Well, my point is is that everything is about the midterms starting....NOW.
So the question for each party, Trump, House Republicans, House Democrats, Red-state democrat senators is what to do?
We’ve seen the democrat House leadership (Pelosi, Clyburn, Cummings, etc.), play down the Trump Impeachment talk. That means they fear the REACTION to such talk—that is, enraged Trump voters.
Will the House Republicans take advantage of this? Will Trump do rallies and campaign for them? I think he will if they ask, but NEVERTRUMPERs better make up their minds in the next few weeks.
Senate democrats up for election in red-states? They’ve got to appease Trump voters, plain and simple. There reelections will also hinge on how any anti-Trump impeachment talk or Mueller reveals go.
Trump himself. You see where he’s going. All a big nothingburger witch hunt.
I’m convinced that exploiting this is his path to keeping his Presidency, which hinges on the House.
We KNOW, despite their forked-tongued talk, what Pelosi et al will do if they win the House.
What will Trump do if the GOP loses the House? I think he fights back, and fires the DoJ Stooges, but of course the democrats will impeach. No doubt.
If the House stays GOP, then Trump has won.
Kill the investigations and deep state coup then and there. Strike immediately and HARD.
So, let’s look at the one who is investigating? Mueller... What doers he do to ensure a Trump defeat—that is, ensuring the House flips? Press too hard, he’s giving Trump something concrete to run on. Does he really have anything? A little bit won’t do it, it will probably just stir up Trump voters.
Does Mueller really have something, good? A death blow? Release it now (next two months).
I don’t think he does. He would’ve shot that cannon already, for many reasons.
Will the House Republicans take advantage of this?
Sounds like past videos of the "peach foety-fi" RATs (and others) freaking out, is ready-made footage for Trump coat-tail campaign ads.
I am in the process of writing a piece about that very question. Some preliminary thoughts:
Verification of the Steele Dossier, if only just portions of it, is absolutely critical in justifying, even retroactively, the actions of the Obama Administration and Deep State and in legitimizing the Mueller investigation. The notion that the dossier is discredited, debunked, etc. doesn’t ring true with Democrats and the Mueller team. Their expectation is that Mueller will produce evidence of Trump “collusion” or conspiracy with Russia and obstruction of justice using the dossier as the linchpin.
These expectations are fueled by the statements of Democrats in Congress and former high-ranking intelligence officials like John Brennan, James Clapper, and James Comey who imply they have knowledge of incriminating evidence against Trump not known publicly.
Given the highly partisan composition of the Mueller investigative team, does anyone doubt that key Democrats have been privy to what is going on inside the investigation? On June 22, 2018 Senator Mark Warner during a dinner at his house on Martha’s Vineyard as part of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee’s annual Majority Trust retreat, per Politico, said:
“If you get me one more glass of wine, I’ll tell you stuff only Bob Mueller and I know. If you think you’ve seen wild stuff so far, buckle up. It’s going to be a wild couple of months.” Warner is the ranking member of the Senate Intelligence Committee. Passing his comments off as a joke is nonsense. Quoting Shakespeare in King Lear, “Jesters do oft prove prophets.”
President Trump responded on June 25th, via Twitter saying, “Why is Senator Mark Warner (D-VA), perhaps in a near drunken state, claiming he has information that only he and Bob Mueller, the leader of the 13 Angry Democrats on a Witch Hunt, knows? Isn’t this highly illegal. Is it being investigated?”
The 35 page Steele dossier is really a series of intelligence memoranda beginning June 20, 2016 and ending on December 13, 2016. The Democratic National Committee (DNC) and the Hillary Clinton campaign paid for its production using GPS Fusion and the law firm of Perkins Coie. The putative author of the dossier is Christopher Steele, a former MI-6 intelligence officer who was deemed credible by the FBI based on his previous work with them on the FIFA scandal.
In order to be effective, even a contrived operations research propaganda piece must contain some elements of truth that can be verified and expanded upon along with a patina of believability.
Steele did not construct the dossier out of whole cloth. He had to have a framework to build his narrative and some direction from GPS Fusion as to the predicate (deliverables) for his investigation. What sources were used? What was Nellie Ohr’s role in supplying information? Was she a conduit to not only pass information from Steele to DOJ and the FBI, but also, to pass intelligence from DOJ and the FBI to Steele and GPS Fusion? Nellie Ohr obtained a ham radio operator’s license not long after she was hired by GPS Fusion. Why?
With the release of the heavily redacted, October 26, 2016 FISA application on Carter Page, it is clear that the dossier and its author played a central, if not indispensable role, in obtaining the authorization to monitor Carter Page and the entire Trump campaign and transition teams and a sitting President.
It also acted as the catalyst/pretext for the FBI to initiate a counterintelligence investigation against the Trump campaign on July 31, 2016 despite the fable that George Papadopolous was the original impetus. Moreover, the FBI continued its efforts to verify the dossier during the Trump transition to and assumption of the Presidency and even after Mueller was appointed as special counsel.
As more information comes out about Bruce Ohr’s role as the go between Steele and the FBI (and perhaps Mueller), it demonstrates the intensity of the FBI’s frantic obsession to verify the dossier. Ohr was in communication with Steele up to November 2017, ten months into the Trump Presidency!
Beyond addressing the allegations contained in the dossier, there needs to be an extensive analysis of the basic premises contained in the document. The major protagonists mentioned in the dossier are Trump, Page, Manafort, and Cohen. Flynn is also mentioned as is Hillary noting that the Russians also have incriminating evidence against her.
Mueller focused his most draconian treatment on Manafort and Cohen. There must be something more that he has to explain why. Manafort is the one person that Mueller wants to crack the most. Cohen has proven to be a dry hole and Page, the person described as a foreign agent in the FISA warrant and the pretext for monitoring the Trump campaign, has been essentially given a pass.
Page has not hired a lawyer. He has not been charged with any crime. He has not expressed that much outrage and anger, instead, saying that this is really not about him. Despite an impressive resume that includes being a USNA graduate, a US Navy intel officer for four years, an informant for the FBI in a case involving the prosecution of a Russian spy, and an international businessman who lived in Russia for three years, Page has chosen to act like the affable fool.
I find it very curious. My conclusion is that Page was working for the FBI as the man inside the campaign. They could direct him to targets and thereby ensnare them in the monitoring of the campaign and transition teams. Otherwise, how does one explain his treatment by the Mueller team and the FBI.
Re the treatment of Trump in the dossier:
The infamous Steele dossier alleges that:
-Russian regime has been cultivating, supporting and assisting TRUMP for at least 5 years. Aim, endorsed by PUTIN, has been to encourage splits and divisions in western alliance
-So far TRUMP has declined various sweetener real estate business deals offered him in Russia in order to further the Kremlin’s cultivation of him. However he and his inner circle have accepted a regular flow of intelligence from the Kremlin, including on his Democratic and other political rivals.
The following additional details were included:
Speaking to a trusted compatriot in June 2016 sources A and B, a senior Russian Foreign Ministry figure and a former top level Russian intelligence officer still active inside the Kremlin respectively, the Russian authorities had been cultivating and supporting US Republican presidential candidate, Donald TRUMP for at least 5 years. Source B asserted that the TRUMP operation was both supported and directed by Russian President Vladimir PUTIN. Its aim was to sow discord and disunity both within the US itself, but more especially within the Transatlantic alliance which was viewed as inimical to Russia’s interests.
The Steele dossier was written in 2016 making 2011 as the approximate time-frame for the alleged beginning of the cultivation and support of Donald Trump by the Kremlin. What was happening in 2011 that might cause Donald Trump to be a lightning rod for the ire of the Obama administration and/or a target of the Russians?
In the Spring of 2011, Trump began his public questioning of Barack Obama’s birth certificate as well as his college and passport records. Trump tweeted 67 times hectoring Obama about his failure to disclose these documents and even offering on October 24, 2012 $5 million to a charity of Obama’s choosing if he “opens up and gives his college records and applications and if he gives his passport applications and records”
Obama has been fixated to the point of being an obsession on the “birther” issue. His thin skin and immense ego were clearly in play when he ridiculed Donald Trump who was in the audience at the 2011 White House Correspondents dinner. Did the Obama administration initiate an FBI file on Donald Trump in 2011 or earlier? Was information in that file provided to Nellie Ohr or Steele by the FBI or Bruce Ohr?
It is beginning to appear more and more that Obama had a personal vendetta against Trump and was out to destroy him completely.