Michael Gaynor
Now turnabout is fair play against team Obama/Biden
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By Michael Gaynor
May 11, 2020

Senator Lindsay Graham eventually should call former President Obama before the Senate Judiciary Committee and ask (after giving due credit to the late Senator Howard Baker): "What did you know and when did you know it?"

Let justice prevail and the real culprits go to jail.

In 1755, Dudley Bradstreet, an Irish adventurer and government secret agent, may have been the first to coin the term “turnabout is fair play” (www.mywebtimes.com/2018/05/09/turnabout-fair-play-pirates-even-series-with-l-p/aq9aw50/).

The Trump Administration is now perfectly positioned to investigate "abuse of power" in the predecessor Obama/Biden Administration and it would be derelict in its duty to uphold the rule of law if it did not lawfully investigate what President Trump referred to as "treason" because Team Obama/Biden leaked a recording of the former president obviously intended to discourage such an investigation.

President Obama in a web talk with Obama Alumni Association members:

"The news over the last 24 hours I think has been somewhat downplayed — about the Justice Department dropping charges against Michael Flynn."

"And the fact that there is no precedent that anybody can find for someone who has been charged with perjury just getting off scot-free. That’s the kind of stuff where you begin to get worried that basic — not just institutional norms — but our basic understanding of rule of law is at risk. And when you start moving in those directions, it can accelerate pretty quickly as we’ve seen in other places.”

Perhaps the former President should discuss that with his former Director of National intelligence, General Michael Flynn, to better understand the calamitous results of his persecution of General Flynn.

The former president stated that General Flynn had pleaded guilty to perjury.

The former president owes the general an apology for that too.

As the late President Reagan put it, "facts are pesky things."

General Flynn pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about his conversations with the then Russian ambassador to the United States, not to perjury, and the United States Department of Justice has determined that there was no lawful predicate for the FBI investigation of General Flynn and moved to dismiss the case.

The only parties to the case are the Justice Department and General Flynn and the case must be dismissed because there is no long a "case or controversy," so the presiding judge's choice is to follow the Constitution and dismiss or go rogue and become a suitable target for investigation himself.

A person who listens to the recording of the former president and remembers him speaking smoothly will be struck by his sudden lack of smoothness as well as his "mistake" as to the charge to which General Flynn pleaded.

Why was the former president rattled?

Probably because turnabout is fair play and he had been on top of the wrongful investigation of General Flynn.

FBI investigations such as the investigation of General Flynn are not routine investigations. They are particularly done for the President of the United States.

It is now public knowledge that former President Obama was aware of the details of then-incoming national security adviser Michael Flynn's intercepted December 2016 phone calls with then-Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak, apparently to the surprise of then-Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates, according to exhibits to the Department of Justice's motion to dismiss the Flynn case.

Fox News reports as follows /www.foxnews.com/politics/obama-knew-details-of-wiretapped-flynn-phone-calls-surprising-top-doj-official-new-docs-show (www.foxnews.com/politics/obama-knew-details-of-wiretapped-flynn-phone-calls-surprising-top-doj-official-new-docs-show):

"Obama's unexpectedly intimate knowledge of the details of Flynn's calls, which the FBI acknowledged at the time were not criminal or even improper, raised eyebrows because of his own history with Flynn – and because top FBI officials secretly discussed whether their goal was to 'get [Flynn] fired' when they interviewed him in the White House on January 24, 2017.

"Obama personally had warned the Trump administration against hiring Flynn, and made clear he was 'not a fan,' according to multiple officials. Obama had fired Flynn as head of the Defense Intelligence Agency in 2014; Obama cited insubordination, while Flynn asserted he was pushed out for his aggressive stance on combating lslamic extremism.

"Yahoo News, in reporting the tape, noted that Obama incorrectly states the charges against Flynn, who was not charged with perjury. Instead, Flynn pleaded guilty in 2017 to lying to the FBI about his conversations with the Russian ambassador in the transition period between the Obama and Trump administrations. But Flynn’s supporters have long argued that the FBI set a perjury trap for Flynn."

What really shakes the former president and his former vice president, Joe Biden?

Fox News

:"On January 5, 2017, Yates attended an Oval Office meeting with then-FBI Director James Comey, then-Vice President Joe Biden, then-CIA Director John Brennan, and then-Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, according to the newly declassified documents, including an FD-302 FBI witness report. They were discussing Russian election interference, along with national security adviser Susan Rice and other members of the national security council.

"After the briefing, Obama asked Yates and Comey to 'stay behind,' and said he had 'learned of the information about Flynn' and his conversation with Russia's ambassador about sanctions. Obama 'specified that he did not want any additional information on the matter, but was seeking information on whether the White House should be treating Flynn any differently, given the information.'

"A previous memo from Rice stated that Biden also stayed behind after the main briefing had ended.

"At that point, the documents showed, 'Yates had no idea what the president was talking about, but figured it out based on the conversation. Yates recalled Comey mentioning the Logan Act, but can't recall if he specified there was an "investigation." Comey did not talk about prosecution in the meeting.'

"The exhibit continues: 'It was not clear to Yates from where the President first received the information. Yates did not recall Comey's response to the President's question about how to treat Flynn. She was so surprised by the information she was hearing that she was having a hard time processing it and listening to the conversation at the same time.'

"Yates, who was fired by the Trump administration after taking the extraordinary step of refusing to defend its travel ban executive order in court, would later say that she was concerned Flynn would be vulnerable to blackmail because of his interactions with Russia.

"The Logan Act, an obscure statute, has never been used successfully in a criminal prosecution; enacted in 1799 in an era before telephones, it was intended to prevent individuals from falsely claiming to represent the United States government abroad. In its motion to dismiss Flynn's case on Thursday, the DOJ noted that the law was an unserious dead letter."

Would Nancy Pelosi be Speaker of the House if the truth had been known before Election Day 2018?

I doubt it.

Would President Trump have been impeached by the Democrat-controlled House of Representatives for improper involvement with Russia?

Certainly not.

Should the United States Department of Justice thoroughly investigate that "insurance policy" that Peter Strzok and Lisa Page texted about in case citizen Donald Trump shocked the world and was elected President?

As Sarah Palin would put it, "you betcha."

Senator Lindsay Graham eventually should call former President Obama before the Senate Judiciary Committee and ask (after giving due credit to the late Senator Howard Baker): "What did you know and when and did you know it?"

To be sure, like General Flynn, the former president is entitled to the presumption of innocence and to plead the Fifth Amendment.

The same with former Vice President Biden, former FBI Director James Comey and former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe and others.

© Michael Gaynor

 

The views expressed by RenewAmerica columnists are their own and do not necessarily reflect the position of RenewAmerica or its affiliates.
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Michael Gaynor

Michael J. Gaynor has been practicing law in New York since 1973. A former partner at Fulton, Duncombe & Rowe and Gaynor & Bass, he is a solo practitioner admitted to practice in New York state and federal courts and an Association of the Bar of the City of New York member... (more)

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