Insubordination Memo: Fill & Download for Free

According to the Washington Post, just hours ago, 31 sources indicate that Trump fired Comey because of the Russia probe. Among other things, last week Comey asked for additional resources for the probe - and he told members of Congress this before he was fired. Sessions and the deputy AG had wanted a “heads-up” from Comey on what he would testify on May 3. When he refused, Trump considered it an act of insubordination. Trump is reported to have screamed at the TV when Comey was testifying. On Monday, Trump and Sessions asked the deputy AG to come to the White House for a meeting. The next day, the deputy AG wrote his memo asking for Comey to be fired. Whether or not he managed to actually interfere with the probe, he certainly tried to. We should remember that the 1st article of impeachment against Nixon was for obstruction of justice. Oh, and I forgot, the Wall Street Journal is reporting that 3 weeks ago Comey saw evidence of collusion and then started getting daily briefings on the probe, rather than the weekly ones he had been getting. There’s more, but I’ll leave it at that.

Sure — if you are Chairman of the Board, lead investor, or a major lender considering what to do about an uncured default. I would consider the signaling, though. It could suggest that you are considering whether to oust him or withhold consent for a major company decision, and will use his answer to decide or to paper the record for when you do so.For anyone else that would be a strange request. A cofounder would be expected to go over this sort of thing in person instead of a formal memo, and would be expected to contribute to the explanation and go-forward plan. For anyone else that sort of demand sounds like insubordination, except perhaps by the CFO or somebody tasked with preparing budgets, financial proformas, and pitch decks.It may be reasonable to suggest that the company needs a written revenue plan as a matter of management discipline. It also would be reasonable for employees and shareholders to inquire informally what is going on, and ask if they can see the financials. But that’s different than telling the CEO what to do.

Imagine that. A member of the House or Senate who is working with the White House with an occupant of the same party. Holy crap! What is the country coming to?Because we never ever saw any of that when Obama was in is the White House. Democrats like Pelosi and Reid routinely worked against him right?Nunes is going to release the memo that many feel is going to paint the actions of political appointees at the top of the DOJ and FBI in poor light. These are Obama era political executives tipping their hand on the scales of justice for political ends.Political use by a small number of high level appointees in the DOJ and FBI and misuse of a FISA warrant for “wiretapping” a political opponent?Previous generations of Democrats would be all over this kind of very inappropriate and illegal action within the Federal government. What happened to them. What is it that tempts them to turn a blind eye to abuse of power? Political expediency and power corrupts.From the Wall Street Journal:The Federal Bureau of Investigation is making a last-ditch effort to block the release of a House Intelligence Committee memo detailing the bureau’s behavior during the 2016 election. This is all the more reason to let Americans see it.In an unusual public statement Wednesday, the bureau objected that it had only “a limited opportunity to review” the memo the day before the House voted Monday to release it. The statement added that the FBI had “grave concerns about material omissions of fact that fundamentally impact the memo’s accuracy.”This is really something. The FBI knows what’s in the memo because it has long known what the House committee was seeking to examine. For months it refused to provide access to those documents until director Christopher Wray and the Justice Department faced a contempt of Congress vote. If they now object to the way the House construes the facts, they should have been more cooperative from the start.Note the FBI’s language about “material omissions” rather than errors of fact. Until this statement the FBI was pleading damage to “national security.” Now that rationale has given way to the claim that the House is omitting key details to reach judgments that the FBI apparently disagrees with. If Mr. Wray wants to fill in those omissions, he can always ask President Trump to declassify more documents to provide a more complete record. We’d love to see them, and Mr. Trump should give that transparency a boost even if Mr. Wray doesn’t request it.The FBI’s public statement appears to be an act of insubordination after Mr. Wray and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein tried and failed to get the White House to block the memo’s release. Their public protest appears intended to tarnish in advance whatever information the memo contains. The public is getting to see amid this brawl how the FBI plays politics, and it isn’t a good look.Neither Congress nor the White House can afford to back down on the memo amid this kind of political hardball. To do so would make the FBI an agency accountable only to itself, as it was in the days of J. Edgar Hoover.In response to the FBI broadside, Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes disclosed that “it’s clear that top officials used unverified information in a court document to fuel a counter-intelligence investigation during an American political campaign.” Perhaps this is what the FBI really doesn’t want the public to see, but Americans need to know if the country’s premier law enforcement agency abused its power to influence a presidential election.An Unaccountable FBI