IN FAIRNESS, THIS IS AS GOOD AS IT GETS FOR TRUMPBOTS:

In particular, Judge Sullivan took strong exception to the exact thing I have been complaining about, which is the suggestion that Flynn was somehow set up by the FBI and should never have been charged with lying to its agents. What caused this backlash was a highly questionable decision by Flynn's lawyers to inject right-wing talking points into their filing asking for leniency.  It was a wholly unnecessary move. Based on Flynn's extensive cooperation with the Office of Special Counsel, his lack of prior offenses, and his decades of (mostly) distinguished military service, the OSC was recommending no jail time.  Based on the sentencing guidelines, which called for a term of incarceration of 0-6 months, there was a very real prospect that Flynn would pay a fine, do some community service and get a period of supervised probation, but otherwise walk away unscathed.

In an indication of how divorced the Republicans have become from reality, several right-wing media outlets spent Monday evening speculating that Judge Sullivan might even throw out Flynn's guilty plea entirely because he would ultimately agree that Flynn had been entrapped.  That did not happen.

Instead, Sullivan tore into Flynn and his lawyers. He almost bizarrely put Flynn under oath before demanding that he admit his guilt and deny all the right-wing talking points which have recently been repeated by the president himself. He forced Flynn to admit that he knew he was wrong to lie to the FBI and that there had been no misconduct in how his interviews were conducted. He acknowledged that any possible wrongdoing then-Deputy FBI director Andrew McCabe and counterintelligence official Peter Strzok may have committed in other areas had no bearing on his responsibility to be truthful to federal agents.

Judge Sullivan openly questioned whether Flynn could have been charged with treason for operating as an undeclared agent of a foreign power while serving as National Security Advisor, suggested that Flynn had dishonored the flag that was displayed in the courtroom, and said "arguably you sold your country out."

He also asked Flynn's lawyers how their filing was consistent with the client taking responsibility for his actions and advised them that they might want to delay sentencing since he was not inclined to let Flynn avoid incarceration.

On Saturday, Fox News host Jeanine Pirro engaged in a bit of wishful fantasizing.

Earlier that week, Michael Flynn's attorneys seemed to imply that he was tricked into lying to the FBI. In response, the judge in Flynn's case asked for more information about Flynn's interview. Pirro wagered that the judge, Emmet G. Sullivan, might blow up special counsel Robert S. Mueller III's entire case.

She hailed Sullivan as "a jurist unafraid of the swamp, a judge who has a track record of calling out prosecutorial misconduct, a man who does not tolerate injustice or abuse of power." She suggested Flynn's guilty plea might be thrown out: "The amazing part of it is, if he does it, then the house of cards of Robert Mueller falls."

That's decidedly not what happened Tuesday. In fact, quite the opposite.

At Flynn's sentencing, Sullivan made a point of making sure that Flynn stated (and restated) that he lied to the FBI, that he knew it was wrong to do so and that he accepted responsibility. Sullivan asked Flynn whether he knew that lying to the FBI was illegal, and Flynn said, "I was aware." The judge gave Flynn several chances to withdraw his guilty plea, and Flynn opted to proceed.

On Monday, Mueller's office released redacted notes of the FBI's interview with Flynn, revealing what exactly the former national security adviser lied about.

Flynn told the FBI that in his conversations with Kislyak during the presidential transition, he did not attempt to influence Russia's vote on a UN Security Council resolution concerning Israeli settlements. He admitted in his charging document in Mueller's case that a senior member of the Trump transition team directed him to contact Kislyak to learn where Russia stood and urge them to vote against the resolution.

Flynn also told the FBI that he did not ask Kislyak to refrain from escalating tensions in response to steps taken by Barack Obama over Moscow's election meddling, which included expelling alleged Russian spies and closing two Russian diplomatic compounds in the U.S. Flynn later admitted that, acting on behalf of a senior member of Trump's transition team, he contacted Kislyak to ask that Russia show restraint. Vladimir Putin ultimately elected not to escalate the situation, a move Trump called "very smart."

Though he admitted to violating lobbying laws by failing to register as a foreign agent on behalf of Turkey for hundreds of thousands of dollars of consulting work, Flynn was not charged for those crimes and has attempted to receive leniency from the Mueller investigation by offering extensive cooperation.

The Trump Foundation agreed Tuesday to dissolve itself under an agreement reached with the New York attorney general's office, the result of a major civil lawsuit alleging that the charity violated state law.

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