US Politics Mega-thread - Page 9944

On February 20 2018 04:51 GreenHorizons wrote:
At this point I almost hope Mueller hid that he has a terminal illness that is going to suddenly kill him right before some critical moment so we can get some good wild theories about the investigation instead of the boring stuff we've been getting.

Not that I wish ill on the man, but they seem about equally inevitable (death and more wild theories).

On Friday, Judge Emmet Sullivan issued an order in United States v. Flynn that, while widely unnoticed, reveals something fascinating: A motion by Michael Flynn to withdraw his guilty plea based on government misconduct is likely in the works.
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To recap: On November 30, 2017, prosecutors working for Mueller charged former Trump national security advisor Flynn with lying to FBI agents. The following day, Flynn pled guilty before federal judge Rudolph Contreras. Less than a week later — and without explanation — Flynn’s case was reassigned to Judge Emmet G. Sullivan.

One of Sullivan’s first orders of business was to enter a standing order, on December 12, 2017, directing “the government to produce to defendant in a timely manner – including during plea negotiations – any evidence in its possession that is favorable to defendant and material either to defendant’s guilt or punishment.” Sullivan’s standing order further directed the government, if it “has identified any information which is favorable to the defendant but which the government believes not to be material,” to “submit such information to the Court for in camera review.”

Sullivan enters identical standing orders as a matter of course in all of his criminal cases, as he explained in a 2016 Cardozo Law Review article: “Following the Stevens case, I have issued a standing Brady Order for each criminal case on my docket, updating it in reaction to developments in the law.” A Brady order directs the government to disclose all exculpatory evidence to defense counsel, as required by Brady v. Maryland. The Stevens case, of course, is the government’s corrupt prosecution of the late senator Ted Stevens—an investigation and prosecution which, as Sullivan put it, “were permeated by the systematic concealment of significant exculpatory evidence. . . .”

While the December standing order represented Sullivan’s normal practice, as both McCarthy and York noted, Flynn had already pled guilty. In his plea agreement, Flynn agreed to “forego the right to any further discovery or disclosures of information not already provided at the time of the entry of Flynn’s guilty plea.” On Wednesday, however, the attorneys in the Flynn case presented the court an agreed-upon protective order governing the use of the material — including sensitive material — the special counsel’s office provides Flynn. This indicates Mueller’s team will not fight Sullivan’s standing order based on the terms of Flynn’s plea agreement.
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Friday’s order suggests Sullivan is ready to do just that. That order consisted of an updated standing order detailing the government’s obligations under Brady. On the surface, Friday’s order seems inconsequential, but in comparing the December 12, 2017, version to the February 16, 2018, version, one substantive change stood out.

It was subtle, but significant given the posture of this case: The revised version added one sentence specifying that the government’s obligation to produce evidence material either to the defendant’s guilt or punishment “includes producing, during plea negotiations, any exculpatory evidence in the government’s possession.”

Last week, the Sierra Club announced the latest U.S. coal plant to close: FirstEnergy’s Pleasants Power Station in West Virginia. It’s No. 268 in a long line of U.S. coal plants that have shut down since 2010, and among several to suspend operations this month.

The environmental organization lauded the closure as a victory in its Beyond Coal campaign and an affirmation that coal continues to lose when pitted against other fuel sources.

The latest Sustainable Energy in America Factbook from Bloomberg New Energy Finance and the Business Council for Sustainable Energy noted that the steady march of coal plant closures did slow somewhat in 2017, with just six plants closing compared to the previous year’s eight. But BNEF expects the closure trend to resume next year, with nearly as much plant capacity set to shut down 2018 as during the 2015 peak, when the coal industry dropped 15 gigawatts.

Overall, the downward slide for coal continues. In addition to the West Virginia plant, the Sierra Club this month announced the phase-out of Luminant Energy’s Big Brown plant in Texas and the drawdown of coal burning at Talen Energy’s Brunner Island plant in Pennsylvania. American Electric Power also unveiled plans to invest in over 8 gigawatts of solar and wind, as well as to reduce its power plant emissions 60 percent below 2000 levels by 2030.

“Our customers want us to partner with them to provide cleaner energy and new technologies, while continuing to provide reliable, affordable energy. Our investors want us to protect their investment in our company, deliver attractive returns and manage climate-related risk,” said Nick Akins, AEP’s CEO, in announcing the plan. “This long-term strategy allows us to do both.”

In November, Charles Patton, AEP's executive vice president of external affairs, said the future for coal plants “is very limited.”

“You evolve and you learn, and technology causes you to look at the world differently, and that’s what you have to do -- you can’t get stuck in the past or with the status quo,” he told Greentech Media. “We’ve learned that and we’re moving forward.”

That perspective puts Patton in the global majority. The United Kingdom announced in January that it would close all its remaining coal plants by 2025, with most already headed for shutdown. Germany followed suit this month. China is also working to wean itself off its cornerstone fuel.

The Trump administration, however, remains an outlier. Riding into office waving “Trump Digs Coal” signs, the president continues to argue that his administration is bringing back the jobs and prosperity that U.S. coal country has lost.

In his first State of the Union address, Trump declared that “we have ended the war on American energy, and we have ended the war on beautiful, clean coal.”

According to the Sierra Club, though, more coal capacity closed in the first 45 days of 2018 than in Obama’s entire first term.

The organization, which has made it part of its mission to shutter coal plants, said it's on track to close the country’s 262 remaining plants over the next decade. So far, the Sierra Club says efforts to close coal plants have prevented over 7,000 premature deaths and stopped over 120,000 asthma attacks, largely in marginalized communities overburdened by pollution.

Blair Zimmerman, a former coal miner and current county commissioner in Greene County, Pennsylvania, where the 4 West Mine closed in January, said the Trump administration hasn’t made any measurable impacts in that rural area.

"There's not been any significant change in the industry since he's taken over,” he told CNN.

According to preliminary numbers from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, since Trump took office, the coal industry has gained fewer than 1,000 jobs. Coal employment has taken a nosedive with the loss of nearly 40,000 jobs since 2012, after natural gas emerged as a cheaper and less carbon-polluting fuel compared to coal.

After the release of the BNEF Factbook, Rachel Luo, the senior analyst for U.S. utilities and market reform at BNEF, said, “For coal there’s more of a long-term story of displacement by cheaper natural gas and renewable energy.” The percentage of U.S. electricity generated from natural gas eclipsed coal in 2016.

The Sierra Club echoed that argument, warning that more closures loom.

“No matter what Trump says, coal simply cannot compete when grassroots activists, the public, and the market all prefer clean energy,” said Mary Anne Hitt, the Beyond Coal campaign's director, after the announcement that the Big Brown plant in Texas would close.

On February 20 2018 06:01 xDaunt wrote:
The curious case of Michael Flynn just got more interesting:



Source.

So here's what this means for the non-attorneys out there. Judge Sullivan, when he took over the case, ordered Mueller to produce all exculpatory information in his possession to Flynn's attorneys or, in the alternative, to produce such material to the court for Judge Sullivan to look at it first (in camera review). Apparently Judge Sullivan has looked at some material and is ordering that it be produced to Flynn's attorneys subject to a protective order. The protective order means that Flynn's attorneys will have to keep it confidential (ie we won't get to see what was produced). The general stink here is that Mueller and the FBI withheld exculpatory evidence from Flynn's team when negotiating the plea deal, which may result in Flynn having his guilty plea thrown out.

On February 20 2018 06:13 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:


"Greatness" doesn't seem to be well-defined, although the most interesting thing I found:

Republicans ranked Obama as 16th and Trump as 40th.

Name Republican Democrat Independent/Other Conservative Liberal Moderate	
 Obama 16          6             12                22    6           11
 Trump   40        44             43               40    44           44

On February 20 2018 06:25 Introvert wrote:



Here's the McCarthy piece that is referenced. He points out, as he often does, that the FBI seemed to believe that any false statements made by Flynn were honest mistakes.

It's more muted than the Federalist item.

On February 20 2018 06:47 On_Slaught wrote:


Lying to the FBI is the smallest of Flynn's legal troubles. He backs out of the deal and he is looking at significant prison time on the more serious charges. Unless ofc he expects a Trump pardon.