The collusion delusion: Now that the Mueller probe is over, let’s look for the real culprits |

The Star Ledger of Newark ^ | 03.26.19 | Paul Mulshine

[Coleus]

There’s an old saying that goes. “When you set out to kill the king, make sure you don’t miss.” I got thinking of that after the news broke that special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe failed to find proof that the Donald Trump campaign colluded with the Russians during the 2016 presidential campaign.

That was no surprise to me. From the evidence available to the public, it never looked like a case for collusion could be made. The anti-Trumpers made much of the campaign’s contacts with various Russians in search of possible dirt on Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton.

But at the height of that hysteria, UCLA law professor Eugene Volokh, who is a leading expert on the First Amendment, addressed that on his Volokh Conspiracy blog:

“If the Hillary Clinton campaign had reason to think that, say, the British government had ‘very high level and sensitive information’ showing serious misbehavior by Trump, I think it would have had every right to get that information and see if it should be put before the American people as evidence that Trump shouldn’t be elected,” he wrote. “Limiting candidates’ ability to expose their opponents’ misbehavior would violate the First Amendment.”

It would indeed – as every journalist should have realized, given that we seek information from shadowy sources all the time.

For a crime to be committed, the Trump people would have had to do something truly devious, such as hacking into the Clinton campaign’s computers. But the campaign was far too disorganized and chaotic to pull off such a sophisticated stunt. Nor was it needed, not with Hillary Clinton doing things like labeling as “deplorables” many of the very blue-collar voters who traditionally made up her party’s base.

[Incorrigible]

Bump

[deoetdoctrinae]

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