K asks if we will see the full Mueller report.
Yes, I do think we will see the full report. It may not happen as soon as people would like, but we will see it.
There are too many legal means available for securing the report, and too many people know the contents.
I wrote this thread about the nature of the current Constitutional showdown, and how the law is on the side of getting the report.
There are now is several pending lawsuits for various reasons from people who have the right to see the report. For example, we have a thing called the Freedom of Information Act. (FOIA) Not surprisingly, news organizations will sue under the FOIA for access.
The judge in the Washington Post FOIA case, though, denied a preliminary injunction ordering Barr to make the report public. “We don’t know exactly what is going to be produced by the government on Thursday,” said the judge. “I would hope the government is going to be as transparent as it can be.”
The House, too, is waiting to see what is redacted. Until we see what Barr tries to pull, we won’t know how to proceed. As a commenter said on my other thread, you have to see the target before you can take aim.
Remember all those redactions in the court transcripts? Like, what the heck was Manafort and Konstantin Kilimnik doing in those meetings:
The court that conducted the Manafort hearing controls when the redactions can be removed.
In the Washington Post / FIOA case, one of the Mueller team lawyers said the redactions cannot be uncovered yet. One reason was that they pertain to investigations still going on.
Judge Amy Berman will certainly release the transcripts without redactions when she can. Will we learn everything eventually? Yes. Will we learn everything Thursday? No.
Are the delays frustrating? Look at it this way: The wheels turns lowly for exactly the same reason Trump is having trouble turning this country into an autocracy. Our government is complex, multi-faceted, with power spread out over three branches.
From an essay in Authoritarianism in America on why it’s not easy to make the US an autocracy, Prof. David Strauss said: “We have a “a large, diverse society with democratic traditions and a strong civil society. . .”
Things just don’t happen fast.
When we have a president trying to turn the U.S. into an autocracy, that’s a good thing.
When we want to see the unreacted support now and a government official stonewalls us, it’s really annoying. But keep the faith. Democracy, with all it’s annoyances, is worth it.
