Mueller also had accountability, but evaded it

Speaking from a Justice Department podium this morning, Special Counsel Robert Mueller all but reconfirmed that the sitting president of the United States is a crook, and urged Congress to undertake impeachment proceedings accordingly.

Said Mueller in words that require no interpretation: "If we had had confidence that the president clearly did not commit a crime, we would have said so. We did not, however, make a determination as to whether the president did commit a crime" of either obstruction or conspiracy— not only because the Trump administration's many manifest obstructions of the investigation made a solid finding of conspiracy (collusion) impossible (which Mueller's report makes clear), but also because Justice Department rules forbid the special counsel's office from indicting a crooked president (even if his obstructions are manifest).

Hence Mueller's undisguised recommendation that impeachment proceedings should commence. As the NY Times paraphrased the special counsel's advice: "[Mueller] said that while Justice Department policy prohibits charging a sitting president with a crime, the Constitution provides for another process to formally accuse a sitting president of wrongdoing — a clear reference to the ability of Congress to begin impeachment proceedings."

Would Mueller advance such an argument if he believed the president, as Bill Barr and other Trumpers insist, had committed no crimes? That of course would be both preposterous and outrageous — two characteristics that Muellerian prudence has never allowed. And yet Trump and his loyalists persist in arguing that Mueller's report cleared the president of conspiracy and obstruction of justice allegations — which is both preposterous and disingenuously outrageous.

I remain disappointed that Bob Mueller refused to go further in his report on Trump's criminal activities. His defense to such disappointment is that going further effectively would have constituted an indictment. Yet in the absence of an official indictment, Trump would then have to defend himself against little but legal phantoms, which would have been unfair of Mueller — and Mueller is anything but jurisprudentially unfair.

It seems to me, however, that a fact-finding mission such as Mueller's should lay out whatever facts it finds and, just as important, whatever conclusions it reaches internally. In leaving the latter undone, Mueller has left all final determinations of Trump's rank criminality in the hands of a dead-end Congress, and permitted Trump, Barr & Assoc. to sing a foul song of "discovered" innocence.