By Mike Huckabee
June 2, 2022
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Blessings on you and your family and from all the Huckabee staff! Today's newsletter includes:
- Where does the special counsel go from here?
- The “Protect Our Kids Act.”
- And much more...
Sincerely,
Mike Huckabee
1. DAILY BIBLE VERSE
I appeal to you, brothers and sisters,[a] in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree with one another in what you say and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be perfectly united in mind and thought.
1 Corinthians 1:10
If you have a favorite Bible Verse you want to see in one of our newsletters, please email [email protected].
2. Where does the special counsel go from here?
Don’t let anyone tell you that Special Counsel John Durham might as well pack it up after his loss in court Tuesday in the Sussmann case. That’s the mainstream media narrative –- at the conclusion of a trial they deliberately ignored –- and since when has a mainstream media narrative been true?
Former Attorney General Bill Barr appeared on “Jesse Watters Primetime” Wednesday night to comment on the Durham investigation in light of Michael Sussmann’s acquittal. Here’s the big take-away from that interview:
“No one’s more frustrated than the law enforcement people who are trying to uphold the law and trying to uphold one standard of the law –- and there’s not; there are two standards of the law, and we’ve had this struggle with that. And people have done, I think, a very good job trying to develop this case in the face of very strong headwinds. And part of this operation is to try to get the real story out. I’ve said from the beginning...if we can get convictions, if they’re achievable, then John Durham will achieve them. But...the other aspect of this is to get the story out, and I think the Danchenko prosecution [relative to the ‘dossier’] is gonna further amplify these themes and the role that the FBI leadership played in this, which is increasingly looking fishy and inexplicable.”
The prospect that the “dossier” was Russian disinformation fed through the Hillary campaign was “very real,” Barr said, and never looked into by special counsel Robert Mueller, Barr said, “even though he had all the relevant facts.”
Barr said he disagreed with Andrew McCarthy about the case being “lost or mismanaged” because of Durham painting the FBI as being ‘duped.’ (If you read what we said yesterday, you know we’re more in line with Barr than McCarthy on this.) “He didn’t. What I think he skillfully did,” Barr continued, “was focus on the clearest violation of the law that didn’t require him to prove even...[a] much more onerous case of the bad faith of the FBI at this stage. That would’ve been a Herculean case...[with a] high degree of difficulty compared to what he was doing.”
Durham didn’t say the FBI were ‘duped’ –- he “treated them as neutral, and let the facts speak for themselves,” Barr said. And the materiality of the lie told to the FBI, Barr thought, was clear. But this is a case that has to be built “painstakingly.” It would have been “a very hard case to prove, at this stage,” that the FBI “are bad guys,” he said. “Especially in front of a DC jury.”
NOTE that Barr has twice used the qualifier “at this stage,” implying that down the road, given what the investigation has revealed at that point, it might not be so hard to make the case.
“Complicated cases like this take a long time to build,” Barr concluded. “They occur step-by-step, and in secret. People don’t like that. But if they want people punished, that’s what it takes. If they want the facts of what happened, you can get it that much more quickly; you can give people immunity, and then require them to provide evidence. So, if you want the facts, if you want a report, that can be done fairly quickly. But if you want scalps, that takes time.”
If it’s true great minds think alike, I should congratulate the former attorney general for echoing essentially what we said here after the Sussmann verdict was read. The points to keep in mind are these:
– It’s true: there really are two systems of justice, and that is now painfully clear.
– Besides getting convictions if possible, Durham’s larger purpose is to get the full story out.
-- The next trial (Danchenko, involving the Steele “dossier”) will continue doing that.
-- The case did NOT hinge on the FBI being duped. Durham meant to let the facts show their behavior to be “fishy and inexplicable.” (In this courtroom, there would have been an acquittal either way.)
-- One big question to be answered is why the Mueller investigation tiptoed around known facts.
– The case Durham is building is very complicated and will take a long time.
– Durham is after big scalps. Don’t worry; this trial was just to sharpen the cleaver a little.
So, where does the investigation go from here? THE EPOCH TIMES has an excellent piece on that. (Writer Hans Mahncke does agree with McCarthy that Durham was pushing the “overarching” narrative that the FBI was duped; again, we saw that a bit differently.) Of course, there’s Danchenko and the “dossier” --- that trial is scheduled for October --- but there are other private actors such as the infamous Marc Elias, Fusion GPS co-founders Peter Fritsch and Glenn Simpson, and, of course, Rodney Joffe –- who was NOT granted immunity.
There was testimony in the Sussmann trial suggesting that Joffe had a role in analyzing the alleged Russian hacking of the DNC emails in May 2016. “If Joffe was involved in shaping the narrative of the alleged hacking,” Mahncke writes, “it would cast yet more doubt on the flimsy but prevailing conclusion that the Russian government was responsible.”
Let’s hope and pray that Durham is headed in that direction. It might even be the Holy Grail. The so-called “Russian hack” story laid the foundation for the whole Trump-Russia Hoax, yet there’s no evidence, at least that has been made public, that the DNC server was hacked by the Russians. The FBI accepted that explanation from the DNC without even examining their hard drive, which is in the possession of a company called CrowdStrike.
https://thescotfree.com/opinion/who-is-john-durham-targeting-next/
Mahncke points out that if Durham has more serious charges in mind for Joffe, he’s not hemmed in by the statute of limitations. For lying to the FBI, it’s only five years (and the allegations are from 2016), but for major fraud against the United States, it’s seven years.
Of course, there are also the “fishy” government actors such as the FBI’s Peter Strzok, Andy McCabe and Director James Comey. They seem like much slipperier fish to catch, but we now have evidence from this trial that the people on the 7th Floor were “fired up” about the Alfa Bank server and demanded a full investigation even though they had no credible evidence.
Jake Sullivan is another possible target. One fact, however, complicates Durham’s look at some government actors and shows how incestuous Washington DC is: Attorney General Merrick Garland’s counsel, Margaret Goodlander, is married to...Sullivan, who was helping spread the fake Alfa Bank narrative with Hillary and is now working in the Biden White House. For Durham, every day must feel like going to work in a mine field.
Have a comment? Leave me one here.
3. Tulsa shooting
Late Wednesday afternoon, there was a shooting at the Natalie Medical building in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Police said four victims are dead and the shooter killed himself. At this writing, the shooter has yet to be identified. This is a developing story, so please pray for those injured and for the victims’ families, and keep watching the news for updates.
4. Newsworthy: Depp-Heard Verdict reaction
We haven’t been covering the Johnny Depp-Amber Heard defamation trial because it’s just not the kind of thing we normally care about. But the reaction to the verdict is newsworthy in a way that touches on a subject we do cover.
After weeks of lurid testimony, the jury took only a few minutes to find in Depp’s favor on all three counts, awarding him $15 million in compensatory and punitive damages. They found that one statement in Depp’s counterclaim against Heard was defamatory and awarded her $2 million. But taking into account the state’s cap on punitive damages and the $2 million for Heard, the upshot was that Heard owes Depp $8.35 million, and the jury didn’t believe any of her claims of spousal abuse.
That’s good news for Depp, who released a statement of gratitude to his supporters, explaining that he knew the lawsuit was a risky longshot, but he had to fight for the truth and he couldn’t allow false charges that he was a wife beater to go unchallenged. He said his life, career and family had been severely negatively impacted even though no charges were ever brought against him.
But many claim the case has larger implications than whether Depp will ever appear in another “Pirates of the Caribbean” movie.
Pundits are saying that this verdict is the death knell for the “MeToo” movement, or at least the unfair aspects that we must believe all women and that any man accused by a woman is automatically guilty and should just shut up and take it. Both the jurors and millions of people watching at home saw Depp’s female lawyer methodically dismantle Heard’s claims, Heard giving testimony that was jaw-droppingly implausible, and witnesses testifying that it was Depp who was the victim of physical abuse by his wife. Analysts say this trial has convinced the public that women can lie and be abusers themselves and innocent men can be falsely accused, something anyone who’s ever seen a film noir movie should’ve known already.
Some feminists are lamenting that Heard has set back the cause of abused women, but I dispute that. She’s made it harder to lie about being abused, but that should never have been easy. I have been saying since the #MeToo movement first appeared that women have a right to be heard and to have any accusations of sexual or spousal abuse taken seriously, but that men accused of such crimes also have a right to a presumption of innocence until proven guilty. The fact that Amber Heard’s lies weren't believed isn't going to free Harvey Weinstein because he really was guilty.
Ms Heard didn’t swing a hammer at women’s rights. She just caused the pendulum to swing back toward the center, where it should’ve been all along.
5. “Misstatement”
I’ve often said that the definition of a “misstatement” in Washington is when someone accidentally slips up and tells the truth. By that standard, the new White House press secretary made a telling “misstatement” about the Democrats’ response to tragedies like school shootings.
6. The “Protect Our Kids Act.”
The House Judiciary Committee will hold an emergency meeting today to put together a bill that will reportedly include eight new gun control measures. It includes “proposals to raise the minimum age for purchasing a semi-automatic weapon from 18 to 21, ban ‘high capacity magazines,’ establish a registry for bump stocks and more.” True to form, it’s not called the “Gun Control Omnibus Act” but the “Protect Our Kids Act.” So when you hear that term, you’ll know what it actually is.
Never let it be said that we don’t listen to all sides of an issue. Here’s an op-ed by Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut, detailing what he says are some small changes that could be made to gun laws and increasing support for mental health that could help reduce gun violence and prevent school shootings and that members of both parties could agree on.
https://www.foxnews.com/
I invite you to read what he has to say and tell us in the comments whether you would be willing to compromise on such measures, whether you think they would help, and why or why not.
For more, here’s Derek Hunter of Townhall.com analyzing a New York Times editorial demanding more gun control and explaining the holes in their thinking.
In his inimitable way, Kurt Schlichter explains that the problem isn’t a lack of gun laws, it’s a shortage of duty and accountability.
Finally, the uncle of one of the young victims of the Uvalde school shooting spoke out against people using their family’s name to promote more anti-gun laws. He said their own family are responsible gun owners, and they believe enhanced security at schools is a far better solution.
https://www.foxnews.com/media/
Have a comment? Leave me one here.
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