By Matthew Vadum -- Front Page Mag——Bio and Archives--December 5, 2017
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I believe the explanation is threefold: (1) to punish Flynn, and derivatively the incoming Trump administration, for opposing Obama’s anti-Israel legerdemain in the Security Council; (2) to promote the political narrative that Russia–Trump collusion had cheated Clinton out of her rightful election victory; and (3) to tie this collusion narrative to sanctions relief, thereby making it politically impossible for Trump to roll back Obama’s sanctions once he was sworn in — a boon for the Democrats’ collusion narrative since the sanctions stand as a reminder of Russia’s election meddling.
If that is the way the game is going to be played, if the purpose of a special-counsel “collusion” investigation is to humiliate the opposition party by exposing its wayward foreign-policy objectives and unsavory horse-trading, then let’s investigate Obama and Iran.Flynn is the first major Trump administration official to cut a deal with Mueller In an itsy bitsy two-page criminal information filed Thursday, Nov. 30, with the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller III charged Flynn with making false statements Jan. 24 to FBI agents, in violation of 18 U.S.C. 1001 Flynn was President Trump’s National Security Advisor at the time he made the relevant statements. He resigned on Feb. 13 this year after a mere 24 days in the post. For reasons only Flynn knows, on Jan. 24, his fifth day in the Trump White House, he made false representations to the FBI about his conduct on Dec. 29, 2016, and Dec. 22, 2016, when he was a member of then-President-elect Trump’s transition team. Although Flynn did not accurately describe two conversations he had with the Russians in the performance of his duties as a Trump transition official, the conversations themselves with the Russians were not unlawful. Speaking with foreigners, even representatives of unfriendly powers, is not a crime In his resignation letter Feb. 13, Flynn wrote:
In the course of my duties as the incoming National Security Advisor, I held numerous phone calls with foreign counterparts, ministers, and ambassadors. These calls were to facilitate a smooth transition and begin to build the necessary relationships between the President, his advisors and foreign leaders. Such calls are standard practice in any transition of this magnitude. Unfortunately, because of the fast pace of events, I inadvertently briefed the Vice President Elect and others with incomplete information regarding my phone calls with the Russian Ambassador. I have sincerely apologized to the President and the Vice President, and they have accepted my apology.
It’s a show that they really have nothing on anybody above of Flynn and that Flynn made the terrible mistake of lying about something he could have told truth about. Because the two things he lied about were perfectly lawful and perfectly proper for somebody to do during the transition. And so, I think it really reflects a weakness, not a strength in Mueller’s prosecution.
You go for the lowest-hanging fruit. You indict people for lying to the FBI, failing to fill out the proper forms. These are forms of essentially political jaywalking, then you squeeze them and you hope that maybe they’ll give you information that would lead to somebody higher up. But in the end, it’s hope over reality. So, I would not say this is a day for celebrating for the prosecution in the Mueller office.Michael Flynn’s guilty plea doesn’t help the Trump administration, but it’s no reason for senior White House officials to head out to the ledges outside their offices It’s about politics, and nothing else.
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Matthew Vadum, matthewvadum.blogspot.com, is an investigative reporter.
His new book Subversion Inc. can be bought at Amazon.com (US), Amazon.ca (Canada)
Visit the Subversion Inc. Facebook page. Follow me on Twitter.