May 27, 2018

Trump's mouthpiece Rudy Giuliani gave another incoherent interview on CNN's State of the Union this morning, full of tics and weird facial expressions. As usual, he called the special counsel a "rigged" investigation and claimed that the charge of "perjury" is really just open to interpretation.

But as Giuliani was spinning as hard as he could while using every Kellyanne Conway talking point he studied, he made a curious slip-up after guest host Dana Bash asked him to clarify what two topics were agreed upon for a Trump interview with the special counsel.

Dana Bash asked,"What are those two topics. What's in, what's out?"

Giuliani immediately began to backtrack," I should say it's all contingent on every point being worked out. It's kind of like the North Korean negotiations. if everything can be worked out then they would probably limit it to collusion and obstruction."

He continued, "The collusion part we are pretty comfortable with because there has been none. The obstruction part I'm not as comfortable with. I'm not. The president is fine with it, he is innocent. I am not comfortable because it's a matter of interpretation, not just hard and fast, true/not true."

Now there's no precedent for a target of an investigation to have the power to dictate the limits of the investigation, nor is there any confirmation that Mueller has agreed to any of this, but Giuliani's job isn't to follow the law or to be inform the public of how federal investigations work, it's to muddy the waters so as to make as many of the American people as possible confused about the investigation. But then Rudy got either really sloppy or really truthful:

Giuliani continued, "If you interpret his comment about firing Mueller -- sorry, Comey, no discussion of firing Mueller by the way."

Over and over since his hiring, Giuliani has said things that end up embarrassing the Trump administration. It's obvious the president wants to fire Mueller and Rod Rosenstein. And by the manner of what Rudy saying, it's clear that there have been many conversations about it.

Giuliani kept the smearing of James Comey to defend his firing by claiming he was doing a bad job and said, "You see it as obstructing the investigation, then you can say it is obstruction, and then you can say it is perjury which is even easier for them, which is where I think--if they are sneaky--they are going. I don't believe Bob is."

What? If a person is telling the truth, how do you "force" a perjury charge on them?

Then Giuliani smeared the entire investigation team by claiming they were diehard Hillary Clinton supporters (Ha ha) so they can't be trusted.

Bash cut in and replied, "I mean, Mr. Mayor, you know Robert Mueller is a Republican. That is a little red herring. I understand why you're doing it, why you are talking about people who are Democrats..."

Rudy interrupted, "Who worked for Obama and who hired Democrats and very, very partisan Democrats. I never would have done that." Interesting.

Of course, Rudy was very happy to leak information during the presidential campaign from very, very partisan New York Bureau FBI agents.

Bash said, "Robert Mueller is the special counsel and he's in charge of this. Are you saying that --"

Giuliani again interrupted, "Which is why we have pause because if I were looking at 13 'down-the-middle' people I would say fine."

So the Trump administration wanted Robert Mueller to investigate each member of his FBI team and determine if they were down the middle people politically or who have a political preference and then determine if they could be trusted to be impartial? Because Democrats or people who have worked for the department through multiple presidents of both parties can't possibly be impartial?

Gotcha.

I doubt there were 13 down the middle people in the entire federal government and let's be honest, law enforcement votes Republican 90% of the time.

But more importantly, this shows the same respect for laws as Trump does everyday: none. Because Guiliani just admitted that he would knowingly commit a crime, since it is ILLEGAL to ask potential hires for their political affiliations, so as to reduce the question of partisanship overruling the integrity of the investigation and it's clear that Mueller has compiled simply a top team with relevant expertise, irrespective of their political leanings.

And Robert Mueller is the one who makes the final decisions on the intel he gathers and has been a lifelong Republican with an immaculate reputation on both sides of the aisle. That is, until Donald Trump started feeling threatened.

All this took place in a little over two minutes. He was on for over twenty.

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