"OKAY, I WROTE THIS FOR USA TODAY right after the Barr press conference, but they don’t want to run it because it doesn’t incorporate the Mueller Report.
Since I don’t have time to read and digest the report this afternoon (I’m teaching two 2-hour classes back to back), I’m just posting it here. Enjoy!"
"BILL BARR: ADULT IN THE ROOM--Glenn Harlan Reynolds
Bill Barr’s press conference regarding the Mueller Report release was notable for both style and substance.
On style, he reminded us that in an age of shrieking media hysteria and out-of-control twitter-pols, there is still a place for stolid, stodgy, rule-following bureaucrats.
Standing at the lectern with his lieutenants behind him, he calmly and carefully explained what was in the report, what had been redacted and why, and what the applicable laws and rules were.
He didn’t play to the media, or to the social media.
In tone and manner he was, well, boring.
It was refreshing.On substance, he made clear that, after two years of investigation, thousands of subpoenas, and endless media speculation, the “Russian collusion” story was, as some of us had noted all along, a story about nothing.
No member of Trump’s campaign — and in fact, no American anywhere — colluded with the Russians to influence the campaign.
...So no collusion, and no obstruction, and no serious grounds for complaining about the redactions. No doubt some politicians, eager to keep their base heated up, will try to pretend otherwise, and some cable news channels and media outlets, desperate for viewers and clicks, will go along.
But normal people should be pleased and relieved that there was no collusion, even as they should be angry that a huge chunk of our political class seriously maintained that the President of the United States was a Russian puppet.
That claim, based more on a desire to undo the 2016 election than on any actual evidence, was a poisonous corruption of our political discourse, and those involved should be — but won’t be — ashamed.
They should, however, be ignored in the future.--Posted by Glenn Reynolds
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