I've been saying for a year that Mike Flynn is far and away the most valuable cooperating witness Mueller has.
Media is expressing unrelenting shock at how good Flynn's plea deal was for him.
Two possibilities:
(1) I was right.
(2) Mueller's a terrible prosecutor.
Choose one.
Media is expressing unrelenting shock at how good Flynn's plea deal was for him.
Two possibilities:
(1) I was right.
(2) Mueller's a terrible prosecutor.
Choose one.
2/ Flynn didn't give up *one* person to get his deal. Or even *three* people. He gave up a whole *classroom-full* of criminals. Heck, *just today* we learned the names of two people he gave up—and this even wasn't a big news day. Upshot—Flynn is Mueller's Trump-Russia shibboleth.
3/ Understanding Flynn's value to Mueller wasn't a matter of guesswork—it was the product of two years of *research*. Flynn occupies a key role in *every* Trump-Russia narrative—putting him in a position to incriminate nearly all players in the scandal. Thus, his sweetheart deal.
4/ Consider that Michael Cohen—who some considered Mueller's top witness—is going to prison for three years for some crimes related to Trump and some not. Flynn, who *likewise* committed some crimes related to Trump and some only tangentially related, may get no jail-time at all.
5/ Part of this is a product of Flynn getting to Mueller faster than Cohen (by a lot); some of it is the product of Flynn having his hands in behavior directly threatening to America's national security and national interests. Cohen's crimes—though serious—were not as expansive.
6/ The result is that Flynn can aid Mueller in a way even Cohen—who, don't get me wrong, is a key witness for Mueller—cannot.
Had Flynn waited to plead guilty, he wouldn't have gotten this deal—but the *timing* of his cooperation has made almost the whole Mueller probe possible.
Had Flynn waited to plead guilty, he wouldn't have gotten this deal—but the *timing* of his cooperation has made almost the whole Mueller probe possible.
7/ Some may say Trump not going hard after Flynn on Twitter is a sign he doesn't think Flynn can hurt him. Not really. Trump may have many reasons for going easy on him: 1) he thinks Flynn held info back; 2) he thinks he'll anger military voters if he attacks him; 3) he thinks...
8/ ...he successfully insulated himself from what Flynn was doing in a way he could not and did not with Cohen; 4) Flynn (or a third party, perhaps a Russian party) may reveal damaging personal info about Trump Mueller wouldn't have discovered if Trump crosses Flynn publicly...
9/ ...Flynn—unlike Cohen—is an ideologue, so if Trump pardons him, Flynn might agree to publicly back Trump's impeachment defense in a way Cohen was never likely to do once he faced jail-time (Cohen facing jail-time for non-Trump related offenses made it more likely he'd flip)...
10/ ...6) Flynn perhaps continued his contacts with Trump as Manafort did and as Cohen—apparently—did not, a possibility suggested, in part, by Trump calling Flynn in April 2017, *after* Flynn had publicly said he wanted a deal, to tell him to "stay strong," and 7) other reasons.
CONCLUSION/ What makes no sense is denying Flynn's clear value as a Mueller witness purely on the basis of the Twitter conduct of a man who's basically mad. Let's go with the evidence—which confirms Flynn's value dozens of times over—and let Trump be inscrutable. (For now.) /end
