I'm seeing a real failure of comprehension of the English language on this board.
What you say is precisely correct. All one has to do is read the letter appointing Mueller to see that his brief is to investigate matters that arose or may arise DIRECTLY out of the March 17, 2017 testimony Comey gave to the House.
Comey testified about Russian meddling in the US election.
He did not testify about Manafort's financial shenanigans a decade before the election.
But that didn't stop Mueller from indicting Manafort for alleged crimes that took place a decade before the election. These crimes were already under investigation by the US Attorney for the Eastern District of Va.
It is about Mueller's authority: he had absolutely no authority to indict Manafort. The jurisdiction and power of a Special Counsel is circumscribed, otherwise he would have unfettered power to do as he pleases, which is exactly the case here. And exactly what Judge Ellis pointed out.
The US Attorney for the Eastern District of Va. didn't seem too eager to prosecute the case against Manafort.
But the case is a handy vehicle to squeeze Manafort and get him to flip against Trump, and this was improper because, as far as I can see, Mueller has zero jurisdiction over the Manafort investigation.
Now, if Mueller's work somehow reveals that Manafort was involved in crimes involving the 2016 election, that would clearly be within his power to prosecute. But decades old crimes, utterly unrelated to the campaign, are not "directly related" to Comey's testimony to the House nor did they arise or arose directly out of Comey's testimony.
There is some sort of triple secret handshake wink, wink agreement to give Mueller that authority, but the Judge was given a horribly redacted version of the document, which is insulting to an experienced federal judge with many espionage cases under his belt. Federal judges can essentially see anything that's classified, so you can imagine his reaction when a redacted document was presented to him that was unreadable and did not, because of the redactions, set forth Mueller's authority. He then had to suffer through a ludicrous argument relying on that redacted document.
I've been before many, many federal judges. And I've seen many angry ones - it is not a pretty sight, especially for the party drawing such a jurist's ire. The Mueller team's tactic was very dicey. If the judge has a bad temper, he'll go down their throat feet first for this kind of insult.
All you have to do is read the letter appointing Mueller and the transcript, both of which I posted. I see no indication that the posters who are doubtful of any of this have done either. In other words, they are often wrong but never in doubt.
LOL!
And the redactions the FBI made to the Flynn documents have been exposed as ludicrous. They tend to show FBI misconduct, doubts about Flynn's guilt, manipulation, etc. Not much in the way of genuine national security issues, more like CYA redactions designed to cover up the FBI's misdeeds.
The government is legally obligated to voluntarily provide a criminal defendant with exculpatory information or any information that tends to show his lack of guilt. This is a cornerstone of criminal law. Or would you like to be prosecuted for murder because the prosecutor is a politician with a point to make or hates your guts, when he has proof that you murder anyone? Believe me, that happens.
There are plenty of cases on the books where the prosecutor intentionally hides exculpatory material, the poor slob goes to prison, then years later he is found innocent because the DA hid the evidence. It is unfortunately what happens in the real world. Most prosecutors are ethical and won't do that but there are plenty who will. It looks to me that Mueller falls in that category - the redactions to the Flynn stuff are mana from heaven for a defense attorney. Flynn may have been told that there is no exculpatory material (lie) and that may be why he plead guilty. Who knows, but it is apparent that the FBI screwed the pooch again, and - again - got caught at it.
LOL!
What I find abysmal is that the extreme suffers of Trump Derangement Syndrome could care less about the prosecutorial overreach Mueller is showing. And the misconduct on the part of FBI and the DOJ. They don't get the fact that this is very bad for our system. These nefarious actions whittle away at the legal and constitutional bases of our republic. Dershowitz, as leftist a guy as you can find, gets it. I get it, many thoughtful lawyers get it, the anti-Trump media has no clue, and the Trump-Deranged could care less.
The Trump-Deranged are the equivalent of the idiots who supported Nixon regardless of his crimes.
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