Comment by tom-_- | Hacker News Reader

Comment by tom-_- | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

The parent's link provides a fair summary of the report and is more detailed than the ABA statement, which is also fair, just less detailed.

The investigation was about two things; Trump's collusion with Russia AND the obstruction of justice.

The report finds no overt collusion between Trump and the Russians. It details promises of influence to the Ukranians and the Russians by sleazy power brokers like Paul Manafort and Felix Sater, and Trump's associates soliciting Russians and pretty much anyone for Hilary's deleted emails but again, no substantial evidence of direct collusion.

Whether there was obstruction of justice seems like a much more legitimate cause for outrage. https://www.lawfareblog.com/obstruction-justice-mueller-repo... details the numerous ways this was attempted, though full-disclosure Brookings is left-leaning centrist think tank.

The full report is here https://www.justice.gov/storage/report.pdf which you don't need to pass the bar to comprehend, though you do need a lot of free time. I've only read a few parts but it's further confirmed my belief that all politicians (right and left) are completely unscrupulous and must be in order win. "Democracy" is a vague, fungible concept that anyone vying for power will either disregard or interpret in their favor.

I certainly agree that there is some substance to the section on obstruction, but let's take a step back and follow the thread here.

1) OP says Democrats haven't undermined democracy since the civil war.

2). I observe that Democrat leadership actively pushed the unsubstantiated conspiracy theory that Trump colluded with the Russians to gain power.

3) I provide evidence that half of the country believes that the President of the United States conspired with Russia to gain power.

The fact that Trump may have obstructed the investigation matters--of course it does. And if he did, he should have been punished for it.

But even if he did attempt to obstruct the investigation, that does not change the basic fact that the Democrats actively undermined our Democratic institutions by convincing the American people, with out evidence, that the President was in cahoots with the Russians.

I have not intended to assert that Trump is as clean as a whistle, or that the Mueller report found nothing at all. (My 'zero evidence' claim above was vague and lazy--it was intended to refer to the question of collusion alone) My intent was to convey that there is no evidence of collusion, and that the fact that the American people were intentionally mislead on this point was the result of a concerted effort by the Democrats to mislead the American people and undermining faith in the President (and, necessarily, the presidency and our republic as a whole.

It is also true that charges were brought due the the Mueller probe, though none led to any charges related to colluding with the Russians to affect the outcome of the Election.

It is also true that Trump may have obstructed the investigation.

All three are true. The fact that folks are refusing to address the first fact by merely observing the second and third facts should indicate how masterfully those other issues--which are related to the Mueller investigation but have no bearing on the question of collusion--have been used to muddy the waters and cover for the Democrats' role in spreading the collusion conspiracy theory, at great cost to the country.

Well I think you've pointed out the core of why political debate often go nowhere. It has a unique way of exposing people's (myself included) fallibility to motivated reasoning and confirmation bias.

I agree that Democrats pinned Russian election interference (which did happen) to Trump (which probably did not) in an attempt to undermine his presidency. I also think this is not too far away from the norm. Remember the birther movement? The stolen 2000 elections? How do you rank claims of widespread voter fraud in that list?

However, I'll contend with you on your claim 1). OP did not say "Democrats haven't undermined democracy". He said Trump's undermining of the electoral system was just worse than the Democrats.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com