Russiagate in the Dog Days

It's just brutally hot here in the D.C. region (and even worse in D.C. than down here in the Slower Maryland) and getting hotter. I don't think anyone has any energy left for Russiagate, but it here goes anyway.

From Peter Svab at ET, Flynn’s Lawyers: Mueller Team Wanted False Testimony, Possibly Retaliated When Rebuked

Prosecutors from the team of special counsel Robert Mueller wanted Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn to testify to something that isn’t true, Flynn’s lawyers said. When he refused, they tried to label him a co-conspirator in a case where they previously said he was only a witness.

A federal judge denied the prosecutors’ move, saying the government didn’t present enough evidence to introduce Flynn’s statement as one of a co-conspirator.

Flynn, former national security adviser to President Donald Trump, is expected to face a light sentence after pleading guilty to lying to the FBI and after extensively cooperating with the Mueller team and the Justice Department. He was also expected to testify on another case of making false statements on foreign lobbying registration forms.

In his November 2017 guilty plea, he said that the forms submitted by lawyers for his now-defunct lobbying company, Flynn Intel Group (FIG), contained false and misleading statements. The prosecutors, however, recently asked him to testify that he signed those forms knowing about the falsities and intending for them.

He refused.

“Mr. Flynn cannot give that testimony because it is not true,” Flynn’s recently hired lawyers, Jesse Binnall, Sidney Powell, and William Hodes, said in a July 8 court filing.

Things aren't going so well for the Mueller team in the Flynn persecution.

Roger, Roger, Roger, Roger Stone avoids jail, banned from major social media after judge rules Trump friend breached gag order in Mueller case (The Peacock).

A federal judge on Tuesday banned Republican operative Roger Stone from posting anything at all on major social media platforms after ruling that the longtime confidant of President Donald Trump violated an already strict gag order in his criminal case.

Judge Amy Berman Jackson during a hearing in Washington, D.C., district court walked through a litany of Stone’s recent posts from his Instagram account that appeared to breach his order not to speak publicly about his case.

Jackson barred Stone from posting on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter — but she decided not to revoke Stone’s bail bond or hold him in contempt for violating her order.
“It seems he is determined to make himself the subject of the story,” Jackson said of Stone, according to BuzzFeed News.

It seems to my simple mind, that the judge has no business limiting his speech. Whether  he helps himself or hurts himself, why should she intervene? I expect the government to drop this nonsense case at some point.

Ellen Ratner

Jim Hoft at Gateway Pundit, Lawsuit Outs Reporter Ellen Ratner as Source for Seth Rich Information

Lawflog.com reported:

Ellen Ratner relayed information from Wikileaks founder Julian Assange to Texas businessman Ed Butowsky regarding Seth Rich’s role in transferring emails to Wikileaks, according to an amended lawsuit that I filed this morning on behalf of Mr. Butowsky.
Although Ms. Ratner is by no means a Republican or a conservative, and her role in the Seth Rich saga (like that of journalist Sy Hersh) obliterates the Democratic narrative that right-wing zealots fabricated the story about Mr. Rich leaking emails from the Democratic National Committee.
Mr. Rich, a DNC employee, was murdered in Washington, D.C. on July 10, 2016, and the murder remains unsolved. Here’s an excerpt from the amended suit (“RCH” stands for “Russian Collusion Hoax”):
45. Mr. Butowsky stumbled into the RCH crosshairs after Ellen Rattner [sic], a news analyst for Fox News and the White House correspondent for Talk Media News, contacted him in the Fall of 2016 about a meeting she had with Mr. Assange. Ms. Rattner’s brother, the late Michael Rattner, was an attorney who had represented Mr. Assange. According to Ms. Rattner, she made a stop in London during a return flight from Berlin, and she met with Mr. Assange for approximately six hours in the Ecuadorean embassy. Ms. Rattner said Mr. Assange told her that Seth Rich and his brother, Aaron, were responsible for releasing the DNC emails to Wikileaks. Ms. Rattner said Mr. Assange wanted the information relayed to Seth’s parents, as it might explain the motive for Seth’s murder.