump-get-his-odd-ideas

11. Michael Gerson: These are the golden days of sleaze

American politics has become a case study of the type that college professors employ in Ethics 101. If the economy is good, does presidential corruption actually matter?

That President Trump and members of his circle are corrupt has been established beyond doubt. There is the financial corruption of using the presidency as a marketing tool for Trump businesses; of foreign governments seeking influence by spending at Trump properties; of close associates being paid for influence by foreign entities; of industry advocates and lobbyists being appointed as industry regulators; of the Trump Organization expanding overseas operations with the help of foreign governments; of possible money laundering through Trump properties. And all of this in the context of a president fighting tooth and nail to shield his financial records from public scrutiny.

There is a political corruption of inviting a foreign government to interfere in a presidential election; of seeking politically motivated investigations against opponents; of attempting to block and discredit legitimate investigations of Trump’s own questionable activities; of directing secret payments to women with potentially damaging information; of attempting to influence ongoing federal investigations.

These activities do not need to be illegal to be corrupt, just as the president does not need to be a criminal to be a deceitful schemer who undermines important legal and ethical norm. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/with-trump-as-president-our-country-is-in-its-golden-days-of-sleaze/2019/05/23/8baa7ce0-7d90-11e9-8ede-f4abf521ef17_story.html

12. Eugene Robinson: Pelosi has Trump frantic and rattled — again

Once again, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is large and in charge. Once again, President Trump is frantic and rattled. Once again, a tough and powerful woman is driving an insecure man out of his mind.

I don’t think Pelosi’s strategy of resisting a formal impeachment inquiry can last forever, but I have to admit it’s working. She looks like a responsible public servant trying her best to serve the public interest. He looks panicked, desperate, out of control and concerned only — as usual — with self-interest.

No one can possibly take at face value Trump’s little stunt Wednesday in which he stormed out of a White House meeting with the Democratic congressional leaders, ostensibly because Pelosi (Calif.) had earlier said he was engaged in a “coverup.” For one thing, Democrats have been saying that for months. For another, Trump undoubtedly has been trying to cover up improper activity. There were the payoffs to Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal; there was the false explanation he dictated aboard Air Force One about the Trump Tower meeting. I could go on and on.

While the president was pitching his scripted fit, aides were already readying the Rose Garden for the brief and bizarre temper tantrum in which Trump vowed to hold his breath until he turns blue. Not literally, but close enough: He said he will refuse to work with Democrats as long as they are investigating him. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/pelosi-has-trump-frantic-and-rattled--again/2019/05/23/90f8adfa-7d97-11e9-a5b3-34f3edf1351e_story.html

13. Paul Waldman: The wall of concealment Trump built around his finances is beginning to crumble

In the past, presidents have gone to almost any length to assure the public that there wouldn’t be even the barest suggestion of impropriety regarding their personal finances. Jimmy Carter put his peanut farm in a trusteeship. Barack Obama refused to refinance his mortgage when rates fell, saying that “When you’re president you have to be a little careful about these transactions.”

President Trump would no doubt say that they were suckers. Not only has he continued to seek every opportunity he can to make money while president, but also he has essentially declared that where he gets his money from and what he does with it are nobody’s business. The obvious reason — the voluminous evidence that he is spectacularly corrupt, in some ways that are simply appalling and in others that bear directly on the presidency — is precisely why it’s so important that we see what he’s hiding.

So far, Trump has been successful in erecting walls of concealment around his finances. But those walls are beginning to crack.

The legal problem Trump and his attorneys face is that there is a long line of jurisprudence establishing that Congress’ oversight powers are extremely broad. And one must acknowledge their spectacular chutzpah, to claim that Congress has no legitimate reason to investigate the finances of a president with a long history of not only scams and cons such as Trump University but also a series of sketchy overseas business deals that have the potential to influence the way he conducts foreign policy. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/05/23/wall-concealment-trump-built-around-his-finances-is-beginning-crumble/

14. Matt Stieb: National Security Adviser John Bolton Is Trying to Run a One-Man State Department

The Trump White House has long been a place of internal strife, from the early days of Steve Bannon versus everyone else, to the daily sparring of John Kelly and his boss, to the current conflict between Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and National Security Adviser John Bolton. According to a new report from CNN, Pompeo is frustrated by Bolton overstepping his role and circumventing the usual policy-making processes.

Since becoming national security adviser in April 2018, Bolton has hosted fewer “principals meetings” involving high-level Cabinet officials and has pursued shorter, more informal briefs with the president and his staff. Generally, he has reengineered his role “into a decision-making perch instead of a position meant to funnel information to the President,” per CNN.

At times, that’s left other top-ranking officials, including Pompeo, feeling excluded and out of the loop.

During a recent debate over how to handle North Korea, Bolton left Pompeo off messages he sent to the CIA that included a list of questions he wanted answered, according to a source in the intelligence community.

Bolton is also reportedly holding meetings at the CIA headquarters as an easy way to keep State Department staffers from attending. One source told CNN that “John Bolton is playing secretary of State.”

Not only is Bolton’s jockeying causing open conflict with Pompeo in national security meetings, Trump also appears to be frustrated by his unconventional adviser. The president reportedly said that he felt undermined by Bolton on North Korea, and that Bolton is pushing a “war agenda” on Iran, when he would prefer diplomatic talks. Naturally, the president also doesn’t like his adviser’s public-facing role. Bolton’s Twitter presence and media appearances are not “appreciated by the president,” a source close to Bolton told CNN. “He wants it to be all about him.” http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/05/john-bolton-wants-to-run-a-one-man-state-department-report.html

15. Dana Milbank: Trump seems to be transparently mad

On Wednesday, Trump started tweeting before 6 a.m. about “NO COLLUSION” and impeachment and “PRESIDENTIAL HARASSMENT!” From that fragile mental state, all it took was one line from Pelosi to propel Trump to the Rose Garden with a poster taped to the presidential lectern announcing such things as “NO Collusion” and “18 Angry Democrats.”

“I don’t do coverups,” announced the man who paid hush money to an adult-film star and who is now fighting legal battles to conceal his tax returns and business records. “I’m the most transparent president, probably, in the history of this country,” he also said.

In one sense, that’s true: Trump’s state of mind is utterly transparent, revealed in real time. At the moment, he seems to be transparently mad.

Back at the Capitol, Pelosi reacted with concern more than anger. “I pray for the president of the United States,” she said. “And I pray for the United States of America.”

So should we all. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/as-impeachment-looms-trump-has-less-method-more-madness/2019/05/22/41c22bec-7cd6-11e9-a5b3-34f3edf1351e_story.html

16. Philip Bump: Trump, not understanding treason, names people he thinks committed the capital crime

During an impromptu press conference at the White House on Thursday, President Trump was asked by a reporter to be a bit more specific with one of the pejorative claims he’s been making in recent weeks.

“Sir," NBC’s Peter Alexander said, "the Constitution says treason is punishable by death.”

Trump gave a slight nod of acknowledgment.

“You’ve accused your adversaries of treason,” Alexander continued. “Who specifically are you accusing of treason?”

Before we get to Trump’s response, here’s an example of Trump using the phrase on Twitter.

My Campaign for President was conclusively spied on. Nothing like this has ever happened in American Politics. A really bad situation. TREASON means long jail sentences, and this was TREASON! -- Donald J. Trump@realDonaldTrump

It is not the only example.

“Well,” Trump replied, “I think a number of people. And I think what you look is that they have unsuccessfully tried to take down the wrong person."

Who specifically?

“If you look at [former FBI director James] Comey,” Trump said, “if you look at [former FBI deputy director Andrew] McCabe, if you look at people probably higher than that.”

Notice what’s happened here: Trump’s gone from nodding at the idea that treason demands execution to hinting darkly that senior officials in his predecessor’s administration might have committed the crime.

It’s an absolutely ridiculous assertion, mind you. For all of Trump’s overheated rhetoric, none is as easily dismissed as this claim of “treason.” Why? Because, as an expert with whom we spoke in March explained, the constitutional definition of treason to which Alexander referred is very specific in its scope.

“You can commit treason in one of two ways,” Carlton F.W. Larson, professor of law at the University of California at Davis and author of the upcoming book “The Trials of Allegiance: Treason, Juries and the American Revolution,” said when we spoke by phone. “One is you can levy war against the United States, which is essentially raising an internal rebellion to overthrow the government. ... The other would be adhering to the enemy, giving them aid and comfort. And ‘enemy’ is defined very precisely as foreign nations or groups with whom we are in a state of open war.”

So unless Comey and McCabe raised an army to take on the U.S. military or provided direct aid to countries who are officially at war with the U.S. -- countries to be named later -- they didn’t commit treason. By definition.

But the president of the United States nonetheless directly and incorrectly accused four former government officials of a capital crime -- and indirectly hinted that perhaps the man who preceded him in office was similarly culpable. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/05/23/trump-not-understanding-treason-names-people-he-thinks-committed-capital-crime/

17. Amy Walter: Democrats and the Enthusiasm Gap

“Democrats are in something of a Catch-22. There is a consensus (at least among the chattering class and highly engaged Democratic voters) that the party needs to pick a nominee who is the most electable, even if this person is not the most exciting or ground-breaking pick (i.e., a white, moderate, male). But, the ‘least risky’ candidate risks depressing Democratic base voters (especially younger voters and voters of color), the very voters Democrats need to turn out if they are going to beat President Trump.”

“New polling by Pew Research suggests that former Vice President Joe Biden — the candidate many see as the most electable — also fits the description of the type of nominee that many voters in the Democratic base say they are least enthusiastic about supporting in November of 2020. Pew asked Democratic voters to choose their level of enthusiasm for a Democratic nominee based on that candidate’s gender, race, and sexual orientation. A nominee who was female, Black, or Latino generated the most enthusiasm and the lowest percent of apathy. A nominee who was described as gay, lesbian or bi-sexual drew slightly more eagerness than wariness — 17 percent more enthusiastic to 15 percent less enthusiastic.”

“The characteristics that drew the lowest percent of enthusiasm and the highest percent of apathy? You guessed it, a white man.” https://cookpolitical.com/analysis/national/national-politics/democrats-and-enthusiasm-gap

18. Paul Waldman:Trump extends his corruption into the intelligence agencies

Because this is the Donald Trump era, the news that the president has “repeatedly urged” the Army Corps of Engineers to give a lucrative contract to a GOP donor and frequent Fox News guest is only the second most scandalous story of the day. The most scandalous is this one:

President Trump has granted Attorney General William P. Barr “full and complete authority” to declassify government secrets, issuing a memorandum late Thursday that orders U.S. intelligence agencies to cooperate promptly with Barr’s audit of the investigation into Russia’s election interference in 2016.

The president’s move gives Barr broad powers to unveil carefully guarded intelligence secrets about the Russia investigation, which the attorney general requested to allow him to quickly carry out his review, according to the memo.

Barr’s “investigation” is nothing but a propaganda exercise, an effort to provide ballast to the lunatic idea that there should never have been any investigation at all into Russia’s attempts to help Trump get elected president. But we have to be clear about just how shocking this order from Trump is.

The executive order not only gives Barr permission to “declassify, downgrade, or direct the declassification or downgrading of information or intelligence” to whatever degree he likes, but also orders the leaders of every intelligence agency to give him whatever he wants. If he wants to declassify something and they object, tough luck for them.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/05/24/trump-extends-his-corruption-into-intelligence-agencies/

19. Jonathan Chait: Laugh at Trump, Sure — But Also Watch What He’s Doing

“You joined our movement” — he said, making clear which subset of the country he was speaking to — “because you rejected the failures and betrayals of the past,” he told the crowd. “You reclaimed your destiny, you defended your dignity, and you took back your country.” The clanging, ethno nationalist oratory felt weirdly out of time and place. “Joined our movement”? “Reclaimed your destiny”? “Defended your dignity”? It sounded less like a speech by an American president than like lines uttered by one of the leaders of the Axis powers.

In combination with Barr’s latest counter-investigation, Trump has succeeded in reshaping the legal incentives under which law enforcement operates. The message is clear: If you investigate Trump or his allies, you will yourself be hounded and scrutinized for evidence of any wrongdoing. (Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, two romantically linked FBI agents involved in the Russia probe, who shared what they thought were private text messages criticizing Trump during the campaign, have been openly mocked by the president and will be the subjects of a forthcoming theater production catering to Trump fans.) And if you carry out Trump’s agenda or goals, you will be rewarded with legal immunity for any crimes, however cruel or brutal.

Just as Trump has put his presidency at the disposal of his never-ending campaign, he is likewise demanding that the federal security apparatus put aside its ethos of civil-service neutrality and follow his whims. For all his buffoonish flailing, it’s hard to say he’s losing. http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/05/laugh-at-trump-but-watch-what-hes-doing.html

20. Masha Gessen: How Nancy Pelosi’s Tactics Affirm the Trumpian Style of Politics

The President of the United States is erratic, illiterate, and doesn’t want to know what he doesn’t know. The President has alienated former allies, befriended or courted murderous dictators, and has repeatedly brought the country to the brink of nuclear confrontation. The President lies constantly, knows that he is lying, and demands that Administration officials lie for him, and often they do. The President has waged war on the institutions of government, overseeing the gutting of the State Department and the destruction of other federal agencies by their own leaders, and effectively shut off media access to the Pentagon, the State Department, and the White House. The President has acted to thwart oversight of the Administration by other branches of government. The President has never made a secret of despising the government itself: he has called it a “swamp” and gleefully shut it down for thirty-five days, during a temper tantrum. The President has not only failed to divest himself of his businesses but has installed his children in and near the White House, openly using his office for personal financial gain. The President has debased political culture and language, using his bully pulpit to spew lies, hate, and personal insults, and to serve fast-food burgers.

These are some of the known facts. The Trump Presidency has been a two-and-a-half-year-long high crime against common decency, good sense, human values, the national interest, and the law. The question is: What constitutes good opposition politics in this situation?

Trump’s performance is repetitive. None of what he has done in his battle of insults with Pelosi is surprising or new: not storming out of a meeting with her and the Senate Democratic leader, Chuck Schumer, on Wednesday (at least the third such walkout in six months); not the scuttling of an anticipated legislative deal with the Democrats (he does this every time); not his counterfactual assertions that he doesn’t “do coverups” and is a “very stable genius” (he has said this before); not the ugly spectacle of his meltdown; not the vulgar sexism of his insults. All of it is just more Trump. https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/how-nancy-pelosis-tactics-affirm-the-trumpian-style-of-politics

21. Renato Mariotti: Why Trump’s Stonewalling Legal Strategy Will Keep Failing

If Trump’s team is not alarmed by the speed and sweeping nature—not to mention the almost dismissive tone—of the two judgments against the president, it should be. Trump’s strategy on a variety of fronts has been to take extreme positions denying congressional authority to investigate the president. On Monday, for example, the Department of Justice's Office of Legal Counsel concluded that the president’s senior advisers are immune from subpoenas to testify about their official duties. Buried on Page 9 of the memo was an admission that the only court to consider this issue had ruled to the contrary. Hiding an unfavorable precedent in this manner might work on a first-year law student, but it won’t fool a federal judge.

Last week, White House counsel Pat Cipollone, arguing against having to produce the full Mueller Report and underlying materials, said the House Judiciary Committee lacked any “legislative purpose” for investigating Trump’s conduct as detailed in the Mueller report. He accused the House Judiciary of conducting a “pseudo law enforcement investigation.” Sound familiar?

The Achilles' heel of Trump’s strategy is that his extreme positions are not fact-specific or nuanced and are easily disposed of as legally groundless. Mehta noted that the “legal issues presented do not require the court to resolve any fact contests because the material facts are not in dispute.” Because Trump challenged the very right of Congress to investigate these matters, the only facts the court needed to consider were basic facts that no one could possibly dispute.

As a result, his strategy is not only generating adverse results quickly, but it could very well convince a court that he is acting in bad faith. If that happens, the House could get the courts to do what it is ill-equipped to do itself: enforce compliance with congressional subpoenas. That could get congressional investigations, or even an impeachment inquiry, off the ground. https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2019/05/26/trump-tax-returns-subpoena-226987

22. Robert De Niro Subpoena's Robert Mueller

Dear Mr. Mueller,

It probably hasn’t escaped your attention (in my mind, nothing escapes your attention) that I play a version of you on “Saturday Night Live.” As “Robert Mueller,” my character is intimidating because he is so honest and upright. I do it for comic effect — that’s the intention anyway — but there’s also a lot of truth to it. To put it another way — it’s good-natured fun, but not entirely good-natured.

There’s a level of satire, directed at the current administration. To be fair, not everyone appreciates the humor. The president has tweeted that there’s “nothing funny about tired ‘Saturday Night Live’” and that it’s “very unfair and should be looked into,” even “tested in courts,” and “this is the real collusion!” Though what or with whom the show would be colluding is unclear. But then I don’t have to tell you about problems with the term “collusion.” You barely mention the word in your report, and then only to explain why you’re not using it. That could be a punch line on “Saturday Night Live.”

As I prepared for my role on the show, I got to know you a lot better. I read about your lifetime devotion to public service and your respect for the rule of law. I watched how you presided over the special counsel’s office apparently without leaks. And you never wavered, even in the face of regular vicious attacks from the president and his surrogates.

While I and so many Americans have admired your quiet, confident, dignified response in ignoring that assault, it allowed the administration to use its own voice to control the narrative. And those voices are so loud and so persistent that they beat even reasonable people into submission. The loudest, most persistent voice belongs to the president himself, and under most circumstances, we want to believe our president.

There’s a lot of speculation about the president being tone-deaf to facts, but there’s not much disagreement about the tone. Whether you take delight in it as his loyal supporters do or you’re the unfortunate target of his angry rhetoric, the hostile way he expresses himself registers with everyone. Nor is there much credible disagreement that the president treats lies, exaggerations and bullying as everyday weapons in his communication toolbox. These onslaughts of rhetoric aimed at his opposition mostly leave his antagonists sputtering in response, but I don’t think an in-kind response will be very effective either.

Say what you will about the president — and I have — when it comes to that lying, exaggerating, bullying thing, no one can touch him. He has set up a world where it seems as if those disapproving of him can effectively challenge him only by becoming just like him. He’s bringing down the level of the entire playing field.

And here, Mr. Mueller, is where you come in — where you need to come in. In your news conference, you said that your investigation’s work “speaks for itself.” It doesn’t. It may speak for itself to lawyers and lawmakers who have the patience and obligation to read through the more than 400 pages of carefully chosen words and nuanced conclusions (with all due respect, as good a read as it is, you’re no Stephen King).

You’ve characterized the report as your testimony, but you wouldn’t accept that reason from anyone your office interviewed. Additional information and illumination emerge from responses to questions. I know you’re as uncomfortable in the spotlight as the president is out of it. I know you don’t want to become part of the political spectacle surrounding Russia’s crimes and your report on them. I know you will, however reluctantly, testify before Congress if called, because you respect the system and follow the rules, and I understand why you’d want to do it away from the public glare.

But the country needs to hear your voice. Your actual voice. And not just because you don’t want them to think that your actual voice sounds like Robert De Niro reading from cue cards, but because this is the report your country asked you to do, and now you must give it authority and clarity without, if I may use the term, obstruction.

We’ve learned our lesson about what can happen to the perception of your work when interpreted in rabid tweets by the president, dissected by pundits all over the map, trumpeted in bizarre terms by the president’s absurd personal lawyer and distorted by the attorney general.

And if, in fact, you have nothing further to say about the investigation, for your public testimony, you could just read from the report in response to questions from members of Congress. Your life has been a shining example of bravely and selflessly doing things for the good of our country. I urge you to leave your comfort zone and do that again.

You are the voice of the Mueller report. Let the country hear that voice.

With great respect,

Robert De Niro

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/29/opinion/robert-de-niro-robert-mueller-we-need-to-hear-more.html