2016 Presidential Election
August 14, 2019 — Scott Johnson
I posted my comments on Andrew McCarthy’s new book — Ball of Collusion: he Plot to Rig an Election and Destroy a Presidency — here on Power Line yesterday morning. I read an advance copy of the book in a few sittings last week. Although we all know the outline of the story and many of the details, I found the book to present a gripping narrative. I didn’t want
»
August 9, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
Dr. Robert Epstein is a psychologist, professor, and author. He’s the former editor-in-chief of Psychology Today. Dr. Epstein is a liberal Democrat. In testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee (see below), he described himself as a “vocal public supporter” of Hillary Clinton. He said that to characterize him as not a Republican and not a conservative is “an understatement.” Epstein testified that in the 2016 election, Google generated a minimum
»
August 1, 2019 — Scott Johnson
Federal Judge John Koeltl has dismissed the Democratic National Committee lawsuit against the Trump campaign, Donald Trump, Jr., Paul Manafort, Jared Kushner, George Papadopoulos, Richard Gates, Roger Stone, the Russian Federation, various Russians, Joseph Mifsud [!], Wikileaks, and Julian Assange. The DNC alleged in the lawsuit that the Russian Federation had hacked the DNC computers and stolen its emails during the 2016 campaign. The Russian Federation, however, is protected by
»
July 30, 2019 — Scott Johnson
Eric Felten is a meticulous and literate reporter as well as one of my favorite analysts of the mysteries of Russiagate. Earlier this month we posted Eric’s July 1 RealClearInvestigations column “Insinuendo: Why the Mueller Report doth repeat so much.” Eric waded further into the Mueller miasma in the RCI column “The shaky foundations of Mueller’s footnotes.” Today Eric continues his investigation of Russiagate in the RCI column “Why the
»
May 23, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
From the White House comes this announcement: Today, at the request and recommendation of the Attorney General of the United States, President Donald J. Trump directed the intelligence community to quickly and fully cooperate with the Attorney General’s investigation into surveillance activities during the 2016 Presidential election. The Attorney General has also been delegated full and complete authority to declassify information pertaining to this investigation, in accordance with the long-established
»
April 28, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
This year, the Democratic National Committee decided that presidential candidates can qualify for the first two debates by earning at least 1 percent of the vote in three national or early-primary-state polls conducted by qualifying pollsters or by receiving donations from at least 65,000 unique donors, including at least 200 individual donors in at least 20 states. I assume that this liberal approach was a reaction to charges that the
»
April 14, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
It’s not news that the liberal Center for American Progress (CAP) is a vicious operation. It is news that Bernie Sanders has decided to call it out. The New York Times obtained a letter (I wonder how) that Sanders sent to the boards of the Center for American Progress and its sister group, the Center for American Progress Action Fund. The letter accuses the think tank of undermining Democrats’ chances
»
April 13, 2019 — Scott Johnson
At ReaclClearPolitics yesterday, the invaluable Eric Felten took a deep dive into the testimony of former FBI counterintelligence chief Bill Priestap before the House last year (and do read the whole thing). President Merkin Muffley explained in Dr. Strangelove: “Gentlemen, you can’t fight in here. This is the war room!” By the same token, Priestap explained to Congress: “You can’t ‘spy’ here. This is the FBI.” Eric tells the story:
»
April 12, 2019 — Scott Johnson
Kim Strassel devotes her weekly Wall Street Journal column today — “Barr brings accountability” (behind the Journal’s column) — to the news that Attorney General William Barr is undertaking a review of the surveillance of the Trump presidential campaign conducted by the FBI and intelligence agencies under the Obama administration. As we have frequently observed, we weren’t meant to learn a blessed thing about this surveillance. Strassel picks up this
»
April 10, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
Attorney General William Barr is testifying before the Senate Appropriations Committee today. A little while ago, he talked about the subject of spying on Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign. Barr stated: I am going to be reviewing both the genesis and the conduct of intelligence activities directed at the Trump campaign during 2016 and a lot has already been investigated. . .by the office of the Inspector General. But one of
»
April 8, 2019 — Scott Johnson
Rep. Devin Nunes appeared on Maria Bartromo’s Sunday Morning Futures show yesterday. No one in Congress has taken more abuse than he has for his work exposing the Russia collusion hoax foisted on us by the 2016 Clinton presidential campaign. To borrow a formulation from Walt Whitman: He is the man. He suffered. He was there. We were not supposed to know. Thanks in large part to Rep. Nunes and
»
March 26, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
Yesterday, the New York Times carried an op-ed by Bob Bauer. As the title — “Trump’s Shamelessness Was Outside Mueller’s Jurisdiction” — suggests, the op-ed is just another attempt to talk around the fact that Robert Mueller cleared President Trump of “collusion” with Russia. What’s notable about the article is how the New York Times identifies Bauer. The Times states: Mr. Bauer is a professor of practice and distinguished scholar
»
March 22, 2019 — Steven Hayward
Just this morning I offered this reflection on Twitter: But just now the news broke that special counsel Robert Mueller has delivered his report on the Trump—Russia collusion investigation to Attorney General Barr. Godot showed up after all. Cue the media frenzy. Not sure how long it will be before we find out what’s in the report, but it’s going to be a long weekend in the newsrooms, where the
»
March 16, 2019 — Scott Johnson
A limited part of the deposition of former secret agent man Christopher Steele — he allegedly of the Steele Dossier — was unsealed on Thursday. Steele’s deposition had been taken in June 2018. His deposition was taken in the now dismissed defamation lawsuit brought by Aleksej Gubarev, a tech executive who Steele alleges took part in the hacking of Democrats’ computer systems (as the Daily Caller’s Chuck Ross explains briefly
»
February 24, 2019 — Scott Johnson
The news reports have it that Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s sentencing memo in the case against former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort is 800 pages long. In reality, it’s 25 pages plus exhibits. The sentencing memo has been filed in the case against Manafort pending before Judge Amy Berman Jackson in the Washington, D.C. federal district court. I have embedded the sentencing memo as redacted and made public yesterday afternoon
»
February 21, 2019 — Scott Johnson
I’m struggling with a painful condition that has not yet been subdued by medication. The condition is disrupting my sleep and the medication is suppressing my energy. (I should add that my painful condition is only painful. It does not have any other physical effect.) Borrowing the heading from the old National Review Notes & Asides column in which William F. Buckley responded to letters from readers — he compiled
»
February 18, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
The race for the Democratic presidential nomination has barely commenced, but already Margaret Sullivan, the Washington Post’s media columnist, is whining about “sexist” coverage of female candidates. As evidence she mentions the “mocking” of Kirsten Gillibrand’s uncertainty about how to eat fried chicken. However, candidates of both genders are routinely mocked when they eat “down home” food in an uptown manner. It happened to Donald Trump and John Kasich in
»
