17-05-2017, 06:01 AM
(This post was last modified: 17-05-2017, 07:33 AM by Peter Lemkin.)
I'm sure everyone by now has heard that Comey was in the habit of committing to memos what had transpired in meetings with politically powerful persons. It seems he also did so whenever he met with Trump or Trump associates. He then circulated a few copies he had initialed of these in the FBI upper-echelons. These have now been subpoenaed in some inquiries and no doubt soon will be in all, along with Comey himself. Trump is a buffoon of a man and has tried to use intimidation throughout his life. He now has cornered himself with [at minimum] obstruction of justice, and very likely more. It begins to look like we'll have a President Pence sooner than later [not a great prospect either]. I currently envisage Trump will put up a great fight, but when it looks as if he will not prevail, he will just resign his office and try to return to his businesses....which may well collapse along with his Presidency, leaving him a man without money. I won't cry. The hardest thing to understand is that 37% or so of the US voting population still have trust in him and his actions. While the Trump Presidency is undergoing a meltdown [as was always likely], I think this will further erode the entire false edifice of the US Political System.......and one can only hope so, and that some will wake up that business/politics/oligarchy as usual is NOT the way forward!...and that the Democrats or a more 'normal' Republican are NOT the solution...we need something completely different and to build a real bottom-up democracy - something we have never had. We also need real choices in the political spectrum...not just A to B on the right. Clinton was a horrible choice and Trump was worse, sadly all too many chose to either not vote, were not allowed to vote or chose the new devil over the old. There was NO sane choice and there hasn't been most of our recent history. If we can't break up the stranglehold of the two [almost one] party system, backed by the Secret Governmental structures, we are a failed Empire soon to end....and I stress soon!
One more side note. Michael Moore has been quietly working on a film designed to bring down Trump and it is about half done and the rights for distribution have been signed and sealed. In a few months when it is released, if Trump is still battling his impeachment and daily scandals, word has it this film will go a long way to sealing his fate with the public - or at least that part of it that still can think for themselves.
I predict that Trump will do the only thing he can in the next weeks - and that will be to get deeply involved in military events and war to rally the folks at home around the flag and what remains of his administration. So more will die needlessly to prop up a failing authoritarian and clown President.
One more side note. Michael Moore has been quietly working on a film designed to bring down Trump and it is about half done and the rights for distribution have been signed and sealed. In a few months when it is released, if Trump is still battling his impeachment and daily scandals, word has it this film will go a long way to sealing his fate with the public - or at least that part of it that still can think for themselves.
I predict that Trump will do the only thing he can in the next weeks - and that will be to get deeply involved in military events and war to rally the folks at home around the flag and what remains of his administration. So more will die needlessly to prop up a failing authoritarian and clown President.
Quote:Comey Memo Says Trump Asked Him to End Flynn Investigation
By MICHAEL S. SCHMIDTMAY 16, 2017
James B. Comey, the former F.B.I. director, during a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing this month. CreditGabriella Demczuk for The New York TimesWASHINGTON President Trump asked the F.B.I.director, James B. Comey, to shut down the federal investigation into Mr. Trump's former national security adviser, Michael T. Flynn, in an Oval Office meeting in February, according to a memo Mr. Comey wrote shortly after the meeting.
"I hope you can let this go," the president told Mr. Comey, according to the memo.
The documentation of Mr. Trump's request is the clearest evidence that the president has tried to directly influence the Justice Department and F.B.I. investigation into links between Mr. Trump's associates and Russia. Late Tuesday, Representative Jason Chaffetz, the Republican chairman of the House Oversight Committee, demanded that the F.B.I. turn over all "memoranda, notes, summaries and recordings" of discussions between Mr. Trump and Mr. Comey.
Such documents, Mr. Chaffetz wrote, would "raise questions as to whether the president attempted to influence or impede" the F.B.I.
Michael S. Schmidt, a New York Times reporter, explains new revelations from a memo written by James B. Comey, the fired F.B.I. director. The memo showed that President Trump may have tried to halt the agency's investigation into Michael T. Flynn.
Mr. Comey wrote the memo detailing his conversation with the president immediately after the meeting, which took place the day after Mr. Flynn resigned, according to two people who read the memo. It was part of a paper trail Mr. Comey created documenting what he perceived as the president's improper efforts to influence a continuing investigation. An F.B.I. agent's contemporaneous notes are widely held up in court as credible evidence of conversations.
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Mr. Comey shared the existence of the memo with senior F.B.I. officials and close associates. The New York Times has not viewed a copy of the memo, which is unclassified, but one of Mr. Comey's associates read parts of it to a Times reporter.
"I hope you can see your way clear to letting this go, to letting Flynn go," Mr. Trump told Mr. Comey, according to the memo. "He is a good guy. I hope you can let this go."
[URL="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/05/16/us/politics/document-Chaffetz-FBI-Letter.html"]
Document: Representative Jason Chaffetz's Letter to the F.B.I.
[/URL]Mr. Trump told Mr. Comey that Mr. Flynn had done nothing wrong, according to the memo.
Mr. Comey did not say anything to Mr. Trump about curtailing the investigation, replying only: "I agree he is a good guy."
In a statement, the White House denied the version of events in the memo.
"While the president has repeatedly expressed his view that General Flynn is a decent man who served and protected our country, the president has never asked Mr. Comey or anyone else to end any investigation, including any investigation involving General Flynn," the statement said. "The president has the utmost respect for our law enforcement agencies, and all investigations. This is not a truthful or accurate portrayal of the conversation between the president and Mr. Comey."
Mr. Chaffetz's letter, sent to the acting F.B.I. director, Andrew G. McCabe, set a May 24 deadline for the internal documents to be delivered to the House committee. The congressman, a Republican, was criticized in recent months for showing little of the appetite he
But since announcing in April that he will not seek re-election in 2018, Mr. Chaffetz has shown more interest in the Russia investigation, and held out the potential for a subpoena on Tuesday, a notably aggressive move as most Republicans have tried to stay out of the fray.
In testimony to the Senate last week, Mr. McCabe said, "There has been no effort to impede our investigation to date." Mr. McCabe was referring to the broad investigation into possible collusion between Russia and the Trump campaign. The investigation into Mr. Flynn is separate.
A spokesman for the F.B.I. declined to comment.
Mr. Comey created similar memos including some that are classified about every phone call and meeting he had with the president, the two people said. It is unclear whether Mr. Comey told the Justice Department about the conversation or his memos.
"Let me issue and control a nation's money and I care not who writes the laws. - Mayer Rothschild
"Civil disobedience is not our problem. Our problem is civil obedience! People are obedient in the face of poverty, starvation, stupidity, war, and cruelty. Our problem is that grand thieves are running the country. That's our problem!" - Howard Zinn
"If there is no struggle there is no progress. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and never will" - Frederick Douglass
"Civil disobedience is not our problem. Our problem is civil obedience! People are obedient in the face of poverty, starvation, stupidity, war, and cruelty. Our problem is that grand thieves are running the country. That's our problem!" - Howard Zinn
"If there is no struggle there is no progress. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and never will" - Frederick Douglass