What Judge Sullivan Should Do

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/05/what-judge-sullivan-should-do/611488/

The Justice Department has requested that he dismiss the case against Michael Flynn. Here are 13 questions the judge should ask of government counsel.

 

U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan probably has little choice but to accede to the Justice Department’s outrageous motion that he dismiss the case against Lieutenant General Michael Flynn—notwithstanding Flynn’s guilty plea to false-statements charges more than two years ago. Existing law provides him little discretion in deciding whether to let the case go. That said, he does not have to dismiss the case without comment.

“Arguably, You Sold Your Country Out”: Could a Judge Override Barr in the Flynn Affair?

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/05/could-a-judge-override-barr-in-the-flynn-affair

What’s telling about the government’s unprecedented motion, which Michael Bromwich, a former inspector general and longtime Department of Justice official, called “a pardon by another name,” is that it tries really hard to rewrite history, if not ignore it altogether. To the Justice Department, all revolves around a single instance, four days into the new administration, when Flynn, a sophisticated official with decades of government service, including in the nation’s intelligence apparatus, found himself in the crosshairs of an overreaching FBI. “The Government is not persuaded that the January 24, 2017 interview was conducted with a legitimate investigative basis and therefore does not believe Mr. Flynn’s statements were material even if untrue,” Timothy Shea, the loyalist Barr installed as acting U.S. attorney in Washington earlier this year, wrote. “Moreover, we [do] not believe that the Government can prove either the relevant false statements or their materiality beyond a reasonable doubt.” No other career official who had been on the case signed the filing—one of them, Brandon Van Grack, a Mueller veteran in the department’s national security division, had abruptly withdrawn from the Flynn case moments earlier on Thursday, in apparent protest of the Justice Department’s reversal.

 

Flynn: What Will Judge Sullivan Do?

https://www.law.com/newyorklawjournal/2020/05/11/flynn-what-will-judge-sullivan-do/?slreturn=20200412084852#

 

On May 8, The New York Times headline read “U.S. Drops Michael Flynn Case … .” I suppose that’s technically true. The article didn’t say that the Flynn case was dismissed. Indeed, it hasn’t been. The Justice Department clearly has no authority to dismiss a pending criminal case—particularly after a guilty plea has been entered by the defendant. All it can do is “ask” the court to dismiss the case. Given who the judge is, the Justice Department can’t be too certain of the outcome or what will happen along the way, and probably won’t be sleeping easily while awaiting the judge’s decision.

Trump's Attorney General Barr Called To Resign For 'Assaults On The Rule Of Law' | MSNBC

Ingraham: Obama to the rescue

Fact Check: Is Obama the only president to criticize a successor?

https://kslnewsradio.com/1924939/fact-check-is-obama-the-only-president-to-criticize-a-successor/

Among the hundreds of #ObamaGate retweets President Trump sent over the weekend was a widely circulated meme with a photo of former President Barack Obama stating, “First Ex-President To Speak Against Successor.” Mr. Trump retweeted the meme, writing, “He got caught, OBAMAGATE!”

The meme had been seen on the Internet in past years. Now it’s adding fuel to the current #ObamaGate fire on Twitter. 

Is Obama the only president in U.S. history to denounce his successor? 

The short answer is no. There are several presidents in recent history who have spoken out against their successors to different news and media outlets.

 

Trump increases attack against Obama with ‘Obamagate’ tweet

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/trump-ups-attack-against-obama-with-obamagate-tweet

Last week, Attorney General William Barr’s Justice Department dismissed the case against Flynn, Trump's first national  security adviser, who was seen as the key prosecution witness from Robert Mueller’s investigation into the Trump campaign.

Trump, along with other Republicans, seized on the decision and framed it as an example of a Democrat-manufactured plot to remove him from office.

 

Trump's 'Obamagate' comments and Barr's Flynn meddling suggest troubling new pivot

https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/trump-s-obamagate-comments-barr-s-flynn-meddling-suggest-troubling-ncna1204856

In my 25 years as an FBI special agent and (now retired) head of the bureau's counterintelligence, I learned the value of predictive analysis. Following the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the FBI transitioned from an investigative agency adept at investigating what happened after the fact to an intelligence agency capable of forecasting and preventing harm from happening in the future.

Trump is clearly still sensitive about the 2016 election, and especially about concerns that he may not have beaten former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton fairly. He therefore has a special interest in undermining accusations of Russian meddling, something he has done since entering the Oval Office. What better way to do this than to flip the script? He didn't have an advantage; in fact, he was the victim

As other commentators have pointed out, attempting this bait and switch would likely involve efforts to censure, discipline or even criminally charge current and former government officials, such as former CIA Director John Brennan, fired FBI Director James Comey, former national security adviser Susan Rice, former National Intelligence Director James Clapper and perhaps even Obama and Biden. During his Monday news conference in the Rose Garden, a reporter asked Trump what crime he might accuse Obama of committing. Trump responded: "Obamagate, it's been going on for a long time. It's been going on from before I got elected, and it's a disgrace that it happened. You look at, now, all of this information that's being released, and from what I understand, that's only the beginning."

What is 'Obamagate' and why is Trump so worked up about it?

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/may/12/what-is-obamagate-and-why-is-trump-so-worked-up-about-it

The US president spent Mother’s Day diving into the rightwing fever swamps and unleashing a barrage of tweets and retweets assailing his predecessor

 

Senate Republicans break with Trump over ‘Obamagate’

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/05/11/senate-republicans-trump-obamagate-249734

After the Justice Department’s abrupt decision last week to drop the criminal case against Flynn, Trump shifted his public focus over the weekend to mount a three-day tear against his predecessor on Twitter, accusing Obama of committing the “biggest political crime in American history.” Trump sought to popularize the hashtag “Obamagate,” which he said makes the Watergate scandal “look small time.” Trump also said Obama “got caught” and later retweeted comments by Flynn’s lawyer, Sidney Powell, who said Obama was part of an effort to frame and entrap her client.

 

Trump hardens campaign tone after virus batters economy

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/05/12/politics/donald-trump-coronavirus-reelection/index.html

Trump also signaled a new fallback strategy designed to whip up the fervor of his base by accusing his predecessor of mounting an attempt to cancel out his win in 2016 in what his supporters refer to as a "deep state plot."

"Obamagate. It's been going on for a long time. It's been going on from before I even got elected, and it's a disgrace that it happened," Trump claimed without evidence. Asked by a reporter to identify the crime he had accused Obama in a tweet of committing, he responded: "You know what the crime is. The crime is obvious to everybody."

The conservative media machine is pulsating with the reverberations of Attorney General William Barr's decision last week to drop charges against Trump's former national security adviser Michael Flynn, who had twice pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI in a case that arose from the Russia investigation.

Shortly after Trump spoke, the scope of the Republican election attack became even more clear as Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa pressed the conspiracy theory on the Senate floor.

"The rule of law is at risk if the federal government can get away with violating the Constitution to do what they did to Lt. Gen. Flynn," said Grassley. "Given all that we know now regarding the fake foundation to the inquiry, it's time we asked: What did Obama and Biden know and when did they know it?"

Republican Group Releases Ad Encouraging Americans to Hold Trump Accountable for Abusing His Power

https://www.newsweek.com/republican-group-releases-ad-encouraging-americans-hold-trump-accountable-abusing-his-power-1503281

Conservative group Republicans for the Rule of Law (RRL) released two new advertisements on Monday highlighting how President Donald Trump has allegedly attempted to avoid all forms of oversight.

The group's latest videos, which ran on Fox News' Fox & Friends, Tucker Carlson Tonight and Hannity, come ahead of Tuesday's oral arguments in the U.S. Supreme Court which could determine if Trump could be indicted for crimes while in office. Trump's legal team argues that the president cannot be investigated for wrongdoings while he is in office.

Pulse oximeters are selling out because of the pandemic. Most people don’t need them

https://qz.com/1832464/pulse-oximeters-for-coronavirus-unnecessary-but-selling-strong/

Amazon is currently flooded with listings for pulse oximeters, many of which are not FDA-approved. People who use such devices are at risk of getting an inaccurate reading. A 2016 study in Anesthesia & Analgesia looked at a number of inexpensive pulse oximeters not cleared by the FDA, and found that many of them were prone to large errors.

A number of wearables offer SpO2 features, including ones offered by Fitbit and Garmin. Apps that use your smartphone’s camera to deliver SpO2 measurements can be hit-or-miss. Such technology hasn’t been cleared by the FDA. One study looked at three pulse oximeter apps: iOx, OX, and POx. All three apps delivered inaccurate SpO2 measurements, according to the authors, from the University of Alabama and the University of Michigan.

 

Something Appears To Be Wrong With Donald Trump | Rachel Maddow | MSNBC