Strong words. But you have to admit that it is undeniable that Trump wants those two things very badly:
- The Mueller probe to end
- A federal law enforcement agency that Trump controls and uses as he sees fit, including let his friends walk free and his enemies feel his wrath.
On the first point:
The Nunes fictional memo is designed to do one thing: allow Trump to make a case to fire Mueller. That should be obvious to everyone by now.
Firing Mueller is Trump’s only out. It is the only way he can avoid an interview with Mueller and avoid all his dirty laundry for the whole world to see.
But this is only part of the overall plan to install Trump loyalists in the DOJ and the FBI. Because LOYALTY is a requirement from anyone who works for Trump.
Why? Dictators need control of law enforcement so the can freely commit crimes without fear of any consequences or accountability.
That is why Mueller has to go. And have no one in the FBI/DOJ dare to reopen the investigation. Trump wants to declare the investigation over. And enough Republicans may help him do it.
And they should be severely punished for their complicity.
On the second point:
How did we get here? Republicans significantly changed their tune about Mueller on December 1 — when Flynn flipped and they realized how screwed they were. The noise started about how the DOJ and FBI are corrupt.
They even used the word ‘coup’ to describe the actions of the DOJ and FBI during the election.
The RW noise machine often projects — what they say about others is often what they themselves are doing. So what if they are really projecting ‘coup’?
Why are they going after the DOJ and FBI?
Because they are not loyal to Trump. And Politico on 12/20 shed a bright light on what Nunes (chief white washer for Trump) is up to:
A group of House Republicans has gathered secretly for weeks in the Capitol in an effort to build a case that senior leaders of the Justice Department and FBI improperly — and perhaps criminally — mishandled the contents of a dossier that describes alleged ties between President Donald Trump and Russia, according to four people familiar with their plans.
A subset of the Republican members of the House intelligence committee, led by Chairman Devin Nunes of California, has been quietly working parallel to the committee's high-profile inquiry into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election. They haven't informed Democrats about their plans, but they have consulted with the House's general counsel.
The people familiar with Nunes' plans said the goal is to highlight what some committee Republicans see as corruption and conspiracy in the upper ranks of federal law enforcement. The group hopes to release a report early next year detailing their concerns about the DOJ and FBI, and they might seek congressional votes to declassify elements of their evidence.
This ‘investigation’ by Nunes was confirmed today by Schiff.
The focus is ENTIRELY about the actions of the DOJ and FBI AGAINST Trump and FOR Hillary.
We can be sure that there will be ZERO investigation of the already reported pro-Trump forces in the FBI that forced Comey’s ill-timed announcement of a re-opening nothingburger.
I believe the real motivation is not just to protect Trump, but purge the the mid to upper ranks of the DOJ and FBI of any one not loyal to Trump. Republican complaints of “corruption” at the DOJ and FBI really is “lack of loyalty”. There is no other way to really frame their motivation. Lack of loyalty is not just a personal affront to Trump, he views it as a fireable offense — if not a crime.
But note that they seek to discredit HOW they found out about Trump’s shenanigans, not that crimes WERE found. In fact their approach seems to be to discredit the investigation because they KNOW more WILL be found.
Loyalty is what Trump counts on to get away with anything and everything. A loyal FBI would never investigate Trump or his family or their businesses. And it would implement Trump policies without question. A pro-Trump judiciary would rule everything Trump did as constitutional and legal.
Just like Putin. A totalitarian state aided by a Republican-controlled Congress that goes to the White House to stroke Trump’s ego with sickening platitudes (which I hope will become campaign ads from that).
Or Hitler. Now I am not suggesting Trump is a modern-day Hitler, but it is worth revisiting history so we do not repeat it:
By late 1934, Himmler and his deputy, SD chief Reinhard Heydrich, had centralized the regional German political police departments within a single new agency in Berlin, the Secret State Police (Geheime Staatspolizei; Gestapo). After Hitler appointed him Reichsführer SS and Chief of German Police on June 17, 1936, Himmler centralized the various criminal police detective forces (Kriminalpolizei-Kripo) in Germany into the Reich Criminal Police Office (Reichskriminalpolizeiamt) and united the Gestapo and Criminal Police within the Security Police Main Office (Hauptamt Sicherheitspolizei).
Himmler's intent was a complete fusion of the SS and the German police. He aimed to utilize the executive authority of the police to implement ideological policies deemed by the Nazi leadership to be essential for the survival and expansion of the German race. These included smashing political opposition and expelling or eliminating “undesirable” racial groups at home (such as Jews, Roma and Sinti, and people with hereditary disabilities), initiating a program of military expansion, and establishing permanent rule of a German “master race” in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. The security of this “thousand-year Reich” would be guaranteed by the elimination of “enemy races,” such as the Jews—wherever they lived—and the enslavement of other “inferior races” such as Poles, Russians, and other Slavic peoples, after physically annihilating their intellectual, cultural, military, and political elites.
To implement these policies, Himmler and his SS leaders, on the other hand, by tying it to the SS, removed the police from the framework of the administration and judicial system of the German state. Police operations ordered by Hitler through the SS-police chain of command would no longer be constrained by judicial or administrative review.
www.ushmm.org/…
I do not think it is possible for Trump to infect state law enforcement, but he could still do great damage with federal law enforcement agencies.
Trump thought he could control the DOJ and FBI with Sessions. And he is furious that he can’t — both to protect himself and use the FBI as a weapon to punish those who dare oppose his rule.
And to get “those people” out of the country.