Brent Nyitray
Fairlington Blade
Let the mutherfuker burn!
jnc4p
Kevin S. Willis
Michigoose
lmsinca
markinaustin
Memetrics
novahockey
quarterback
ScottC
yellojktVital Statistics:
| Last | Change | |
| S&P futures | 4,189 | 65.50 |
| Oil (WTI) | 90.19 | -0.53 |
| 10 year government bond yield | 2.74% | |
| 30 year fixed rate mortgage | 5.45% |
Stocks are higher this morning after the Consumer Price Index came in lower than expected. Bonds and MBS are up.
The consumer price index was flat month-over-month in July, according to BLS. On a year-over-year basis, prices were up 8.5%. Ex-food and energy, prices rose 0.3% MOM and 5.9% YOY. These numbers were below Street expectations, which triggered a rally in the stock and bond markets.
We saw decreases in energy, used cars and apparel. Overall, this is good news for the Fed, especially the decrease in the month-over-month rate. One data point does not mean the risk of inflation is over, however it does give the Fed comfort that inflation is moving in the right direction.
The immediate reaction in the bond market was a drop in the 2 year bond yield by 16 basis points to 3.11%. The 10-year bond yield dropped 6 basis points. This means the inversion of the yield curve has eased. Finally, the Fed Funds futures have gone to a 60% chance of a 50 basis hike from a 32% chance yesterday.
More good news on the inflation front: The Atlanta Fed’s Business Inflation Expectations index fell to 3.5% from 3.7%. This index peaked in March at 3.8% and has been moving down ever since.
Mortgage applications rose by 0.2% as purchases decreased 1% and refis rose 4%. “Mortgage rates remained volatile last week – after drops in the previous two weeks, mortgage rates ended up rising four basis points,” said Joel Kan, MBA Associate Vice President of Economic and Industry Forecasting.
“Mortgage applications were relatively flat, with a decline in purchase activity offset by an increase in refinance applications. Kan noted the purchase market continues to experience a slowdown, despite the strong job market. “Activity has now fallen in five of the last six weeks, as buyers remain on the sidelines due to still-challenging affordability conditions and doubts about the strength of the economy,” he said. “Refinance applications increased over three percent but remained more than 80 percent lower than a year ago in this higher rate environment.”
Loan Depot is getting out of the wholesale business. Volumes were down 26% QOQ and 54% YOY. “We have already made significant progress by consolidating management spans to create operating efficiencies and reducing headcount from approximately 11,300 at year-end 2021 to approximately 8,500 at the end of June, 2022, to approximately 7,400 at the beginning of August 2022. We are accelerating our execution of the plan and expect to end the third quarter of 2022 with headcount below our previously stated year-end goal of 6,500. In addition we are exiting our wholesale channel consistent with our strategy of becoming a more purpose-driven organization with direct customer engagement throughout the entire lending process. Our exit from wholesale will also enable us to direct resources to other origination channels, reduce operational complexities and increase margins.”
Western Asset Management – a small mortgage REIT – is stuck with a bunch of non-QM loans that it wasn’t able to move before NQM rates moved up violently a couple of months ago. Some 60% of the loans on its balance sheet are at rates of 5% or lower, with par rates now around 6% – 7%. It will probably have to sell them in the 90s in order to get rid of them.
Filed under: Economy |
All Things in Moderation 
Just so we’re all on the same page re Obstruction of an Official Proceeding, below is the Wikipedia of the relevant language:
(c) Whoever corruptly—
(1) alters, destroys, mutilates, or conceals a record, document, or other object, or attempts to do so, with the intent to impair the object’s integrity or availability for use in an official proceeding; or
(2) otherwise obstructs, influences, or impedes any official proceeding, or attempts to do so,
shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both.
The term “official proceeding” is defined in 18 U.S.C. § 1515(a)(1) to include proceedings before federal judges, Congress, federal government agencies, and regulators of insurance businesses.
I do not see where Trump is guilty of any of this if he never made it to the Capitol and repeatedly told his audience to protest peacefully. Further, on January 4th he offered National Guard troops to both Pelosi and Bowser, whom declined, further demonstrating an attempt to ensure that Official Proceedings not be obstructed.
Lms, where in the language do you see Trump violated the statute?
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I thought he only told them to be peaceful once–surrounded by a lot of inflammatory rhetoric. But I don’t know if I can trust my memory.
But whether he said it 10 times or not at all, having a barn-burner of a political speech is not actually a crime. Denying the results of an election is clearly not a crime, because if was half of the Democrats would be in jail. There’s an argument that both the speech and his behavior during the riot was grossly negligent and so merited impeachment, which I can buy, but still not really a crime (nor should it be).
The fact check on Pelosi (and also McConnell) both having the same role in requesting NG troops is interesting. It implies that ultimately that’s up to the Capitol Police (who are answerable to–as I understand it–both Pelosi and MccConnell), who could have apparently made requesting NG troops part of their prep and decided not to. Curious.
Anyway, there are a lot of people to blame in the negligence category and Trump is only one of them.
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I’m sure there a lot of folks to blame for Jan 6 but I really doubt any of us can blame Dems for the attack on the capitol. I do appreciate you’re observations Kevin!
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McWing, not a legal scholar here but there appears to be a lot of evidence that Trump was trying to impede the certification of the election. If that’s not a legal proceeding then you can have that point. I don’t think he has to actually be part the insurrectionist mob (although he apparently wanted to be there). Between the fake electors scheme, his pressure on Pence and literally inflaming the crowd I think he bears a lot of responsibility for that day. We disagree but I’m firm in my opinion that he is guilty of numerous crimes. He literally mentioned the word peaceful one time in his speech prior to the march to the Capitol.
Also, there has been quite a bit of fact checking his claim that he requested 10,000 to 20,000 National Guard to be there and most everything I read says his claim is false. IMO he’s a known liar so not sure why anyone would believe him if there are substantial disputing facts.
https://apnews.com/article/fact-checking-235651652542
The House Sergeant at Arms reports to Pelosi and the Senate Sergeant at Arms reported to McConnell, a Republican who was then Senate Majority Leader. There is no evidence that either directed the security officials not to call the guard beforehand, and Hammill said after the insurrection that Pelosi was never informed of such a request.
Public testimony confirms the fact that the Speaker was not made aware of any request for such a deployment prior to then,” Hammill said in a statement this week.
Republicans have falsely laid the blame on Pelosi without mentioning that GOP Leader McConnell had similar authority over the security officials that day. But there is no evidence that either was involved in any effort to block the National Guard before or during the insurrection.
It doesn’t matter really what I say here because you’ve all made up your minds that he hasn’t actually done what I believe he’s done. Regarding the search of Mar A Lago, I sincerely doubt any of that would have occurred unless there was an abundance of probably evidence of a crime. The idea that Trump and so many R’s are making claims about planted evidence tells me they must have found something. Trump knows what this evidence is and so the more he cries foul and riles up his clan of sycophants the more challenging it is for our country to move beyond him and all his lies.
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Other possible charges include 18 U.S.C §1512 obstruction of Congress; 18 U.S.C. §371, criminal conspiracy to defraud the United States; Obstruction of Justice; Solicitation to Commit Election Fraud, and Incitement to Violence.
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lms:
It doesn’t matter really what I say here because you’ve all made up your minds that he hasn’t actually done what I believe he’s done.
I don’t even know what you believe he has done. I asked you several time what crimes you think he committed and you kept ignoring the question. Then finally you presented a list that of “possible” charges that someone else had put together.
The fact of the matter is that it doesn’t matter what we say nor what the facts actually are, because you want him ti be guilty of a crime, any unnamed crime will do, and you are going to believe his is guilty of something come hell or high water. If you “feel” he is guilty of a crime, he must be.
Regarding the search of Mar A Lago, I sincerely doubt any of that would have occurred unless there was an abundance of probably evidence of a crime.
You probably also sincerely doubted that the FBI would have instigated an investigation into Trump collusion with Russia unless there was an abundance of evidence of a crime. How did that turn out? Your incapacity to factor into your thinking what we now know happened a mere 5 years ago is really quite staggering.
Trump knows what this evidence is and so the more he cries foul and riles up his clan of sycophants the more challenging it is for our country to move beyond him and all his lies.
Lol. Supporting the J6 show trial and the endless investigations of Trump is perhaps the single worst thing to do if one genuinely wished to move beyond Trump.
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If you “feel” he is guilty of a crime, he must be.
That’s what I was saying yesterday. The problem is that this is a facts versus emotion argument. And those cannot be resolved.
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Regarding the search of Mar A Lago, I sincerely doubt any of that would have occurred unless there was an abundance of probably evidence of a crime.
Yeah, I’m very dubious of this at this point. I’m not sure that’s ever been true for the general population and small time players (minor politicians, business people), but I least thought it would be true in the case for a former president. I would think they would not want to do that and then it have be obviously political. Yet now I’m not sure. It could be another case where they were just convinced beyond all reason that, if they broke in a trashed the place, they’d find smoking guns everywhere they looked and those things they didn’t actually go in there for would justify the raid after the fact.
Lol. Supporting the J6 show trial and the endless investigations of Trump is perhaps the single worst thing to do if one genuinely wished to move beyond Trump.
This is true. I have to say it feels to me like the left, the Democrats, and to some extent the media want to talk about Trump and think about Trump so much more than I do. I’m not sure we’d have touched on Trump in the past week here if lmsinca wasn’t bringing him up, honestly. And most of the time when we mention Trump now it’s in the context of what the Democrats are doing or the press is reporting, and if either the Democrats or the press had just stopped talking and fretting over Trump . . . I’m not sure we’d be talking about him at all.
I would love nothing more than for Trump to just go away. He needs to spend the rest of his life doing his comedy tour.
Anyway, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: if he’s the nominee, I’ll vote for him against any Democrat except Tulsi Gabbard. If he isn’t the nominee by the time the GOP primary hits Tennessee, I will gladly vote against him. Literally the only thing that could possibly get me to ever vote for Trump again is that the only other choice was a Biden, a Harris, or a (shudder) Elizabeth Warren. Or anyone of that political mindset, which is the vast majority of Democrats.
I get a little irked by being put in a role that even tangentially defends Trump. He’s not a good guy (as I expect anyone who he’s turned on or that he has stiffed can tell you). I have zero doubt that he would have been a much better president than Biden, but even has president he clearly had no interest in the pandemic and so let the authoritarian experts run roughshod over him. I’m of the opinion a DeSantis would not let that happen (but obviously, I am prepared to be disappointed).
Point being I’m not sure I like Trump any more than lmsinca does as a person. As president, I liked him better than she did I’m sure. The fact that he’s an asshole is not unique to powerful politicians and probably an asset, and he was an asshole in much better ways as president than most of the politicians engineered in DC thinktanks that we usually get.
Eh, I would truly like it to be over. If the left wasn’t generally sociopathic and always gaslighting us, they would, too. “No, I totally want him gone. I want us to forget about him. SO WATCH HUNDREDS OF HOURS OF WALL-TO-WALL TRUMP COVERAGE SO WE CAN RELIVE IT ALL OVER AND OVER AND OVER. What? What are you complaining about? I JUST DON’T UNDERSTAND WHY YOU WORSHIP TRUMP!!”
I’d be perfectly content for Trump to announce he’s not seeking political office ever again, and then vanish from the news. The people who are not letting that happen are not the majority of the right, and definitely not the GOP who, I am sure, would like to see Trump disappear much more sincerely than Democrats or progressives.
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Scott…..I’m sorry I don’t always go back to see what you’ve asked me. You guys are way too prolific here and I don’t have a lot of time to debate or even read or answer your questions. IMO, there is still a lot of evidence against Trump re both of his past impeachments. What I feel is the same as what I believe to be true. And it’s pretty obvious so I didn’t need you to tell me that activating Trump’s base by accusing him of wrong doing will ensure his continued effort to occupy the White House……………but should those of us who think he’s unfit for office ignore his schemes just because it activates his cult following? That’s not going to happen. At some point I keep hoping that the bloom will fall off the rose!
One thing I have noticed here is that the times I manage to make a rare appearance here, the comments expand………….LOL
I wish I had more time to debate all of you but I just don’t. Such is my life! And it’s obvious also that most of you think my opinions are pretty worthless so that plays a part in my hesitancy to check in. Not being a debbie downer but this place is such an echo chamber that it’s tough to express an opinion without feeling stupid. Not something I’m super excited about……………you guys have your own game going here and I actually respect that so I generally just let it go there. Sometimes I still get agitated about the political situation though and even though I campaign, vote, donate etc I still feel the need to throw an opposing opinion out there occasionally. Not sure it’s in my best interest but sometime I can’t resist.
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Great to hear from you.
The FBI search warrant was issued, as all are, based on probable cause, which requires an affidavit based on information from previously reliable informants. That doesn’t mean all warrants are legit – some informants were reliable in the past but not this time, some affidavits are made in bad faith [but in my experience these were local, never saw an FBI warrant successfully quashed on a Motion to Suppress]. Also, if stuff was found outside the scope of the warrant [and IdK what the scope was] it could likely be suppressed, unless it was contraband in plain view. So I will wait for the reveal, and for the Motion to Suppress evidence, if there is one, before judging this situation. And I agree with you that the politics are a separate issue that should not affect the Justice Department in any direction, whether it arouses Trump’s base or leads to an indictment or whatever.
On another note, here is an analysis of the new big statute from a real estate investor view, mainly.
https://evergreensmallbusiness.com/inflation-reduction-act-what-every-real-estate-investor-should-know/
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Mark:
The FBI search warrant was issued, as all are, based on probable cause…
Is this based on personal knowledge of this warrant, or is this just a faith-based declaration that, since that is what is supposed to happen, it must have happened in this case?
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Been on vacation in the Davis Mountains with no internet for several days and y’all have been posting like crazy.
Probable Cause is the standard for warrant issue.
As I wrote, sometimes the affidavits are either wrong or deceptive or defective. If the affidavit, whether true or false or partly false or not based on reliable sources does not make out Probable Cause but the Magistrate issued the Warrant anyway then this is subject to challenge by a Motion to Suppress Evidence which could be timed early, but often is better timed late, when it can be used to effectively quash an indictment as well as the evidence seized.
Absent a Motion by the Defendant the affidavit is never revealed and is never an issue at trial, but again, if there were to be an indictment there would surely be a Motion to Suppress as part of the pretrial set of Motions and all would be known then.
From what I have read of the Warrant itself and the abstract itemization return there is no issue of “declassification”. However, it is difficult to prosecute a defense secrets case because the jury can never hear the evidence and usually the Defendant either wins outright or gets a sweet plea deal. Of course Courts Martial are an exception – but being CIC at one time does not grant military jurisdiction.
Would it be tried as an unlawful retention of Presidential Records case? Could be, but that seems like a political win for DJT. He never negotiated a Presidential Library deal like his predecessors since Truman but he could say he was in that process, I suppose.
No, I think it is going to have to be defense information need to know stuff to be triable, and the Grand Jury is going to have to take a defense expert’s word for the nature of the documents to indict, first. But if that happens, we should see the flurry of pre-trial motions and the case will be hell to prosecute.
If the material seized leads to evidence or includes evidence of some other statutory violation worth a prosecution – say the media favored January 6 conspiracy – the Motion to Suppress might have legs as to striking evidence outside the four corners of the Warrant.
I will say this about my own views: I think the feds are telling the truth in the following – they asked for the documents politely, were stonewalled, then subpoenaed the documents, but were given only a partial recovery of them subject to a misrepresentation by a lawyer or lawyers, and then seized them under Search Warrant. The progression is logical but need only lead to replacing the documents in the National Archives, and prosecuting the lawyers who misdirected the government on the subpoena return.
I also note that so far none of Trump’s lawyers have made standard defensive moves available but have played the PR game, which may be malpractice. We shall see. I am speculating beyond ordinary procedural stuff, of course.
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Mark:
I think the feds are telling the truth in the following – they asked for the documents politely, were stonewalled, then subpoenaed the documents, but were given only a partial recovery of them subject to a misrepresentation by a lawyer or lawyers, and then seized them under Search Warrant.
Where/when did the feds say any of this? In their only public statements on this, neither Garland nor Wray provided any substantive comments at all about why they did what they did.
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I replied to a Jennifer Rubin commentary on the documents recovered from DJT.
She relied on this quotation from a former prosecutor:
“Not only does it raise the possibility that sensitive information may have landed in the wrong hands, but it also makes it almost impossible to decline to file criminal charges against Trump and the explosive sideshow that will come with it, an unenviable task for any prosecutor.”
I wrote:
This seems incorrect to me. Only positive evidence that sensitive information landed in the wrong hands would make declination impossible.
Please follow me on this. A prosecution for a crime related to the review, retention, removal, or destruction of records* would be straightforward, but does not have the urgency or sex appeal necessary to carry the sideshow. Only conspiracy or espionage charges do. A conspiracy charge would require a motive for obstruction – say financial gain, or working for a foreign power, or extortion of an individual or agency, or avoidance of a prosecution for something else, to be worth the effort. An espionage charge, if none of the documents can be proven to have been shared with commercial or foreign state agencies, is another hollow exercise [although admittedly one that has been pursued against careless nuclear lab workers in the past].
While this is not the parallel the Rs say it is, once the investigation of HRC’s emails did not uncover evidence they were shared inappropriately with a dangerous entity that security breach was going nowhere as a prosecution.
But it too was a breach.
The difference the Rs will not acknowledge is that HRC’s breach was not wilfully hidden from the government, nor misrepresented to investigators repeatedly. The big picture is here instructive, however.
*The unlawful retention issue might justify a slap on the wrist prosecution just as a prophylactic against future similar misconduct. Would it be worth the political firestorm?
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Mark:
The difference the Rs will not acknowledge is that HRC’s breach was not wilfully hidden from the government, nor misrepresented to investigators repeatedly.
Two points here. First, HRC literally wiped her server clean while she was being investigated. If that is not willfully trying to hide things from the government, I don’t know what is.
Second, we (you and I and Jen Rubin) have literally no idea whether Trump has willfully hidden things or made misrepresentations to investigators. The only things we “know” are things that anonymous sources have leaked to Trump-hating outlets like the WaPo. In other words, exactly the same type of reporting that led us to “know” so much about Russian collusion that turned out to be completely false.
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I am taking the government’s view as stated for the purpose of the discussion, in both the documents recovered from Trump and the HRC server matters. That is all that is necessary to draw my conclusion about having positive evidence of malicious intent to justify a high profile prosecution.
In both cases, a “lesser” being would have been prosecuted and intent would have been left to a jury. And I am not saying pols should get preferential treatment, but they have got it and they do get it.
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Mark:
I am taking the government’s view as stated…
As stated where and by who? The affidavit was almost completely redacted, and the only other information that I am aware of has come from anonymous sources laundered through the media. So where are you getting this “government stated view”?
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Mark:
I agree with you that the politics are a separate issue that should not affect the Justice Department in any direction
It should not. But over the last 6 years it has become impossible to reasonably deny that it does.
Three words: Russia Collusion Hoax.
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Exactly. Supposedly the judge is a D donor who represented Jeffrey Epstein’s co-conspirators.
You can’t make that shit up.
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Trump was trying to impede the certification of the election. If that’s not a legal proceeding then you can have that point.
As far as I know that is a legal proceeding covered by the statute.
Between the fake electors scheme
The framing of this has always fascinated me. There is a long history of alternate electors and the goal was for Pence to not certify certain states electors (and if Pence felt that there was fraud in the election it certainly seems to me then that denying that certification would be within his authority as President of the Senate. [Obviously there is disagreement here] The VP’s ability to reject electors has never been adjudicated so ultimately the act isn’t illegal and we honestly don’t know if it would withstand Supreme Court muster. Further, there is not established Federal law prohibiting alternate electors from doing, well, anything. There is no law that says that I cannot present my vote to Congress to be counted, but it doesn’t mean that Congress has to recognize me either. Calling it “scheme” may be appropriate as the word is commonly defined but calling it “illegal” or “fraudulant” certainly isn’t. The Trump administration certainly wasn’t concerned with it being illegal and as far as I know, most crimes are not announced to the media before hand:
https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/530092-stephen-miller-alternate-electors-will-keep-trump-challenge-alive-post/
“As we speak, today, an alternate slate of electors in the contested states is going to vote and we’re going to send those results up to Congress,” he continued. “This will ensure that all of our legal remedies remain open. That means that if we win these cases in the courts, that we can direct that the alternate state of electors be certified.”
He announced this on a television show.
Will you please direct me to the statute where this is forbidden?
his pressure on Pence and literally inflaming the crowd I think he bears a lot of responsibility for that day
I see this a lot but have you actually watched the speech? He repeatedly told the crowd to march to the Capitol and protest peacefully. How is this incitement? Further, the mob at the Capitol penetrated the perimeter even before Trump started finished speaking, in fact, the mob at the Capitol didn’t even attend the speech of Trump’s to be incited. His speech was by invitation only.
Where in the speech would a reasonable person be incited to commit violence, which I believe incitement laws require?
his pressure on Pence
In what way is the President “pressuring” his Vice President to take or not take a particular action, “illegal”? If Trump asked Pence to attend a funeral of some foreign country’s deceased leader, could you construe that as “pressure”? I wouldn’t. In some ways the VP works for the President and in other ways the VP is serving their own, independent term as they are elected separately. Would define what “pressure” means and show us the statute in which it says the a President asking his VP to not certify an election constitutes some sort of crime of “pressure”?
Regarding the National Guard, nowhere in the article does it deny the Trump offered National Guard troops on January 4th. In fact, the Capitol Police’s own timeline that was produced proves that Trump offered them National Guard troops:
Click to access USCPJan.6Timeline.pdf
If you scroll to the bottom of page 5 you’ll see the following:
COP Sund asks Senate Sergeant at Arms (SSAA) Micheel Stenger and House Sergeant at Arms (HSAA) Paul Irving for authority to have National Guard to assist with security for the January 6, 2021 event based on briefing with law enforcement partners and revised intelligence assessment
COP Sund’s request is denied. SSAA and HSAA tells COP Sund to contact General Walker at DC National Guard to discuss guard’s ability to support a request if needed.
Finally,
Regarding the search of Mar A Lago, I sincerely doubt any of that would have occurred unless there was an abundance of probably evidence of a crime.
Why don’t you think skepticism is warranted given that a DOJ attorney was convicted of lying on a FISA warrant the the FBI has apologized to falsifying information in obtaining FISA warrants to spy on the Trump campaign? At what point, in your opinion is it warranted to be skeptical of the FBI?
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At what point, in your opinion is it warranted to be skeptical of the FBI?
When they reopen a case on a Democrat a week before the election.
The “alternate electors” thing was skeevy. In the same way using the pandemic to have the courts unconstitutionally re-write election laws is skeevy. The same way election officials telling poll watchers counting was done for the day and they can go home and then continuing to count is skeevy.
Lots of skeevy things went on around the 2020 election. Interest seems to be primarily focused on one skeevy thing that is clearly not illegal to do.
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It doesn’t matter really what I say here because you’ve all made up your minds that he hasn’t actually done what I believe he’s done.
And you’ve made up your mind he has, so . . . the difference is . . . ?
I’m too distant to say what he’s done or hasn’t done from a legal and objective perspective, so all I can say is, at present, I don’t see it. And apparently I’m not the only one because if there were a clear causal chain that was a slam dunk, there’d be no need for the January 6th committee or much of anything else that is going on.
But whatever will be, will be!
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Maybe I was born a cynic but I’m not sure that a Federal agency that ran a child porn site is worthy of much trust.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/01/21/fbi-ran-website-sharing-thousands-child-porn-images/79108346/
You’re mileage may vary however.
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https://www.dailywire.com/news/spectacular-backfire-biden-officials-blast-fbis-raid-on-mar-a-lago-as-report-reveals-rat-on-inside
Some Biden administration officials in the U.S. Justice Department slammed the FBI’s raid on Mar-a-Lago this week, saying that the situation backfired big time and the bureau ended up creating the very situation that it sought to avoid.
Newsweek reported that the FBI specifically targeted three rooms at former President Donald Trump’s residence — a bedroom, an office, and a storage room — and that the information used to obtain the warrant “was based largely on information from an FBI confidential human source.”
The report said that the confidential informant told the bureau what documents were taken and where the documents were located.
The report said that federal officials waited until Trump was out of state to execute the search warrant at the property because they wanted to be as low-key as possible.
“What a spectacular backfire,” a DOJ official told the publication. “I know that there is much speculation out there that this is political persecution, but it is really the best and the worst of the bureaucracy in action. They wanted to punctuate the fact that this was a routine law enforcement action, stripped of any political overtones, and yet [they] got exactly the opposite.”
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a perceptive six year old could have told them how this would be perceived.
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Exactly…this sounds too absurd to be the full story.
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Scott,
I saw that Newsweek piece and ultimately found it unpersuasive in what I think it’s primary goal was, to frame the FBI as ham-handed and overly cautious in its noble attempt to pursue Justice. All we have is the anonymous sources’ word that all this was legit versus the obvious answer that the FBI and DOJ don’t really give a shit and will follow their normal arrogant, unjust procedures unless one is a member of the Establishment. It read like the response a job candidate gives when asked what they think their biggest flaw is, that they “care too much.”
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Totally agree.
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I haven’t seen any poll numbers for Trump, but I will guarantee this helped him, not hurt him.
Jonah Goldberg is beside himself right now.
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The theory over at Legal Insurrection:
https://legalinsurrection.com/2022/08/this-is-a-provocation-they-are-trying-to-get-a-reaction-that-allows-a-further-crackdown/
This is a provocation. They are trying to get a reaction that allows a further crackdown. See, In Re J6.
It’s also a provocation to get Trump to declare his candidacy for President before the midterms. Democrats would love to turn 2022 into a referendum on Trump rather than the deliberate destruction of the national borders and inflation.
Would the FBI and DOJ do such a thing? Aren’t they “above” politics? The then FBI Director James Comey admitted to trying to set up the new President Trump by alerting him to the Steele Dossier, and then leaked the story of the briefing to CNN, which gave license to report on the false allegations in the dossier. So yes, the FBI and DOJ would do such a thing, and have done such a thing to Trump.
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The theory over at Legal Insurrection:
That makes the most sense of all I have seen so far.
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The FBI also planned terrorist attacks and other federal crimes to juice their numbers. There’s not enough real crime to pursue or it’s just too hard so they honeypot people … doing criminal things in order to catch criminals but it’s okay when they do it because they are the good guys!
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