Marcy Wheeler (a thousand blessings upon her eagle eyes!) has focused on this incredibly-important point. More than one summary exists; apparently, each section has its own precis. Marcy begins by quoting yesterday's NYT piece:
Leopold will surely get the door slammed in his face, so I doubt that he'll be able to save the day. Maybe someone else will. Maybe someone in Congress.And the Justice Department quickly determined that the summaries contain sensitive information, like classified material, secret grand-jury testimony and information related to current federal investigations that must remain confidential, according to two government officials.The detail is useful because it tells Jerry Nadler and FOIA terrorist Jason Leopold precisely what they’re looking for: Mueller’s own summaries of their findings (which in fact may be parallel summaries, addressing multiple questions.
Let's repeat the key words, this time in boldface:
And the Justice Department quickly determined that the summaries contain sensitive information, like classified material...Oh really? Izzat so? The WP tells a rather different tale (boldface added by me)...
Summaries were prepared for different sections of the report, with a view that they could made public, the official said.To recap:
The report was prepared “so that the front matter from each section could have been released immediately — or very quickly,” the official said. “It was done in a way that minimum redactions, if any, would have been necessary, and the work would have spoken for itself.”
Mueller’s team assumed the information was going to be made available to the public, the official said, “and so they prepared their summaries to be shared in their own words — and not in the attorney general’s summary of their work, as turned out to be the case.”
1. Summaries were prepared with public release in mind.
2. Barr refused to publish or quote from these summaries.
3. When asked to release the summaries, Barr's Justice Department pretended that they contain classified material. They do not. In accordance with all precedence (not to mention common sense), those summaries were written to be read by "poor on'ry people like you and like I."
Conclusion: Barr is lying. Simple as that.
Further conclusion: He would not have told this lie if the actual Mueller report were helpful to Trump. Simple as that.
Do not underestimate the importance of this. I've been demoralized for months, but now I'm starting to grin again. Reports leak; they always do. The brown-n-smelly is hurtling toward the sharp-n-whirly -- and when it hits, a huge stink will engulf both Trump and Barr.
7 comments:
I need to catch up on a couple of things:
1. The issue with the Mueller report that everyone seems to be missing is the question of what standard of proof Mueller used. Did the evidence raise a reasonable suspicion of collusion but not probable cause, not more probably true than not, not proof beyond a reasonable doubt? If you go to a doctor and he says he sees a lump that raises a reasonable suspicion of cancer but he thinks it most likely is not, would you just ignore the lump? We have a possible cancer in the White House and we should not require proof beyond a reasonable doubt to begin treatment.
2. The problem with equivocating hugging with rape is that rape becomes less serious. Hugging isn't so bad therefore rape isn't so bad. Beyond that, the people who get really agitated with invasion of personal space are sociopaths in prison.
3. Again on a personal note, once you create a work of art, you do not get to judge its worthiness, that is up to the audience. Put your work on a a page and create a link, let us judge its value. Perhaps you can sell a few.
I'm so glad you're back, Joe. That must have been one helluva depression. Been there. Done it.
So until Dems congratulate Trump on his 2016 victory, and until Dems stop fighting the Border Wall, playing this game of "Now we got em" will just backfire.
So strange. Right as Joseph gets optimistic, I get pessimistic! After the media fall all over itself declaring Trump exonerated after the Barr letter, I have a feeling the media is going to latch onto the fact that Mueller did not 100% find direct collusion with the Russian government (a claim no one has made) itself enough to declare Trump exonerated. The good news though is that the public did not buy the media's spin onthe Barr report at all. The public saw right through it immediately, so it's possible the media spin on the Mueller report won't matter.
But really, it's all moot. We are in a holding pattern until the public actually sees the report. And like Joseph, somehow or another, it will get released.
One last note, I have a feeling the sentence fragment about how Mueller did not establish collusion or conspiracy with Russia will turn out to be much more narrowly defined when viewed in its full context than most of us are now interpreting it. No one has alleged that Trump or his campaign was actually working directly with the Russian government but instead that they willfully received Russian aid from intermediaries. That's not a criminal conspiracy as it's technically defined, and it's reasonable to not call it coordination. But it is still damning, and I have a feeling this is what Mueller will say.
I second Sharon in saying that it's good to have you back Joe!! You have been the one blog I have followed since the Bush administration, and I was afraid you wouldn't be back.
As to the current post, I agree with everything you write, so I can't really add anything.
Needs to said again and again, when we work with Eastern European Politicians, our Media calls it Political Consulting, when a Russian person interacts with anyone in the U.S during an Election Campaign, our Media and Government calls it Collusion.
By accepting a false premise, people are being setting up for a disappointment, and rightly so.
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