The Daily Zeitgeist - The SPECIAL Mueller Report Summary Report 3.25.19

Episode Date: March 25, 2019

In this SPECIAL bonus episode, Jack and Miles are joined by super producers Anna Hossnieh and Nick Stumpf to break down what they know and understand about the Barr summary of Mueller's report. FOOTNO...TES: 1. (THREAD) The Barr Summary—a very different document from the Mueller Report—is being woefully misread by media. It doesn't import what media is suggesting it does. Lawyers are welcome to comment on this thread as I report the Summary accurately.2. “Trump Wins!”: The President, the Mueller Report, and Our New Political Normal3. After the Mueller Report, the Dream of a Sudden, Magic Resolution to the Trump Tragedy Is Dead Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Starting point is 00:02:01 New episodes every Thursday. Hello, the internet, and welcome to episode, huh? Episode special of Dirt Daily Zeitgeist. My name is Jack O'Brien. I'm joined by Miles Gray, super producer Anna Hosny, and super producer Nick Stumpf, super's producer.
Starting point is 00:02:22 It is Monday, March 25th, 2019. 2019 it is early and we uh early west coast time and we wanted to issue a special report on the muller investigation yeah and what we know what we don't know and what we continue guys just to not know because we still don't know because we yeah i mean we haven't seen the report i mean yeah okay so we got the summary uh yesterday where william barr said look uh i don't really have any evidence that anyone in the trump camp or in his committee or campaign uh directly coordinated with the russian government during the election for any kind of interference, and also zero obstruction of justice. And, you know, the president has taken that to spike the football.
Starting point is 00:03:11 Wait, did he say zero obstruction of justice? Well, he said find no reason to charge. There isn't enough to charge the president. But that was not a quote from the Mueller report. That was Barr's own account. Right, so here's the thing. Right. If we just, I guess we can take it from how the president is looking at it, where he says,
Starting point is 00:03:30 no collusion. And I mean, this is how the media is reacting to it as well. We've got the front page of Drudge, Trump wins, exclamation point. And the front page, the main article on the New Yorker, Trump wins, exclamation point and the front page the main article on the New Yorker Trump wins exclamation point uh so that I think those are the two ends of the spectrum so this is how the media is taking this and I think that that's probably a good starting point is this is how it's being interpreted right yeah is the I mean if you look it's that the president they haven't they haven't found enough evidence to say that the president was guilty or anyone in the campaign was guilty
Starting point is 00:04:10 of the hack and leak shit specifically right and that's the wiki leaks the hello russia if you're listening type shit all the hacked emails and any other things that were directly related to people in the u.s coordinating with very very rigidly defined as the Russian government. So that leaves a lot of room for like, what about all those cutouts of the Russian government like Oleg Deripaska and Konstantin Kalimnik and Felix Sater and all these other people? Well, that's a whole other thing.
Starting point is 00:04:39 But the media and a lot of the way we're looking at it has so narrowly defined this collusion thing that I guess everyone was just looking specifically at this hack and leak thing. When we look at sort of all of the activity and behavior of this administration, there's clearly something else going on, more to do on a foreign policy level than sort of the, hi, help me win election. What do you need to get these emails? So just playing devil's advocate, we were talking about this before we got on mic, and I think the reaction to, like you seem to have an appetite to continue to pay attention
Starting point is 00:05:21 to an investigation into what happened around the election with regards to Trump and his people's relationship to Russia and his people's relationship to other Russian-related powers. And the response I've gotten as I've tried to parse the language of Barr's summary of the Mueller report from more centrist people and just people who don't have my level of curiosity is like, just move on. He's found no collusion. It's no collusion. That is the verdict. And I don't know.
Starting point is 00:06:03 Nick, you were kind of making that general point, it seemed like. Basically that, yeah, that although there's, I'm sure when the report comes out, there's going to be all sorts of shady shit, you know. And specifically on the obstruction part, like the drafting of the Don Jr. letter and some other stuff. But, like, nothing is, basically this is the verdict. They're not going to get him out by impeaching him. Right. Therefore, the smartest play for the Democrats is to say, let's not spend the next two years trying to say,
Starting point is 00:06:39 oh, Mueller, we need to check his homework. We need all this underlying evidence, and we're going to do this investigation all over again ourselves because we think somehow they missed something or they didn't get it right. I think that's the wrong play. I think to turn it into a political issue is the other option. Be like, this guy is shady.
Starting point is 00:06:56 This guy is, you know, he's celebrating a great victory that only a few of his campaign officials are in federal prison. Right. You know what I mean? Like, just do it that way. Yeah. And pled guilty. Well, and I think, you know, at the very minimum, the actual report has to come out because
Starting point is 00:07:15 we're only going off of William Barr's assessment of the Mueller report. Right. We have the Barr summary of the Mueller report. And again, someone who, as we all know, his whole like raison d'etre in terms of becoming a G was because he he had voiced all these opinions that the president could not be charged with obstruction of justice while sitting in office. That was like he he drafted that memo or that letter that was like sort of his audition tape. Right. And that's when he he came on trump world's radar being like oh yeah this would be a good guy for attorney general but the but it's important to remember that that is the official justice department policy and and was before he wrote that no right but even then he was even eviscerating what muller was doing too and had a very clear stance of like oh i don't i think this is wholly inappropriate he also like was willing to stretch his mind in any way.
Starting point is 00:08:05 Because again, Mueller, he left that determination to William Barr and Rod Rosenstein. He said, here's my evidence. He's like, here's a case why you totally could bring obstruction charges. Here's why you might not be able to. But I'll leave that to you. And it seems like William Barr took the very, you know, I'm look, I'm no lawyer. We all know this. I'm just some guy in a hoodie. But the whole his determination, it seems like because there was no crime of collusion for the Hackenleek thing,
Starting point is 00:08:36 he's using that to excuse any of the actions that might be looked at as obstruction. Because, well, if there was no crime, then as you read obstruction, it wasn't a crime. Right. Right. They did. They did play a little fast and loose with that stuff and i think that's where people are getting a little bit pissed off as being like well what about all this other stuff because it's not just hack and leak that stinks of shit with this whole presidency in this whole administration i mean one of the issues that was brought up in in a thread that you forwarded us this morning was just the idea that there was a, you know, there was a relationship with Russia and, you know, then the Republican platform like at the RNC shifted in a pro-Russia direction, which is seems like a big deal, but it wasn't the deal that people were paying attention to throughout this investigation. Right. It appears sanctioned, you know, like like Miles was saying, foreign policy was kind of traded. Like there was a lot of like, oh, you know, I you know, I work on the Russia sanctions.
Starting point is 00:09:37 You know, you guys don't attack us. It felt very I mean, to me, it felt like there was, you know, like why was everyone lying? Like why was Pence? Why was, what was his name? Flynn. Like, why was everyone lying about their contacts with Russia? Right. It was a lot of, there's so much blur there that I'm, this is a very frustrating response to me.
Starting point is 00:09:58 And it's hard for me. Yeah. Yeah. Like, it's hard for me to be like, okay, so we're just going to. Moving on. Yeah. Like that, I get stuck because it's like, okay, so you couldn't find- Because Trump was the one that was throwing forth all the, hey guys, I didn't collude with any Russian hackers.
Starting point is 00:10:12 I'm not here with the IRA. I'm not involved with any of that. So it's like, okay, so you've been proven innocent of that. But see, I struggle with not taking him and impeaching him for the obstruction of justice because we know that exists. Right. Yeah. Well, yeah, we were able to see very clearly. We're like, oh, this is this seems very untoward behavior.
Starting point is 00:10:33 But I guess, again, that's the problem of even trying to speculate right now, because right now, you know, just like we said on the episode that came out this morning when we were recording, when the, you know, the report came out that we would have the report we don't know is that we don't know and we still haven't read what muller's actual report is we don't know what you know specifically he might have because there might be you know then this is the other thing we were talking about sure trump has done this thing where he's really good at just doing enough shit that on its face you're like dude that can't be legal but there's no like legal code or whatever that he's actually violating so flirting with russia might not be a crime that we've we've defined as a crime but when you're looking at it as like oh you're the president and you're doing this this looks fucking right it might just be that you're a bad president but not that you're committing crime and I think just there was a fog of outrage and smoke I mean my start my smart friends on the left and right as opposed to you know people I
Starting point is 00:11:34 know on the right who are like investigate the FBI now it's time to bring down the right like my my actual reasonable friends on the you know. And to a certain extent on the far left, we're pointing out from day one that this was, there was never evidence like actual provable evidence of Russian collusion. There was a lot of smoke and like Ana, you were saying like a lot of lying and shit, but maybe politics is a shameful smoke filledfilled back room type thing where you know people get elected president uh with the help of you know various shady alliances because they're
Starting point is 00:12:16 going to like focusing on a quid pro quo thing as a type of collusion seems a little strange because politics is all quid pro quo. It's all transactional. Yeah. So one quote that I just wanted to bring out in this, like towards the front here, is from Masha Gessen, who is a Russian journalist who fled Russia and now writes for The New Yorker. I thought she summed up sort of the point of how people are feeling about the mainstream media at this point pretty well. She said that there have been various scandals throughout this administration that
Starting point is 00:13:06 have been treated as isolated incidents, but Mueller was the one story that held our attention. Like throughout the course, it was the one that like people kept sort of coming back to and, you know, getting excited about, which is understandable because it was raising the question of whether the president was a Manchurian candidate type, you know, foreign agent. But the quote is Mueller, according to Attorney General William P. Barr, has now concluded that the president did not collude with Russia. dream of the sudden magic resolution to the Trump tragedy has not materialized. The report has not made the case that he is an illegitimate president. The political opposition and the media acting as representatives of the public should have been building the case that he is an unfit president in a way that did not rely so heavily on the outcome of the Mueller investigation,
Starting point is 00:14:00 which has always been pitched as the single answer to all our prayers yeah right yeah sorry that's that's kind of saying it's like yeah dude now they can still do that though we could the democrats if they're smart we'll do that from now they will say this is a political we're going to do this on the political field as opposed to the legal field because donald trump has spent his life in this gray area just shy of a crime. It's unethical, shitty, and everything else. Well, I mean, he's definitely committed other crimes. He's committed other crimes completely. But I'm saying on this thing.
Starting point is 00:14:31 Yeah, in terms of Russia, right. Like, it is potentially a potent political point to harp on. Right. You know, his behavior with regard to this stuff. But if you screw it up and you go, like, oh oh no, we're still hoping to get a legal win here, that's when you can blow it as the left. And I think we've just constantly throughout this show have always been like, look, dude,
Starting point is 00:14:52 no matter what the fuck this thing says, it's not going to be the magic bullet. Because on one hand, the atmosphere in the country is way too charged politically that even if this document or the report was like, oh yeah, here it all is, you would have half the country being like, this is a fucking farce. Right. And shit show.
Starting point is 00:15:11 And it wouldn't help anything. It wouldn't actually remedy the actual damage that's been done in this country. I think it would be really, really broad and deep problems in the United States had he found the thing that I think a lot of people were suspecting he was going to find. Well, yeah, and I think people on both sides were just invested in one way or another that this thing would, you know, whatever he's going to come up with will fully exonerate the president. It hasn't. And the document, I mean, even William Barr's thing is like, it also does not exonerate the president. Right. But cut to President Trump going fully exonerated. Thank you so much.
Starting point is 00:15:54 Good night. Tip your waitress. And yeah, I think the, again, we have to see the fucking report. We just, we just. The thing is, I wanted to point something out here before we move on. At this time, we just don't know. We just, I think it's, I wanted to point something out before we move on. At this time, we just don't know. We just don't know.
Starting point is 00:16:09 We don't know. Oh, that's interesting. Yeah. And we haven't known. And I think, again, this is very narrow. Like, great. You've found that the hack and leak part, you haven't found any direct coordination with them and the Russian government. Right.
Starting point is 00:16:23 And that's sort of like what the words are that are very specific. So here are the assumptions that are going into any broad reading of this. I think we're assuming that Mueller would not have just ended the investigation with a bunch of really intriguing leads out there, like that he looked at these things and was like, look, for all these things and was like, look, for all intents and purposes, this is the Russia investigation.
Starting point is 00:16:49 This is the investigation into whether there was collusion and there just wasn't anything there. And also there's an assumption that bar would not, you know, bar and Mueller are homies from way back. They like, you know, are each other's. I think Mueller is Barr's godfather, if that's possible.
Starting point is 00:17:10 That might be wrong. But he would not mischaracterize the, you know, the conclusions of the investigation in like a very broad way that would then immediately get, you know, thrown back in his face. So, I mean, I'm assuming that he is doing his best to, you know, put out there what the,
Starting point is 00:17:34 what the report is at, like what the general conclusion of the report is could be wrong. I just, I just knowing what bars whole MO was coming into that position. I can't really look at his assessment of that and say, oh, there's no obstruction of justice, Mr. I don't believe in obstruction of justice ever. That's for sure. He came out at Mueller and saying the obstruction element of this investigation is ridiculous. He did not agree with that. Right.
Starting point is 00:18:01 That's for sure. He was already hostile to that portion of the investigation to begin with. So I'm not I'm not going to say that, you know, he's totally lying or whatever, but I can't. It's hard for me to fully take that without at least three grains of salt. Yes. But again, and that's why I'm like this whole thing. All the speculation around this isn't helpful because I just at some point we need to know like what the investigation actually found and then draw your conclusions from there. Was it was a scope actually too narrow?
Starting point is 00:18:34 And what was he only looking at just the hack and leak portion? Was he not really giving serious thought to the foreign policy possible quid pro quo things that were going on? Right. I just think even even on that front, it would be weird for Barr to mischaracterize it, though. Like in his paragraph, in the actual summary about the obstruction part, he's like, here's what we look for, and here's why. Like, the reasoning is, it basically looks like there's two lanes of reasoning.
Starting point is 00:18:58 One is that they didn't have sufficient evidence to win a case in court. Right, it didn't reach that threshold. Because it's very hard to prove motive. Everybody's always been saying in the reporting about this, you always hear, like, it's really hard to prove obstruction because you have to know what's in somebody's mind, essentially. And then also the thing that you were talking about
Starting point is 00:19:16 where you can't obstruct something that's not a crime. Right. But in any case, the threshold for these guys, for Mueller, Rosenstein, Barr, is can you win a case in court on these on these subjects that's the that's the threshold for them so like and even if you legally had it like would people just be so over it at that point i don't think i think if they had a legal case to make and they he actually makes specifically makes the point like we're not just saying we can't indict the president because you can't indict a president we're saying we didn't find evidence sufficient to pursue this in legally speaking right so i you know it seems
Starting point is 00:19:55 to have been a more or less good faith thing to run this all down and again like bar could make this determination and say like yeah no no no obstruction no obstruction but the report's going to But the report's going to come out. I mean, it's going to come right. And it's probably going to find stuff that will pal Paul Manafort was giving campaign voter information to someone who is known to be tied with Russian intelligence. That. OK, what about that? Or the other things that are going on? Like, you know, Manafort was lying as much as he could. things that are going on like you know Manafort was lying as much as he could and there's just so many other things and I think that's why it's so odd for even the for the media to say oh and I guess and Mueller found no collusion or whatever because again collusion isn't a crime and we've been so like narrowly using this word that of course Trump wanted that because it's it it it
Starting point is 00:20:43 puts it in a box that's very hard to actually nail down. Right. And then you cut to this moment and now he can just go, hey, we're out here, no collusion. But there's all this other shit going on. And I'm sure in the report you're going to find some really disgusting shit. That's right. And I think that's the problem. And I think maybe we have an issue that we don't have laws set up that are actually nuanced enough to understand in this age we're living in, people are moving like this.
Starting point is 00:21:09 Also, Trump has been moving like this his whole life. His singular genius is moving like this. He's been in the shitty world of New York real estate doing exactly this, probably dancing right on the line his whole life. And prior to this, most people, at least in the office of the president, weren't as audacious as he was to do the shit the way he's doing it. I mean, granted, all presidents have figured out ways to get their shit done. But in the way that he's sort of like in your face kind of doing it, people are more like, oh, that's new around this town.
Starting point is 00:21:42 And we're like the townspeople not realizing like it's a new era. Can he do that? Yeah, right. And that's what everyone's been like. Can he do that? Yeah. And that sort of left. Isn't there a show?
Starting point is 00:21:50 Isn't there a show called Can He Do That? I think there's a podcast. Yeah, yeah. Shout out to that. The Washington Post. Yeah, also had a very cool headline too. What's their headline? It was something like, oh, there's no Russian collusion or whatever.
Starting point is 00:22:04 And I think we have to be a little more nuanced with how we're talking about this. What's their headline? It was something like, oh, there's no Russian collusion or whatever. And I think we have to be a little more nuanced with how we're talking about this. And I don't, you know, again, I don't need, I don't think we, this, again, let's figure out what the report looks like and go from there. I'm like so tired of like speculating about this because A, I was never counting on this to fucking cure anything. Right. about this because a i was never counting on this to fucking cure anything right and then now because the media was like put so much fucking emphasis on this thing yeah like now everyone's like i feel like we're just kind of at the beginning this is this is really where we're gonna start it could be yeah i mean i think again the one thing to consider is in 2020 the like the idea about russian interference or or Russia or whatever is very low on voters' priority list.
Starting point is 00:22:50 And I think that is something to consider. Granted, as a country, we also need to protect our democracy and not allow things like this to happen. But I think that's where it's the balancing act of go ahead and do all that stuff. Figure out, get to the bottom of this. But don't make that the brand going forward. Exactly. Yeah, you can just do picture of the man. Like, you know, you take everything that we know about him in totality,
Starting point is 00:23:11 and this can be one little detail of it. But, like, the Cohen testimony. Excuse me. You know, like, this is how this guy rolls. I mean, the stinky in Helsinki wasn't... If that was because that's just how he deals with foreign powers and it wasn't that they were in cahoots that's almost more damning yeah then he has no spine right it is consistent with his behavior with other with these other with other strong du terter and yeah you know yeah
Starting point is 00:23:38 it's not inconsistent right but yeah i so let's take a quick break. I want to talk about the mainstream media and why just sort of psychoanalyze them a little bit after the break. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th, 2017, was murdered. There are crooks everywhere you look now. The situation is desperate. My name is Manuel Delia. I am one of the hosts of Crooks Everywhere, a podcast that unhurts the plot to murder a one-woman Wikileaks. Daphne exposed the culture of crime and corruption
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Starting point is 00:26:53 where we live at the intersection of sports and culture. Up first, I explore the making of a rivalry, Kaitlyn Clark versus Angel Reese. I know I'll go down in history. People are talking about women's basketball just because of one single game. Every great player needs a foil. I ain't really near them.
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Starting point is 00:27:27 And can the fanfare surrounding these two supernovas be sustained? This game is only going to get better because the talent is getting better. This new season will cover all things sports and culture. Listen to Naked Sports on the Black Effect Podcast Network, iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The Black Effect Podcast Network, iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The Black Effect Podcast Network is sponsored by Diet Coke. And we're back. And one thing that I have kind of been thinking about a lot in the lead up to this past weekend, and, you know, as we've heard rumors that this was going to
Starting point is 00:28:06 be a disappointing outcome for people who are putting all their eggs in the Mueller basket I've been wondering how much of this is the people who seemed most giddy and over-the-top like horny for a Mueller indictment that would just, you know, Trump being let out of office in handcuffs were, you know, like the crooked media guys and like the mainstream media and Rachel Maddow and people who were the most cocky in the run-up to the 2016 election of just like there's no way this guy's gonna win like right so it's almost like this was you know like masha gesson said this i wonder how much of this putting all of their weight on the outcome of the Mueller investigation was their sort of hope for a Hollywood ending where,
Starting point is 00:29:08 you know, they get their whole, their big sin from 2016 is undone. And it turns out the 2016 election never happened. Right. Yeah. He's like, Oh yeah,
Starting point is 00:29:19 sorry about that. When we sort of let y'all think everything was all good without actually being a little more honest about what the state of the country was. Right. Yeah. Oh, I mean, I think totally. And people I don't know. I mean, if half of it is the coverage and I think half of people like some of the journalists, too, were just so shocked to think that this is the state of things that it was almost like okay something as spectacularly awful as this administration will hopefully have a just as spectacular solution right something to it uh but yeah i i don't know when you really do look at just sort of how even now they're even sort of analyzing this Barr summary in just as narrow a way as they were talking about collusion as well.
Starting point is 00:30:11 I don't know. I don't know. It all just feels like that's the blanket statement. That's it. If Barr says no collusion, then the way they ran with it, that was the most insane part. Like, after I got all the news alerts, you know, you see no collusion. What the fuck? What the fuck? What the fuck? That's like all you're thinking for like 20 minutes.
Starting point is 00:30:34 And then, you know, as soon as I started really getting into it, then I was like, wait, but there's so much more to this. And I hate this because the way I saw it is all anyone all over, like across the United States from, you know, literally the Midwest, anyone just takes a look at that goes, oh, okay. I guess he got away with it. And it's like, oh, my God, it's not just that. Like there's so much more. There's so many different nuances. Like it's crazy to me. And that really, it fucked me up.
Starting point is 00:31:05 It really did. Well, I think if anything, it's just, it fucked me up. It really did. Well, I think if anything, you need to also present a counterpoint. Okay, the president was not found of directly colluding with the Russian government to influence the election. Okay, great. Very specific. Sir. And then you can say, still no determination on repeated contacts with russian officials around these other things too yeah i think just in the lying and the right just just frame it like that because
Starting point is 00:31:32 when you give too many people live in the headline world headline reality where they go no collusion and now a lot of people i'm sure everyone was talking with their relatives who were on the on the right who were like well how'd that work out for you? There's no collusion. And to them you say, it was only found of this very narrow thing. I'm like, please explain these other things. Like what was going on with Cambridge Analytica? Now let the conspiracy theories begin. Oh, Mueller was conspiring now too.
Starting point is 00:31:59 Or even plainly just say there was no, the president has not been exonerated yeah right of of obstruction or these by any stretch of the imagination not exonerated even in the document that you are using to spike said football it's the word said it's there saying but they do exonerate him of collusion collusion yes yes he specifically says yeah that's a big deal but it's also kind of a big deal that muller says while this does not indict him we it also does not exonerate him that like it's a weird thing for him to put it so to equivocate like that but it's also like he does use the words this does not exonerate the president of obsession of
Starting point is 00:32:33 justice yeah which is like again it's like how do you what do you do with that as the left so even to the point of that it it could exonerate him of collusion right the only way this would have been proven is if muller had something so absurd like some email where it's like dear kremlin i donald trump am ready to conspire and like the actual the evidence that you would need to really be like bow there it is right no no savvy criminal even talks like not even someone like donald trump i think he's gonna get caught up on some dumb shit like that and as as we learned in the Cohen thing, the way Trump does a crime is he just insists on the reality he wants to be true
Starting point is 00:33:11 around the people who make it so, essentially. So he's not saying, okay, do this crime on my behalf. He's saying it would be great if this crime were committed. If that worked out. If the result of this crime. Hey, if it's what you say it is, then I love it.
Starting point is 00:33:26 It's a cute dog. I'm ashamed if anything happened to him. Yeah. Right. So if it's what you say it was, then I love it. Like that whole thing. Right. That is.
Starting point is 00:33:40 It's not on its face. What are you going to say? Like, I don't know. I don't know what I was saying. Is that illegal? You say, I didn't know that I don't know what I was saying. Is that illegal? You say, I didn't know that was a representative of the Russian government. Yeah, right. And I think if you work in a campaign, you tell me how you do it.
Starting point is 00:33:51 And when you work in a campaign and it's like we're just trying to win and somebody calls you up with their own opponent. Yeah, okay, great. Yeah, I love it. You're going to turn that down? And like you guys were talking about, it's a majority game and you can plausibly do that. But I think most people, though, would have, when you think about who was it uh in one of the elections like found the binder called the fbi no yeah al gore got a ups the day before a debate with george w bush that was all of george w bush's uh debate prep and rather than even opening it to like look at page one, he just sent it to the FBI right away.
Starting point is 00:34:26 And who won that one? And then got his ass kicked. Right. And then got his ass kicked in the debate. But I don't know. So I mean, I guess the one argument is- Who did win that one, Nick? But I mean, really, let's think.
Starting point is 00:34:39 But in the end, who really won? Yeah. I mean- I do think, I mean, mean well when you look at the i think the historian's conclusion of the florida recount was that bush would have won but they got it like in a pretty shitty corrupt way like they got it to be that outcome in a pretty shitty corrupt way but he would have won anyways um i i do think a lot of this is going to have to be litigated in the pages of history uh like that's i think the
Starting point is 00:35:12 the horizon i'm kind of adjusting the truth of this story to um and just like from a practical perspective, I just don't I don't know what there is. I do think that it's probably and this is, again, very early results without having seen the report itself. But I do think it's probably in Trump opponents best interest to now start viewing this as, okay, how do we just talk about he is the president, right? He is running for reelection. Let's not worry about the legitimacy of his presidency. Let's focus on the effectiveness of his presidency. And let's reinterpret all of this shady shit that we were saying, well, maybe he's a Russian agent, and be like, no, he's not a Russian agent. This is just how –
Starting point is 00:36:11 He's a terrible president. He's just bad at this. I was thinking a good question now is like, okay, so the report does establish that Russia most definitely – Interfered in the election. Interfered in the election. What are you donald trump doing about that like forget about your role in all this stuff and then and you know put it like
Starting point is 00:36:29 just shift the whole thing so it's like okay pretend this is normal life for a second like you know right and that that you know but he's i mean if all of his actions point to the fact that he doesn't care or if anything he's severely wants to inhibit the uh you know law enforcement's ability to respond to election interference. But then you can make the political point that this guy is doing a bad job defending us. Yeah, no, absolutely. And I think that's that's where we have to walk the fine line, because on one hand, it's so clearly to people. It's like there's an injustice that people feel just by looking at him and being like, there's something so fucking sinister and off that like this can't work.
Starting point is 00:37:03 And then we're having to balance that with how this political machine actually operates. And on one hand, of course the, the emotional side is just fucking do whatever we have to do to impeach this person. Like just fucking do it. And then,
Starting point is 00:37:17 but then we also live in a world where a failed impeachment attempt could have, could spectacularly backfire. And then, and then we're looking at a guaranteed four more years of Donald Trump that and there's the precedent to like there's going to be some other is gonna be a Democratic president at some point and you really don't want it to you want it to be this hard to impeach the president because if it's not this hard, that's all we'll ever do is special counsels and impeachments. Yeah, I mean, when you look at a
Starting point is 00:37:41 comparison between special counsel investigations, we as we have throughout the course of this and just kind of the timeline and number of indictments, this was a fairly short special counsel investigation when you compare it to Whitewater, when you compare it to Watergate, when you compare it to some of these other, like per indictment, there were a lot more indictments and a lot less time. But I do think that there was litigation, like there was legislation that was passed to limit the powers and make it less of a broad-reaching thing than it was under Ken Starr. And I think that that's probably a good thing in the long run, even though it does seem like it made it fairly limited, uh, this time around.
Starting point is 00:38:31 All right. So, you know, that's where we're at currently just trying to sort through this stuff. We thought we would kind of check in with you guys and let you know, kind of our thoughts on the situation. Um, let you know kind of our thoughts on the situation.
Starting point is 00:38:50 Obviously the story is going to continue to evolve and, you know, we'll, we'll be keeping an eye on it, but anything else, anyone else wants to share one thing? Hashtag Monday motivation. No, at like four,
Starting point is 00:38:59 that was like three in the morning when I was like deep in reading, I got into a hole last night as you guys may have seen from my text to you. But there was a moment of absolute insanity where I thought, I'm kind of attracted to Robert Mueller. Oh, wow. And then I was like- He looks like Sam Eagle. What am I doing? I need to go to bed.
Starting point is 00:39:20 But it was that moment where I was like, God, there's something so attractive about a man who's really going to have to go through it right now. Yeah, the eagle face. And then I went to bed because I was like, I am starting to lose my mind. I guess that's the other thing. They're probably going to subpoena him, too. I mean, they're not subpoenaing him, but call him to come testify, I would think, wouldn't you? Right. Yeah, Jerry Nadler is trying to bring everybody into the committee to be like, what is going on? Right. Yeah, Jerry Nadler is, like, trying to bring everybody into the committee to be like, what is going on?
Starting point is 00:39:47 Right. I mean, the drudge headlines are, Trump wins, no collusion, no obstruction, with a asterisk, no proof of crimes, Nadler, it's not over. Maxine Meltdown. Yeah. Well, I mean, yeah. They look a lot of spiking of the football on the right today. You know what I mean? Yeah.
Starting point is 00:40:05 But don't worry. That's fine. Because motherfuckers took the House in 2018 on issues that had nothing to do with Trump or Russia. Right. So, you know, like, I know a lot of people are very dejected by it, and I feel bad for you because I... Don't put all your eggs in a basket, y'all. But don't worry. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:40:24 There's still time to come. We still don't know, guys, and that's just really the bottom line. We just don't know. We're gonna have to see that report, baby. Yeah. I mean, the main thing that I think the left has been, uh, pointing out as they make fun of, uh,
Starting point is 00:40:40 more centrist liberal people about their obsession with the Mueller report is report is like the thing that people actually care about is you know the tax cuts for the rich and the health care for all or health care for none as uh you know it seems like you know on the one hand the traditional political uh indicators are pretty good like are in Trump's favor when it comes to things like low unemployment in swing states. On the other hand, he has like objectively like gone in the opposite direction of the populist moment that he that got him elected. And that seems to be winning the day in politics on both sides.
Starting point is 00:41:23 winning the day in politics on both sides. So, you know, that might be the smarter place for people to focus their energies going forward. All right, we're going to now go record a regular episode. But this has been the Mueller Report Report. No, the Bar Summary Report. The Bar Summary Report. Yeah, the Bar Summary. The Mueller Report bar summary report.
Starting point is 00:41:46 Report. Cast. Cast. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th, 2017, was assassinated. Crooks Everywhere unearthed the plot to murder a one-woman WikiLeaks. She exposed the culture of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state.
Starting point is 00:42:19 Listen to Crooks Everywhere on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Gianna Pradenti. And I'm Jemay Jackson-Gadsden. We're the hosts of Let's Talk Offline from LinkedIn News and iHeart Podcasts. There's a lot to figure out when you're just starting your career. That's where we come in. Think of us as your work besties you can turn to for advice. And if we don't know the answer, we bring in people who do, like negotiation expert Maury Tahiripour. If you start thinking about negotiations as just a conversation, then I think it sort of eases us a little bit. Listen to Let's Talk Offline
Starting point is 00:42:57 on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Kay hasn't heard from her sister in seven years. I have a proposal for you. Come up here and document my project. All you need to do is record everything like you always do. What was that? That was live audio of a woman's nightmare. Can Kay trust her sister or is history repeating itself? There's nothing dangerous about what you're doing. They're just dreams. Dream Sequence is a new horror thriller from Blumhouse Television, iHeartRadio, and Realm. They're just dreams. Confessions. Join hosts Gabe Gonzalez and Chris Patterson Rosso as they explore queer sex, cruising, relationships, and culture in the new iHeart podcast, Sniffy's Cruising Confessions. Sniffy's Cruising Confessions will broaden minds and help you pursue your true goals. You can listen to Sniffy's Cruising Confessions, sponsored by Gilead,
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