Time did matter and that fuck sat on his ass and did nothing until it was too late. Fuck that doj. Republicans can cut that department and get rid of a lot of waste.

While buying their guns.

Kinda late. Or, too late. Not his fault, he was trying to move with all deliberate speed, it was a skewed judicial system that failed us.

Maybe Smith is a brilliant prosecutor when playing by the rules of a fair and impartial court. But he totally misjudged -- and bungled -- this situation. Many of us have been saying all along that the course he and Garland were on would never get this into trial before the election.

And it was not a case of, "He did his best under the circumstances of a sabotaging AG and a rigged court system." There were absolutely other options available to him and he never should have been pursuing the "Mother of all Conspiracy cases" strategy. That was never going to work.

The course that had the best chances of going to trial long before the election and resulting in sanctions that would have prevented Trump's running for office was to assemble a smaller case consisting only of the elements of crimes that unquestionably were committed within the bailiwick of the DC Circuit. Maybe that would have failed also, for the same reason that none of Epstein's adventures and collaborators have ever been exposed as the sex traffickers they all were. That is to say, even a limited case within the DC Circuit might have been threatening to so many people in the Beltway that even that would have been blocked. But that was the only course that had a chance.

I have no idea what the hell Smith thought he could accomplish by sending this to the 11th. Or maybe Smith didn't really want it to go to trial. Who knows? Garland sure didn't.

Where do you think Judge Chutkan sits?

What do you think the 11th Circuit has to do with the election interference case?

that it was easy for Trump's people and the SCOTUS to jam the gears every step of the way. A simpler case on more limited charges would have had a better chance, IMHO.

I suppose you and he reason that the "kitchen sink" / "more irons in the fire" strategy gives better odds that SOMETHING will get through. From the first day, I said that was the wrong strategy. I can't prove that a simpler strategy would have been more successful, but these cases ended up exactly where I said they would be -- dead with zero impact. Smith's report is a 24-hour news cycle event, and ultimately can be dismissed as the rantings of a disgruntled prosecutor who lost. There is no comfort in some fragments of his investigating being released

And the case before Chutkin never got to trial, did it? She dismissed it, right after the election because she knew Smith had missed the window of opportunity. This case was the very definition of "time is of the essence", and Smith pissed around month after month expanding the scope, each month getting himself farther and farther from a trial. We don't know his motives. Maybe he just figured, "I'm a lawyer, not a politician. I am trained to keep working on a case for as long as it takes to make the biggest, most bullet-proof case possible." I guess they don't teach "Justice delayed is justice denied" in law school.

However it happened, it is a disaster of existential proportions. Of course, it should not have come down to one man (Smith or Garland, take your pick), any more than it should have come down to Mueller, who clearly was way past his "use by" date. The system failed. DoJ failed. Our political system failed. Our Constitution failed. SCOTUS failed. Our media failed. So I certainly don't place all the blame on Smith. But it didn't have to be this way.

Smith was named Special Prosecutor 2 years before the 2024 election. That should have been enough time for Smith to try the case but Trump came up with this novel legal maneuver called Presidential Immunity and that had to weave through the trial and circuit courts before going to the Supreme Court, which took it to the very last day of their session to reveal their decision to remand it back to the trial court to consider Immunity. It wasn't the charges that were too broad, as they had no bearing on immunity and a delay of, what, a year? Roberts was in bed with Trump from the git-go. All of the blame belongs to Roberts. So, how did you miss Roberts role in this sordid mess?

He didn't get around to indicting Trump until August 2023. That was just 15 months before the election.

Smith was named as SC in Nov 2022. At first, one might say that 9 months to bring an indictment isn't exactly slow. Maybe, except for the fact that the House special committee had already compiled a vast cache of evidence, and DoJ was also supposedly doing its own investigation for the two years prior. So by the time Smith came on board, there was already a mountain of evidence.

Of course, some of the Congressional evidence wasn't admissible in court, so Smith's team would need to do some backtracking to get essential evidence into indictable form. But that wasn't the main delay. The big delays came because Smith acted as if time wasn't important, and he kept expanding his probe month after month, instead of getting some basic crimes into trial quickly. And by letting the scope run wild, he exposed himself to the 11th Circuit, and all the shenanigans that Cannon pulled. That slowed everything down.

Bottom line, never any sense of urgency in any of this from either Garland or Smith. Garland was happy rolling up the dumbasses that took dumps in the Capitol, and never had any intention to do anything more.

So yes, I blame Smith AND Garland, and find it discouraging that anybody would still be defending that pair at this stage. Garland stalled for 2 years. Smith didn't necessarily stall, but he went on a wild goose chase that guaranteed there would never be a trial before the election. They both are to blame.

Garland Failed

He should not have been allowed to run for office again.

Rec

Which he was going to have to do anyway... convictions or not (as it is now), and for 4 years minimum.

First thing first, stay away from high rises...

Who he worked for.

On paper he was Biden's. On paper he is also republican. We like to keep republicans close, so it's easier to stab us in the back. Hell, we promised our base EVEN MORE REPUBLICANS!.

They said no thank you. Maybe we'll learn?

Lol, nah!

I now think he accomplished exactly what he intended to.

what you think the post means.

and his co-conspirators. Initially I believed he was going for the actual on the ground insurrectionists first but would still hold the planners accountable.

Please clarify what your post meant.

that is how I read it.

William 769 thanked you for supporting Garland and said those of us who said he was an abject failure are disgusting.
I told him he misread your post.

and is extremely incompetent which I find hard to believe, so I’m sticking with intentional.

He did what his BOSS, BIDEN and the PARTY, WANTED.

Keep trump in play so Biden could run to defeat him a second time! Why isn't this obvious? Because the buck doesn't stop at the top. Biden and his people got railroaded by an AG he could've fired any day? The latter sounds really bad, incompetent even.

a case against his son.

Think Nixon and Watergate.

Think Reagan / Bush I and Iran-Contra and BCCI

Think Bush II and the 2000 election followed by lying the path into and methodologies of the Iraq War.

Then Trump

No consequences and wealth and power served.

so many times, and never an answer.

Who managed the operation. Who organized:
Coordination and payment of:
transportation to D.C.
hotels and motels
meals
booze
hookers
armaments, bear spray and flags

???

I’m at a loss for words. But I’m also not surprised.

I’m deeply ashamed - for her. She’s obviously not, but SOMEBODY has to be.

That much is obvious. The question is why was none of that of interest to Smith or Garland?

The answer to that is equally obvious. DoJ has always been a far right operations, willing to do anything (legal or otherwise) to support the authoritarians in our system. J Edgar set it up that way. We can cite a few DoJ people who depart from the J Edgar profile, but by and large, DoJ in general and the FBI in particular has always been, and continues to be, an operation that considered itself police, judge and jury and sometimes executioner because they and only they know what is best for the public.

Just this morning I listened to a podcast that retold the story of the 1971 break-in of FBI offices in Media, PA by the group the took the title Citizen's Commission to Investigate the FBI.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens%27_Commission_to_Investigate_the_FBI

They successfully captured documents that showed the extra-legal means that the Hoover FBI was willing to go in order to intimidate citizens that saw the world differently from J Edgar, particularly with regard to the Vietnam war. There were hearings by the Church Committee and that resulted in some legislation to constrain Hoover. But that patronizing attitude within Justice is still strong today.

Burglary is a crime, of course. But what the FBI was doing was far worse than the crime of entering a building and taking documents that should have been in the public record already.

Just a side note, a crucial moment in that affair came when the Citizen's Commission had sent some of the documents to major newspapers. Hoover personally learned of that and had AG John Mitchell (could have been a twin of Merrick Garland) personally harassed and threatened the editors of WashPo to not publish the story. They had to think hard about that, but ultimately they went forward with the story on the front page.

THAT WOULD NEVER HAPPEN TODAY. And that is where we are and why we are where we are.

My response is still the same.

and could have prevented Trump's re-election, but didn't?

I voted for President Biden because I believed he would put the right people in the right positions to further his agenda. The past four years just bolsters in the belief I was right. Garland is also not above the law as he shouldn't be. He has to follow the the law & the way our judicial system is set up. trump & his minions subverted the law and our our judicial system to no end. No one and I mean no one has been able to prove otherwise. You disagree with me & that's fine but to suggest that "could have prevented Trump's re-election, but didn't?" is just downright ludicrous.

Go in peace.

Garland was a mistake. I accept Biden's assessment.

GARLAND TORPEDOED

And should be released. It is a disgrace if it isn't.

The 2nd report will likely show Trump shared these documents with others and violated national security. It will be difficult for Republicans to ignore, much less defend Trump's actions.

I can't imagine anyone defending Trump once they know. Well, these days they'll find a way, but not enough to win an election.
But it still won't get us Kamala

...and see them not defend him, because they have consistently proven that every time you think they couldn't possibly go any lower, they whip out an ACME Inc. cartoon portable hole, slap it down, and dive right in.

around Mar-a-Lago, Republicans will defend Trump, but it won't be easy.

They DGAF

Even if there once might have been a question about his powers, the SCOTUS has made it clear, there re no laws that constrain a President for anything related to an official act, and obviously this would be an official act.

But Biden won't do that, any more than he will release the unredacted Mueller report. The system has failed the people at every point, in every dimension.

By the time it can be released Trump will control the Justice Department and will have it quashed. However, the way Washington works I bet that the report will eventually be leaked by somebody.

Mike Lee is a piece of shit Magat Senator from Utah.

Mike Lee asked Donald Trump to replace James Comey with Merrick Garland.

Think about that.

Did you extract that from memory, or do you have a link? It is something to think about.

I wonder what kind of judge he'd be had he become SCOTUS.

I also wonder why President Biden appointed Garland as AG.

I never wondered about these things before. But these days I wonder what else has been swept up under the rug.

due to Obama's choice, and the politics Mitch was playing. A lot of good that did us.

I'm sick of placating the Republicans who only care about their power and greed, even if they have to lie, steal, cheat, betray, etc to attain their undeserved goals.

Amazing, wasn't it, when Biden had a few classified documents in his garage, it was literally a matter of days before Garland moved on that. Against Hunter Biden, it was also just a few weeks. But he couldn't get Trump to trial in four years. That makes him the single most incompetent Attorney General we have ever had. A huge failure here, one on which the constitution and democracy are at stake. Why didn't we get this done?

We had scared rabbit leaders who dumped Biden.
Watching Obama chuckle with Trump did not make me feel any better.

Paranoia!

Now Obama, like Garland stabbed Biden in the back?

That's some weapons grade cult of personality, mixed with low key character assassination of the most beloved centrist president in history!

Merrick Garland.

Garland f*cked America

In skimming the report, I don’t see any place where Smith casts any shade at Garland.

On the contrary, the report seems to highlight the meticulously conducted investigation as the foundation for the body of evidence collected, and for Smith’s confidence that if taken to trial, Trump would have been convicted,

(the report also describes Smith’s thinking in declining to pursue charges of insurrection against Trump, and so even if convicted, he could still have been elected and served as president- and likely wouldn’t have been sentenced by election day)

MORE REPUBLICANS if Kamala won!

Biden gave BIRTHER LIZ CHENEY a medal of freedom!

The party LOVES republicans, just not the maga ones, as if there was a difference.

Our base hates republicans, but our party hates our base.

So we lose.

But it'll work next time! We just have to move FURTHER TO THE RIGHT!

NOT!

I appreciate many things about Joe Biden, but not releasing the report on the theft of classified documents is frankly unforgivable.

Unbelievable, were it not for history wherein the bastards keep getting away with. Again and again and again.

The convicted felon play book, delay, delay and then delay some more. Time does matter.

https://www.washingtonpost.com
› investigations › 2023 › 06 › 19 › fbi-resisted-opening-probe-into-trumps-role-jan-6-more-than-year
FBI resisted opening probe into Trump’s role in Jan. 6 for more …
Jun 19, 2023 · A Washington Post investigation found that more than a year would pass before prosecutors and FBI agents jointly embarked on a formal probe of actions directed from the White House

https://docs.house.gov
› meetings › JU › JU00 › 20230712 › 116192 › HHRG-118-JU00-20230712-SD006.pdf
FBI resisted opening probe into Trump’s role in Jan. 6 for …
Jul 12, 2023 · investigate Trump over classified records has had its own obstacles, including FBI agents who resisted raiding the former president’s home. But the discovery of top-secret documents in Trump’s

https://www.cnn.com
› 2025 › 01 › 06 › politics › doj-trump-jan-6-riot › index.html
The lost year: How Merrick Garland’s Justice Department ran out ...
1 week ago - Several months after the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol, FBI investigators began pursuing a tantalizing tip suggesting that Donald Trump had possibly met with members of the Proud

https://www.thenation.com
› article › politics › trump-indictment-merrick-garland
Why Did Trump’s January 6 Indictment Take So Long? | The Nation
August 2, 2023 - There’s plenty of blame to go around—starting with Attorney General Merrick Garland.

https://www.washingtonpost.com
› outlook › 2022 › 03 › 05 › merrick-garland-prosecute-trump-select-committee
The Jan. 6 committee gift-wrapped Trump for Merrick Garland. Is ...
5 March 2022 - The House panel has built a potential criminal case against the former president, but the Justice Department needs to know it can win before charging him.

ugh

This was baked into the cake. Find me one Trump supporter who says they would have voted differently had they seen this.

It is a 24-hour news cycle item.

There will be people who write books based on some of these details, and they will make some money, but otherwise, this is zero impact. Nothing here that wasn't already known.

I've been down this false legal road so many times, and yet the next time there's always hope something will be done. It's kind of pathetic, but it shows how ingrained my ideas of law and order, and this country is. Judge, jury, Congressional hearings....they always find the way to get off scot-free. ...ruled by law, not by man...what a sick, sad, dangerous joke

that stopped me in my tracks. He doesn't believe the Garland ever would have appointed a Special Counsel at all had the January 6 Commission not "shamed him" (Hartmann's words) into basically having no excuse not to do something.

It is incredibly depressing, and it's no surprise that so many people are ruminating about this subject days before a demented, deranged monster is sworn in again as president.

Last edited Wed Jan 15, 2025, 01:07 AM - Edit history (1)

And at the end of the day, isn't that the most important fucking thing in the world?

corruption, cronyism, dishonesty, pilfering and manipulation of voting in other countries.

Some of it quite critical:
Imelda Marcos . . . look at all the shoes she has!

Aren't you happy you live in a country where that doesn't happen?

Time passes . . .

Now it is happening in the US, and the media turn a blind eye?
Can't quite work that out!