Under the leadership of Josef Stalin, the Soviet Union’s internal security services were led by a People’s Commissar for Internal Affairs. Two of the most famous Commissars were Nikolai Yezhov and Lavrentiy Beria. Both committed appalling atrocities and both wept…
Tag: James Comey
Firing Mueller: Living in a Bubble is Dangerous
Remember on Election Day when Princeton professor and poll analyst Sam Wang gave Hillary Clinton a 93% chance of winning and pegged the most probable Electoral College results as Clinton 323, Trump 215? It’s easy to forget just how unlikely…
Donald Trump and His Tapes
Prompted in part by former FBI director James Comey’s testimony and in part by statements and tweets made by President Trump, both the House Intelligence Committee and the Senate Judiciary Committee sent out requests for any tapes or other records…
Is Our Attorney General a Crook?
I see here that the U.S. Senate confirmed Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III at Attorney General on February 8th in a very contentious and narrow 52-47 vote. Every Republican voted for him and every Democrat voted against. I see here that…
Trump’s Impeachable and Unimpeachable Offenses
While there is still some controversy about it along constitutional lawyers and experts, it’s generally conceded that the president of the United States cannot be criminally prosecuted while he’s still serving in the office. As we discovered during the Clinton…
Why No Lawyers Will Represent Trump
President Trump can’t find a top law firm that wants to represent him. He and his top aides have tried. They’ve looked around. They’ve had conference calls. But they got zip, nada, bupkis. The top litigators and their firms have…
Laugh of the Day
First we had Sean Spicer hiding in the White House bushes and now we have this: The ceremony occurred in the Blue Room of the White House, where many senior law enforcement officials — including the Secret Service director —…
Trump is Being Taken Apart, Step By Step
J. Edgar Hoover died when I was still in nursery school, but I knew his name from about that time. People talked about him differently than they talked about anyone else. He was fearsome and untouchable because he knew secrets…
Trump Won’t Win Fight With the Intelligence Community
A lot will be written about the following tweet, possibly for decades or even centuries. We won’t know the full implications for a while, yet, and it could be that it doesn’t amount to much in the bigger picture. James…
Trump Just Crippled His Legislative Agenda
Writing in the Washington Post, James Hohmann makes a rather obvious point about the fallout from President Trump’s decision to fire FBI Director James Comey. Another significant repercussion: Every piece of Trump’s agenda just became harder to get through Congress.…