Flynn

Why aren’t Republicans outraged by Flynn’s pro-Russia activities?

I have been following several different threads on Facebook and other online places about the Mueller investigation. I am not surprised that there are many people defending Trump and his people, or that they try to undermine Mueller or make light or deny that there was anything illegal.

But what I am stunned at is that I have not read a single comment by any of these folks, presumably conservatives and/or Republicans, who will admit there was anything wrong with the acts that brought this up in the first place.

Even if there was no collusion during the election campaign, it is clear that Trump’s team, before he was president but during the transition period, bargained with Russia to undermine official US policy, one that was strongly supported by both parties, to punish Russia for hacking in the USA.

Apparently, this is all fine with these pro-Americans who up until a year ago thought Putin and Russia were evil.

This post from Lawfare summarizes it:

“The most important revelation here is that contrary to Cobb’s statement Friday morning, Flynn is saying clearly that he was not a rogue actor but was operating at the behest of the presidential transition team. He states that a “very senior member of the Presidential Transition Team,” a “senior official of the Presidential Transition Team” and “senior members of the Presidential Transition Team” were involved in directing his actions. The stipulated facts also make clear that Flynn reported back to the transition on his conversations with Kislyak.

“Second, take a moment to remember the context in which Flynn’s underlying conduct took place: He and apparently the Trump transition team were working to undermine U.S. foreign policy goals endorsed by both parties. In December 2016, President Obama authorized sanctions against Russia in response to cyber-enabled election interference. He did so with broad bipartisan support to deter such activity in the future against the U.S. and its allies. The shared bipartisan—even nonpartisan—goal was to protect foundational elements of democracy and legitimacy. To the extent that there was mainstream criticism of the action, it was for being too weak, not for being too aggressive with respect to Russia.”