Interestingly, yesterday I posited some random thoughts about accountability on Teh Twitter, noting that a few dozen random accounts know more about Russiagate individually than any person who has ever sat in a room with President Donald Trump. [FWIW – The author of this story I’m highlighting agreed.]
Miranda Devine notes in a New York Post article (Murdoch publication), polling shows more people are following the declassification of Russiagate documents than ever before [READ HERE]. That’s both a good thing from the perspective of an enlarged awakening but also holds a serious downside if people are focused on the delivery of accountability.
The series of documents declassified by the DNI (Gabbard), CIA (Ratcliffe) and FBI (via Grassley) has not changed the arc of the story; but they have provided strong evidence to support what was already obvious.
Essentially: the Clinton Campaign and the U.S. Intelligence Community, particularly the FBI, conspired together to exonerate Clinton from her email scandal, and frame Donald Trump as a Russian asset to assist her election win in 2016.
Everyone who has walked the deep weeds of Russiagate/Spygate has essentially known this framework for seven or more years. The DNI, CIA and FBI evidence is providing receipts for the operation as it unfolded. The latest evidence has proven the conspiracy researchers accurate, and the corporate media participants who participated in the ruse are not happy.
Miranda Devine breaks down the data on who is following the story and what the releases have done to squash the defenses of those who tried to label the Clinton/FBI operation as conspiracy theory. All of this is a very positive outcome and a greater percentage of the public are now aware.
However, there’s a downside as a result of those who are new to these discoveries. Even more people are thirsting for accountability for the conduct, and those who are very familiar with the story are renewing expectations of criminal activity against the perpetrators of the fraud.
Those who carried out the operation did not leave a trail of signed documents outlining their misconduct. There is no one single element of the very complicated story that provides a ‘gotcha’ moment. Instead, there is an assembly of mounting evidence that showcases how the fraud was perpetrated. Each document release adding more layers of corruption to the pile of fraud as it was manufactured.
The Clinton campaign knew what they were creating. The Obama White House knew what was happening. The CIA could see what the Clintons and her FBI/DOJ allies were assembling, and the FBI was a willful participant. All of this is not refuted, despite the Gordion knot of plausible deniability they wrapped it in.
The problem for the Trump White House is not that Clinton and the IC collaborated to frame Donald Trump in 2016. The problem for the Trump White House in 2025, which now becomes a problem for the Dept of Justice, is that a large portion of the American public expect some form of legal accountability for it.
Absent of criminal liability, people with increased knowledge get angry at the lack of accountability. Simultaneous with this increased knowledge, people are susceptible to the influence of outrage voices amplifying the criminal accountability demand. It’s a precarious position for the White House and Dept of Justice.
If the Trump administration does not ‘punish’ the perpetrators, they run the risk of losing electoral support. However, when you look carefully at how the fraud was perpetrated, the criminal aspect is a very challenging hurdle.
The overarching defense of the perpetrators pertains to the baseline of the fraud itself, which is, essentially, that candidate, then President-elect and eventually President Trump was compromised by Russia.
The Obama White House, FBI, CIA and aggregate IC claim they were investigating whether Donald Trump and members of his administration were taking action to the benefit of a foreign adversary, Russia. Outwardly, President Obama famously warned his officials to make sure all things within their investigation were done “by the book.”
When the CIA or FBI failed to brief Trump-allied Republicans (ie. Devin Nunes), their justification is they were investigating something “sensitive” to the national security of the nation, and therefore unprecedented measures were taken.
Sure, you can argue the officials at the top of the CIA, FBI, DNI and DOJ knew Trump-Russia was nonsense, but how do you prove it… I mean, really prove it beyond a reasonable doubt. Even with the mounting declassified releases, you end up in the Horowitz/Durham conundrum, saying “they should have known.” Unfortunately, that’s not criminal.
The CIA or FBI leadership lied to congress, misled congress or were “less than fulsome’ with congressional oversight. Again, they fall back on the unprecedented approach and sensitive national security threat – that’s the shield. Yes, we did not answer the question(s) accurately -even honestly- to the U.S. govt., because we were investigating the U.S. govt.
In these matters of potential national security compromise, the CIA can easily lie to congress and then claim the lie was necessary to protect the government against the threat, and the investigation thereof. The ‘we had to lie’ scenario.
All of the players within the fraud end up carrying some form of plausible deniability, so long as the originating context for the investigation remains valid, even if it is tenuously valid. Something akin to ‘we saw Russian intel intercepts outlining a potential plan by Clinton, but there was also the potential of the Trump-Russia collusion being real’, so we had to look into it…. and we did it, “by the book” where there was no “book” to guide us.
Those legal defenses, while frustrating to accept – and almost entirely based on lies, are valid and purposeful when outlined in legal proceedings. Unfortunately, that legal defense seems to cover all of the 2015/2016 and even early 2017 participants.
Keep in mind, Inspector General Michael Horowitz conducted three investigations with only one criminal referral, Kevin Clinesmith. [(1) IG investigation of Clinton emails. (2) IG investigation of FBI conduct in Clinton investigation, and (3) IG investigation of FISA abuse (Carter Page)]. Additionally, Special Counsel John Durham investigated the origin of Trump-Russia and was never able to penetrate any of the top names for criminal accountability.
All four of these extensive investigations end up as defensive legal shields against any indictment, and the media is already using them to full value. Factually, all those previous investigations create significant “reasonable doubt.”
Intwined inside this legal Gordion knot is the problem for the current Dept of Justice.
Making matters worse still, in a little-known court filing, which has not had enough scrutiny, the President Trump DOJ told the FISA Court in July 2018 that predication for the investigation of Carter Page was valid [SEE HERE].
If the Donald Trump Dept of Justice was saying the warrant against Carter Page was legally valid in 2018, a full two years after the FBI began investigating the Trump-Russia collusion, then how can the Donald Trump 2025 Dept of Justice claim the investigation of Donald Trump was invalid.
We essentially watched any hopes for Russiagate legal liability melt as a result of that July 12, 2018, letter. Which, stands on soapbox, is exactly why I was shouting about it when the letter was finally revealed FIVE YEARS AGO.
The Trump DOJ wrote the letter to the FISA Court after Inspector General Michael Horwowitz released his highly critical investigative findings into the Carter Page FISA application. The Trump DOJ told the FISA Court that despite the information from Horowitz the application was properly predicated. THIS IS IN 2018!
Keep in mind this letter to the court was written by AAG John Demers in July 2018. Jeff Sessions was Attorney General, Rod Rosenstein was Deputy AG; Christopher Wray was FBI Director, David Bowditch is Deputy, and Dana Boente was FBI chief-legal-counsel.
[SOURCE]
As you can see, there are a myriad of defenses for the Russiagate conspirators to draw from, including defenses directly from the Trump administration. Which brings me to the final two points.
For President Trump the most dangerous part of this entire storyline is pushing an expectation that criminal indictments could be possible. Instead, the possibility of criminal accountability is almost non-existent. Expectations need to be managed. Because if people get their hopes up and then nothing happens the collapse in morale could be politically devastating.
I am open to hearing counter opinions established in solid framework; however, based on current evidence, from my perspective the only people who potentially show any signs of legal accountability are the ones who come along AFTER Robert Mueller and Andrew Weissmann begin their 2017 coverup operation.
The court of public opinion is the venue for the rest.
Get as many as possible for perjury ASAP.
Then try them for the conspiracy as convicted, incarcerated felons.
That would frame the matter differently.
The ‘we had to lie’ scenario repeated over and over to a jury eventually sounds like a deliberate attempt to deceive.
It’s…a process…I guess!
Plausible Deniability vs. Possible Stupidity…
What Sundance says makes sense. I can’t help it though. There must be something behind this strategy. You cannot possibly be that stupid in generating that much hope for indictments without following up on it by bringing them. There must be some plan to canalize the rage that results when nothing happens, or I just can’t imagine the level of ignorance. The stakes are so high, that the admin must have given it a thought before they started with Epstein. This plan is 4,5 years in the making, so there is a chance something bigger is about to happen. I just don’t get it yet.
If it isn’t, one can only come to the conclusion, that the whole thing is rigged from top to bottom. That there is no such thing as democracy anymore and that it’s all a big theatre with roles to simulate it. If that is so, the people will reset the whole thing. It happened once, it can happen again…against all odds.
If no one is going to prison then – 4 options and a warning
1) Pay whistleblowers $2 million, $5 million $10 million to come forth and if good evidence witness protection – pay them to rat each other out
2) Use Lawfare against everyone involved. – bankrupt them as they did Flynn and tried against Trump
3) Leak, leak, leak just like the Democrats
4) Play very, very tough – with the idea you want to crush them
5) Watch the Susie Wiles’ of the world for any action that remotely smells of retreat.
“I am imploring, like honestly, I’m just imploring the media, do not report this as a legitimate investigation,” [Marc] Elias told MSNBC. “Do not report this as ‘They are opening an investigation into John Brennan’ … Report this as the misuse, the abuse, the authoritarian takeover of the Department of Justice. That should be the headline.”
Hah! Too bad for Elias, it’s no longer 2016.”
Wonderfully done paragraph from Miranda Devine’s fine rollup.
Marc Elias? LOL, BFYTW.
Maybe it’s time for a slip up. You know a moment of reckoning. Like in the movies. 🍿
The complex conundrum cannot be solved by trying to resolve it all at once. IMO the strategy needs to be to break it into its smaller components and use the simpler avenues.
Make arrests of smaller players for lying to congress, or other easy to prove charges. Then copy them to be your witnesses against the higher players.
For that they may use precedent such as solitary and such.
Further, the leftist lock on “narrative” has to be taken hold of, and used. For that, perhaps a few billionaires that own the news need to be brought in for questioning and rattle them with a few days in solitary for colluding to support a coup. That can change the “narrative” quickly.
Last, Sundance said “it’s frustrating to accept the legal arguments”…. Do not accept the legal arguments.
Crimes are convicted based on circumstantial evidence that prove the crime. You don’t have to have signed doc stating plainly what they’re doing. If everyone is a fervent anti-Trump agent, acts in unison, meets in the dark corners, and always those meeting are followed up by actions… that may not bring full convictions, but a scandal of colossal proportions. Something that will destroy the Left.
But… the investigation into the culprits leads into more investigations, and that means other crimes (smaller but certainly there) will be uncovered.
Let them fight in courts for the next 3 years. Let more investigations and cases and convictions pop up during these 3 years.
Ultimately, Al Capone didn’t go to jail for the big crime but for the smaller ones…
Let Dem worry about their legal future instead of 2026 or 2028. Time isn’t on their side if they lose elections big, judges are removed, and laws are fixed.
Don’t start with a large bombshell, but with a smaller one.. something that repeats every week. Another person called to testify. An arrest with a couple days in solitary. A “leak” that someone is singing… let paranoia consume them, and that leads to mistakes, which themselves lead to more mistakes, that ultimately leads to finger pointing and a flight to save their own skin at the expense of coconspirators…
Also, include Wlection Integrity within this thing to make sure it gets the support to fix the fraud.
Oh… hire Big Balls and a few other geniuses to coordinate some of this huge tentacles octopus so everything is kept tight and connected.
Scott Peterson was not only convicted, he was sentenced to death based solely on circumstantial evidence. Manson spent his life in prison for a crime he wasn’t even present for.
Solid! Very good line of thought! Stop playing by the books and get nasty!
Agreed: If necessary, follow the Dem playbook and make the process be the punishment.
Where’s Adam Schitt?
On the Schitter.
One more thing to my previous long post.
If enough whistleblowers come forward in re to misdoings, then the DOJ can declare previous investigation tainted, as well as change the law or circumvent it (do to tainted trials) in re to “limitations” and restart the whole thing in full or in part.
I disagree about “managing expectations”. Americans must have the full expectation of a balanced and correct law system, or there isn’t an America left. It matters not for moral.
I think Trump should go full weight and push for an expectation that wrong will be righted.
Even if trying to “manage expectations” works, I almost guarantee it that 10% of MAGA will in no way accept that, and if morale falls for 10%, it’s enough to sway elections anyway.
It’s full Big Ugly or nothing, and it doesn’t matter.
If nothing much happens, we all know the corruption and coups will happen again.
Like I said before, in previous posts:
Our Republic is already half way drained and ruined. This term may be a last ditch effort to restore it, just as Graccus (I believe) tried to the Old Roman Republic. Likelier than not, we are on a path towards Empire.
If the corruption is allowed, the Old Republic falls quicker. If there is a real fight to restore the Republic, a New one might take its place, or a young Empire might begin, with hundreds of years left of life, and possibly a reformation back to Republic. In my view “managing expectations” is tantamount to “managing the decline”.
The court of public opinion is definitely what must follow but allow that public opinion the cold anger (sometimes turning hot) if the law isn’t followed. Trust in the People. Don’t manage them and their expectations.
The People expected for the best outcome when they declared Independence, they didn’t get their expectations managed.
A “managed” fight will be lackluster and lost from the very beginning.
Also, that means Trump will probably need to endorse some proper Senators and House Reps, because as much as he wants a Legacy left behind him, it will be written by the victors and RINOs won’t be on his side.
They may have plausible deniability, but Capone’s accountant is out there with something simpler to charge them with.
Normally, no democrat will ever be convicted in or near Washington DC. The Jury pool is almost all rabid democrats with an occasional RINO never Trumper thrown in for visual but not substantial variety.
Democrats are convicted when the democrat leadership decides that they NEED to be convicted for the benefit of the party.
The leadership has dirt on most if not all of its elected officials. Those who break ranks without (private) permission are subject to prosecution to encourage the rest to hang together lest they hang separately.
The way that criminal convictions happen in this foul matter is if VSGPDJT so controls the narrative and hangs it so heavily around democrats’ necks that democrat leadership concludes that the only way to turn the page away from public concern over this issue and enable democrats to get back into power nationally is to hang some sacrificial democrats.
This will only happen if democrats lose heavily in the midterms and look likely to lose heavily in 2028.
Personally, I believe that, barring outbreak of WWIII [a real possibility], MAGA will carry the 2026 elections strongly.
If that happens, and if WWIII does not happen by 2028, Democrats will nominate Senator Fetterman of Pennsylvania for President over AOC after a spirited primary.
Fetterman is being licensed now by democrat leadership to stand apart from current democrat positions closer to the center to position him visibly as moderate in the public mind as 2028 approaches.
He came into national office after the conspiracies of 2015-2021 and represents a new face. He would probably lose to Vance in 2028 but less certainly and less badly than would a more visibly rabid democrat candidate.
So, no prison bus driving to GITMO? Bummer.
Sundance is right. I think attaining accountability is a pipe dream. It’s time to put away the pitchforks, it’s time to focus on our communities and direct our energies toward achieving victory in the 2026 mid-terms.
Respectfully, Sundance is wrong. Without accountability we are no longer a nation.
And, if Sundance REALLY believes he’s right, then we are just wasting time reading and commenting on this site. He just needs to ignore all these releases etc. Since they don’t matter, or worse (getting hopes up for accountability and nothing happening) the maga movement gets discouraged and becomes disengaged.
Which is it Sundance?
We need a Sammy The Bull Gravano to come forward or be compelled to come forward.
It’s really a shame that, in cases such as these, in our era, that frontier justice is no longer an option.
“Because” is not an excuse for willfully lying.. they knew the “sensitivity” of the issue was a false prop to cover for the their own malfeasance.. They are better off with the “I can’t remember” excuse.. They knew they were lying, at the least they should all be prosecuted for bearing false witness in a discovery review..
I disagree, as do many commentators here. You’re right, 2026 IS critical. But, we can bolster that WITH beginning of prosecutions to hold people accountable. If people AREN’T held accountable what does that say about our nation.
Also, I’m not a lawyer, but I’m assuming lying is NEVER acceptable under ANY circumstances and always punishable. Lawyers, is that not the case?
if we just accept it, then we are perceived as chickens, complicit or pushovers—none of which are acceptable.
As you can see, 47 had 4 years to plan coming in office and hit the ground running, no, really sprinting! It’s amazing what he has accomplished in these 6 months.
I’d like to think there there are brilliant legal minds that have been reviewing this and have several pathways to action. 47 does not like losing. Not being vindicated probably doesn’t sit well with him.
I can only see the following outcomes:
1) accountability for the perpetrators. There are multiple ways for that, from jail time (or worse—which I do NOT see occurring. Even though the acts were treasonous), to heavy fines, loss of pensions and public acknowledgment of wrongdoing—to allow them to avoid jail time.
2) a third term for 47. Not very likely, but if the bargain is no prosecutions, only sunlight and acknowledgement the first term was unfairly restricted and therefore deserves a chance at a third term, I believe MAGA would swallow hard and accept it. Is this why the Epstein files aren’t being released? Leverage?
3) Military Tribunals, again to bring justice, sunlight and corrective action and restore the nation.
4) end of the nation as we know it. If corruption is known, whether provable in court or not, there is no trust in the government. If there is no trust in the government (and no accountability) and corruption can run rampant, we become Venezuela in less than a decade.
why I think (and hope) it’s one of the first three and not four (besides loving this country and not wanting to have that outcome).
47 has had 4 years to prepare for this. As we can see, he has planned out much of this term as shown in what has been accomplished in the first 6 months. It’s absurd to think he doesn’t and didn’t think about this and formulate a plan as well.
The only thing 47 thinks about is making this a great country again. But, he does love winning. He understands that to make this country truly great again it needs to be fundamentally changed again (remember 44 fundamentally did change it).
There would be no better win for our country (and him personally) is for him to be vindicated, corruption exposed and rooted out, and a new era of a great nation reborn.
I holdout hope for this.