dagblog - Comments for "Garland appoints special counsel to review Biden documents"

Team Trump grabbing docs last

PeraclesPlease — Sat, 28 Jan 2023 11:15:05 +0000

In reply to Garland appoints special counsel to review Biden documents

Team Trump grabbing docs last day before Biden's inauguration, as announced realtime: rats stealing a sinking ship.

Yes, there's a reason the Trump secret docs aren't the same as Biden & Pence's. Part is a gross neglect & torturing of the law, vs the much more calm & measured & precedented (& legal) departures and treatment of docs by Pence and Biden. And Pence and Trump *both left at the same time* - 2 weeks after the failed coup, a week after Trump's 2nd impeachment.

It's not too hard to see 2 categories of handling classified docs by departing politicians - the way that largely follows the rules, the ways it doesn't.

In any huge complex operation one can focus on the small details, but we easily see criminal intent and abandonment of duty yet again in Trump's lack of following the rules. Of course many from the rightwing will try to muddy what's not very muddy, but we don't have to play that silly game if we don't want to.

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/trumps-day-office-sensitive-documents-al...

And here a reporter repeats

PeraclesPlease — Thu, 26 Jan 2023 23:15:25 +0000

In reply to Sorry, you're confusing Jan 6

And here a reporter repeats Trump's phrasing vs an accurate one:

Why did you feel the need to cover this?

And why did you feel the need to cover it without using stronger terms? Why even adopt his preferred label, Education?
— emptywheel (@emptywheel) January 26, 2023

That's a Politici/MSNBC bang-up job

Sorry, you're confusing Jan 6

PeraclesPlease — Thu, 26 Jan 2023 22:43:03 +0000

In reply to you yourself explained right

Sorry, you're confusing Jan 6 - which is super complex and messy - with Trump walking out of WH with docs who knew he shouldn't & being resistant to any cooperation, whiie Biden & Pence were more careful and responsive to NARA.

And again, I'm not expecting the public at large to understand well, even less so when the press goes along with oartisans' "it's too tuff".

Here's another one many in the press blew, but some like Charlie Savage/NYT got right - even as his paper-mates bolloxed it:

Corrections also required for those who chased the NYT's "scoop": https://t.co/jQXNoJZ7ZB https://t.co/IRdHsWH0xQ https://t.co/McCMzM4AKa https://t.co/dScDl6KRNl
— Dan Froomkin/PressWatchers.org (@froomkin) January 26, 2023

New: National Archives asks

artappraiser — Thu, 26 Jan 2023 17:56:24 +0000

In reply to Garland appoints special counsel to review Biden documents

New: National Archives asks all living presidents and VPs — except Carter, who’s exempt from the Presidential Records Act — to look through their files for any government documents. https://t.co/qa5nrgLWR5
— Gabe Fleisher (@WakeUp2Politics) January 26, 2023

Side note: CNN reports that a “source familiar with the Archives” said they don’t “remember Carter finding any stray classified documents.”

But AP cites a “source familiar with the matter” who said Carter *has* returned classified docs to the Archives: https://t.co/8WZkgX9bxo
— Gabe Fleisher (@WakeUp2Politics) January 26, 2023

you yourself explained right

artappraiser — Thu, 26 Jan 2023 08:12:32 +0000

In reply to Oh please most voters will

you yourself explained right here why most voters' eyes would glaze over,

This is complex and murky overall, si requires patience and digging and sifting/collating - tens of thousands of hours of videos, photos, tweets

Oh please most voters will

artappraiser — Thu, 26 Jan 2023 08:08:30 +0000

In reply to The fucking media isn't the

Oh please most voters will read neither the NYTimes nor Marcy. I stand by the original statement that many are not going to see anything now but special political persecution of Trump; so does Axelrod! Some may even like that it's happening, while seeing it as 'not fair'. It's the way the cookie crumbles, sometimes shit hits the fan. And hey, when did you become such an FBI fan?

The fucking media isn't the

PeraclesPlease — Thu, 26 Jan 2023 07:57:00 +0000

In reply to “I feel it’s likely that when

The fucking media isn't the "court of public opinion" - it's assholes with a job to do, to try *explaining* nuances to the tiki-torch masses. I don't say they have to succeed - it's a tough job, i worked in media - but at least they should give it a fucking try before tossing in the towel. And these are people who largely write sitting on their asses pondering - not investigative or war journalism, such as Russian reporters getting a slug in their back or Ukrainians getting hit by gunfire. Explain how 2 violations of the same law can differ by degree and intent - is that so fucking much to ask when writing words, vs "i dunno, Vern, it all looks pretty messy and complicated to me..." This is the grist of half of Tom Tomorrow's amusing but sad cartoons, the clueless talking head.

Marcy's self-appointed job includes explaining why *some* Jan 6 rioters are charged with insurrection and why some aren't, and how the 5 or 6 intertwining groups that day differ, and how the DoJ is documenting how the organized groups deliberately used the teeming rube masses as an attack weapon in order to show intent & execution from the President's circle on down. This is complex and murky overall, si requires patience and digging and sifting/collating - tens of thousands of hours of videos, photos, tweets, Signal calls, texts, etc. to pull together in a cohesive, persuasive fashion - something the Jan 6 committee largely did without too much help from that mainstream bothsideism press (tho a lot of info from citizen reporters on the internet tracking down participants and social media comments.) And if it wasn't obvious, why this all takes so much time, why Rudy & Trump & Bannon aren't in jail yet. Even a Tweeter with 400k followers can't get that "Proud Bit trial was delayed 4 weeks, so the prediction for end of year has also been delayed". Basic logic lije that.

Sure, if it's Tucker Carlson or Aaron Maté I know which way they spin, no surprises. I'm talking about the rest.

Part of how Trump stays "relevant" is the kneejerk reaction to out his every brainfart in the front page in bold, and then afterwards futiley trying to explain why it's not right. Promote, then try to tear down. Of course the Republicans it right is taking the opportunity to parade the 3 confidential docs cases as identical, whether they are or aren't. At the moment, 2 look similar - we don't have full details - and 1 is wacky obstinate criminally insane. How fucking tough is it to say "Biden & Pence cases seem tame; Trump's is a gross violation"?

Trump doesn't even fucking read - he used David Pecker and Michael Cohen to seek revenge with every piece of documentation he ever retained - the guy has filed about 3000 lawsuits in his life. He walked out of the White House taking as much useful dirt for revenge as he could manage - we knew it at the time, because there was some timely reporting that he was ignoring pertinent laws.

So yes, maybe our 4th Estate is now a lost cause, but that's the issue - not whether the public is confused. And where I live, the press is largely still working *despite* media ownership that favors the liar-in-chief. And some of the worst headline brainfarts sadly come from NYT and WaPo even tho there's (unrealistic?) hope that they would lead the sane & sober news evaluation while CNN is again wooing the conservative eyeballs by "cleaning up" (aka sanitizing) their reporting. Much of small town reporting is dead, but this is straight & simple DC + public records stuff (except the docs themselves can't be evaluated in context because they're confidential to varying degree, so we're stuck with a # of docs metric, whether enemy's nuclear missiles or Sec'y of State travel agenda.)

“I feel it’s likely that when

artappraiser — Thu, 26 Jan 2023 05:35:18 +0000

In reply to Shorter, "I, Peter Baker,

“I feel it’s likely that when the probe is done, the Biden case will wind up being one of unintended mistakes — carelessness but not willful defiance of the rules or law,” said David Axelrod, a former senior adviser to President Barack Obama. “The Trump case is much different and more serious. But in the court of public opinion, those lines may now be blurred.”

Politics vs.court of law.

What don't you and Marcy get about that difference?

Shorter, "I, Peter Baker,

PeraclesPlease — Wed, 25 Jan 2023 07:41:48 +0000

In reply to Officially equal now; the

Shorter, "I, Peter Baker, confess that I am so bad at my job that I give up trying to explain why the Trump case is different from the Biden case, which is literally my job." https://t.co/ETlusuOuNf
— emptywheel (@emptywheel) January 24, 2023

Here's Mike Pence showing how

PeraclesPlease — Tue, 24 Jan 2023 22:26:04 +0000

In reply to Dunno. Get there's a legal

Here's Mike Pence showing how it's done - largely the way Bidens done it. Trump is the outlier. Sandy Berger was an outlier. Oetraeus was an outlier. Most sane honest people don't fight the classifying agency or hide stuff. Classification's goal isn't to put people in jail - it's to try to guarantee safe but efficient use. We *want* the right people to be using the sensitive documents to handle whatever security-minded important tasks need doing. We don't want ex-pols to take home to blackmail people for revenge and leverage, which is a side of Trump that exists all too well. Do Dems not explain it well enough for the MAGAhats? Sorry, it's difficult to counter intentional distortion. But Pence's guys will get it. Where are the Romney Republicans? Or do her have to concede all to the fringe lunatics who sadly have a Republican majority simply cuz it's tuff for them to understand?

Pence and his lawyer’s handling of this seems just right. Of course, they can see how other approaches can backfire. https://t.co/s5E8aXbOPU
— Andrew Weissmann (@AWeissmann_) January 24, 2023