So Trump asks Russia to find and hack Hillary Clinton’s emails–and Russia does so. Russian operatives offer “dirt” on Hillary Clinton at a June 2016 Trump Tower meeting–and Donald Trump Jr. “loves it.” The president’s first national security advisor, General Mike Flynn, is convicted of lying to congress about his contacts with Russian oligarchs and their discussion of lifting sanctions. The president’s campaign manager leaks polling data to a Russian with ties to the Kremlin. The president lies about a Moscow construction project that would have netted him millions–a project that finally fizzled only after he had accepted his party’s nomination. And the Kremlin, avowedly, preferred Trump over Hillary Clinton.
All of this is collusion.
But, apparently–at least according to the attorney general’s interpretation of the Mueller report–they’re not conspiratorial. And it’s a conspiracy that would constitute criminality. Collusion amounts only to questionable behavior.
Still, we need to see the Mueller report and its associated evidence. It’s beyond absurd that we should take one man’s word for its conclusions. Congress should get the full unredacted enchilada. Because we require something more akin to a jury, it is that body which needs to interpret the report and decide on a course of action.
Is the whole collusion/conspiracy nonsense a matter of semantics?
“You like potato and I like potahto
You like tomato and I like tomahto…”
Possibly, although it’s important we have a high bar for establishing crimes. I don’t know what’s worse, the president’s questionable behavior or the possibility that he could be railroaded in the absence of that high bar.
It is clear from their many lies that the president and his circle–his family and campaign–have many things to hide. And I’m confident that, in time and under a watchful congressional eye, these will be revealed.
So, now, here we are. The Mueller report is in and, as we’ve loosely agreed upon as an electorate, we must abide by it. Because both major parties believe it will vindicate them, I say let’s have at it straight away. Let’s get this whole sordid mess behind us.
The collusion, that is.
There inconveniently remains the matter of obstruction of justice. Mueller’s report specifically did not exonerate the president in this regard. Neither did it conclude his guilt. So why not let congress get on with its constitutional duty of being a check on the president? Let’s get this mess behind us as well.
We have better things to do.
We still have a wall to build. We have Muslims to ban. We have more children to separate from their parents. We have Obamacare to kill. And, while we’re at it, there’s a middle class the taxman hasn’t finished eliminating. There remain sanctions on Russia to eliminate. There remains the longest running war in our history to yet wage. There are women to grope and groups–hell, all manner of people–to insult. Campaign rallies can never stop. There are dictators to have secret discussions with. There are inappropriate people to appoint to high positions and, apparently, there are too many people in the FBI. We still have coal to reconstitute as a source of energy. There’s a boatload of money to launder, and numerous banks to yet defraud. There are inappropriate people to grant security clearances to. Enough lies can never be told. There’s always an emergency to declare. And there conveniently remains a government to shut down.
“Things have come to a pretty pass
Our romance is growing flat
For you like this and the other
While I go for this and that”
Let’s call the whole thing off.
Joseph Oldenbourg