[Vision2020] Washington Post 12-6-17: Republicans hammer Mueller, FBI as Russia investigation intensifies

[Ted Moffett]

Vision2020 Post: Ted Moffett
***** Original material contained herein is Copyright 2000 through life
plus 70 years, Ted Moffett.  Do not copy, forward, excerpt, or reproduce
outside the Vision2020.Moscow.com <http://vision2020.moscow.com/> forum
without the express written permission of the author.*****
----------------------------

I predict Trump will survive the Mueller investigation and serve out his
first term as president, perhaps even winning a second term.  I am merely
being realistic regarding the magnitude and sophistication of the
Orwellian propaganda machine that supports the Trump agenda.  I would
dearly love to be proven wrong!

Some may think "Orwellian" too extreme a characterization of the propaganda
tactics we are witnessing.  But consider the example, one among many,
of the muddying of fact and falsehood about the Hollywood Access
recording:
Trump Once Said the ‘Access Hollywood’ Tape Was Real. Now He’s Not Sure.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/28/us/politics/trump-access-hollywood-tape.html
--------------------------------
All that is required for such misinformation to succeed is for the claim to
be repeated often enough that a large segment of the public regards the
whole issue as doubtful.  Proving anything true or false is irrelevant to
the psychological intent of such propaganda tactics.

Wikipedia on Orwellian:

"...control by propaganda <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda>,
surveillance <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surveillance>, misinformation
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misinformation>, denial of truth
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denialism>, and manipulation of the past,..."
--------------------------------
The whole article is pasted-in below without annoying advertisements.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/republicans-hammer-mueller-fbi-as-russia-investigation-intensifies/2017/12/06/4a6097ca-dabb-11e7-b1a8-62589434a581_story.html?utm_term=.d67ceffb0b4e

Republicans hammer Mueller, FBI as Russia investigation intensifies

By Devlin Barrett <https://www.washingtonpost.com/people/devlin-barrett>
and Sean Sullivan
<https://www.washingtonpost.com/people/sean-sullivan/> December
6

Republican activists and lawmakers are engaged in a multi-front attack on
special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s probe of possible connections
between associates of President Trump and Russian agents, trying to stop or
curtail the investigation as it moves further into Trump’s inner circle.

For months, the president and his allies have been seizing on any whiff of
possible impropriety by Mueller’s team or the FBI to argue that the Russia
probe is stacked against Trump — potentially building the political support
needed to dismiss the special counsel.

Several law enforcement officials said they are concerned that the constant
drumbeat of conservative criticism seems designed to erode Mueller’s
credibility, making it more politically palatable to remove, restrict or
simply ignore his recommendations as his investigation progresses.

Fox News Channel personality Sean Hannity, one of the president’s informal
advisers as well as one of his most vociferous defenders, on Tuesday night
called Mueller “a disgrace to the American justice system’’ and said his
team is “corrupt, abusively biased and political.’’

Several conservative lawmakers held a news conference Wednesday demanding
more details of how the FBI proceeded last year in its probes of Hillary
Clinton’s use of personal email and Russian election interference. This
week, the conservative group Judicial Watch released an internal Justice
Department email that, the group said, showed political bias against Trump
by one of Mueller’s senior prosecutors.

Fresh ammunition came this weekend, when it was revealed that Peter Strzok, the
top FBI agent on Mueller’s team, had been removed
<https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/two-senior-fbi-officials-on-clinton-trump-probes-exchanged-politically-charged-texts-disparaging-trump/2017/12/02/9846421c-d707-11e7-a986-d0a9770d9a3e_story.html?utm_term=.d3b96fcf014d>over
politically charged texts he’d exchanged with another former member of the
Mueller team, senior FBI lawyer Lisa Page. The texts appeared to favor
Clinton and disparage Trump, according to people familiar with the matter.

*[Top Mueller FBI agent removed amid probe into politically charged texts
<https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/two-senior-fbi-officials-on-clinton-trump-probes-exchanged-politically-charged-texts-disparaging-trump/2017/12/02/9846421c-d707-11e7-a986-d0a9770d9a3e_story.html?utm_term=.1a430e060473>]*

“The question really is, if Mueller was doing such a great job on
investigating the Russian collusion, why could he have not found the
conflict of interest within their own agency?’’ Rep. Mark Meadows (R-N.C.)
asked at the news conference. Meadows, leader of the Freedom Caucus, cited
a litany of other issues that he said show bias on the part of the FBI and
Mueller, including past political donations by lawyers on Mueller’s team.

An FBI spokesman declined to comment.

Accusations of bias against Mueller from conservatives have become
commonplace in the public debate about the president and the Russia probe,
and Republicans are expected to grill FBI Director Christopher A. Wray
about those matters when he testifies Thursday before the House Judiciary
Committee.

The chairman of that committee has been pressing the Justice Department to
appoint a second special counsel — one to probe Clinton, as well as the
FBI’s handling of past Clinton-related probes. Law enforcement officials
also expect Wray will be pressed on that issue again Thursday in the wake
of the Strzok-Page revelations, which are being investigated by the Justice
Department’s inspector general.

Mueller did get a public vote of confidence Wednesday from Deputy Attorney
General Rod J. Rosenstein, the senior Justice Department official
overseeing the Russia probe — though Rosenstein did not address the Strzok
inquiry. In an interview with NBC, Rosenstein was asked whether he was
satisfied with what he had seen so far from the special counsel’s office,
and he said yes and noted that some public charges had been filed. “We’re
not in a position to talk about anything else that may be going on,’’ he
said.

Mueller first became aware in late July of text messages exchanged between
Page and Strzok, who had been engaged in an affair, according to people
familiar with the matter who, like others, spoke on the condition of
anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.

Strzok was removed from the job immediately and transferred to the FBI’s
human resources division, which was widely understood by his colleagues to
be a demotion. Officials have said Page left the Mueller team two weeks
earlier for unrelated reasons.

Trump tweeted this weekend that the FBI’s reputation was “in Tatters.’’

*[Law enforcement officials warily eye White House
<https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/law-enforcement-officials-warily-eye-white-house-as-trump-criticizes-fbi/2017/12/04/371e9ea6-d939-11e7-b1a8-62589434a581_story.html?utm_term=.a3eab865f0da>]*

Strzok was a major player in both the Clinton and Russia probes, taking
part in key interviews, including those of Clinton and Trump’s former
national security adviser, Michael Flynn, who pleaded guilty last week to
lying to the FBI during that January questioning.

On Wednesday, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles E. Grassley
(R-Iowa) signed letters to the Justice Department and FBI demanding more
information about Strzok’s communications.

“Strzok’s behavior and involvement in these two politically-sensitive cases
raises new concerns of inappropriate political influence in the work of the
FBI,’’ Grassley wrote in one of the letters.

Matthew Miller, a Democrat and former Justice Department spokesman, said
Grassley is part of a Republican effort to undermine Mueller’s credibility
over the long run.

“First, they want to kick up dust about Hillary Clinton so the conservative
press has something to talk about that isn’t Trump’s misdeeds,’’ Miller
said. “The eventual goal, though, is to delegitimize Mueller in such a way
that he can either be fired or can be ignored if he concludes the president
broke the law.’’

A Grassley spokesman called Miller’s comment “a baseless charge from a
Democratic operative’’ and said the senator has a “three-decade record of
government oversight across administrations.’’

Grassley also called Mueller an “honorable person” whose investigation
should be allowed to “play out.”

Tom Fitton, the president of Judicial Watch, has called for the Mueller
probe to be shut down, saying his prosecutors are simply too biased against
the president to conduct a credible investigation.

Fitton said the Justice Department and FBI “covered up’’ the Strzok issue
for months. “That’s a scandal,” he said. “Rosenstein needs to explain what
he was doing, what he knew and when, and Mueller needs to explain himself
as well. I think Mueller has fewer and fewer supporters in the Republican
establishment, because of what he allowed to happen.’’

The email released by Judicial Watch this week was sent by Andrew
Weissmann, now on the Mueller team, back in January, when he was a senior
Justice Department official in the criminal division. After then-acting
attorney general Sally Yates was fired for instructing department employees
not to defend Trump’s first travel ban in court, Weissmann sent her a note
saying he was “so proud and in awe’’ of her. Judicial Watch said the email
shows Weissmann is biased against the president.

Tillis offered a mixed review of the Mueller probe.

“Some of the questions raised about some of the people in the FBI and their
behavior and possible biases make you want to go back and look at the role
that they played and whether or not there was any bias that was woven into
any results or observations they made,” Tillis said. “But on the whole, I’m
satisfied with the way it’s progressing.”

Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker (R-Tenn.), one of
his party’s most outspoken Trump critics, said he couldn’t envision the
president firing Mueller.

“I can’t imagine him being terminated,” Corker said. “To me, that would be
a step too far.”

As for the way the Mueller investigation is proceeding, Corker declined to
opine. “I have almost no knowledge as to how it’s proceeding,” he said.

In Congress, an effort by a Republican lawmaker to ensure Mueller could not
be abruptly fired has lost steam.

Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), who in August unveiled legislation to prevent
Trump from firing Mueller without cause, said Wednesday that he felt no
urgency for the Senate to take it up.

“Based on what’s occurred with Flynn and some of the reports over the past
week, I’m not overly concerned that we have to move quickly,” Tillis said.
He called his bill a “good governance” measure that lawmakers will continue
to discuss.
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