This is what I expect and am not disappointed. It could be a lot worse...

[DemocratSinceBirth]

The Department of Justice “determined not to make a traditional prosecutorial judgement.”

“The Special Counsel states that ‘while this report does not conclude that the President committed a crime, it also does not exonerate him.’”

No clean bill of legal health.

[Drunken Irishman]

1. This is about the best case scenario for Trump...

If, a year ago, anyone floated the idea that the Mueller Report would determine, basically, there wasn't enough evidence either way, we'd all laugh at that fact and dismiss it. Trump wasn't going to be unequivocally exonerated by Mueller, but basically saying you couldn't determine either way is basically the best outcome for the President.

This is a monumental victory for Trump.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

4. Seems like there is something for everybody.

I never bought into the notion Mueller would indict him or clearly say he committed impeachable offenses.

[Drunken Irishman]

5. What's in it for Democrats?

Because right now, this is the headline:

Link to tweet

This is nothing short of a massive victory for Trump.

Mueller couldn't conclude that 1) he obstructed justice and 2) he colluded with Russia. His only determination was that they couldn't conclude he didn't, either.

That's a grand slam home run for Trump. We didn't even get a 'while evidence suggests Trump's campaign colluded with Russia..."

We basically got, "err, uh, sorry, we can't say one way or the other."

It took two years to draw that conclusion.

[uponit7771]

2. From the DOJ down to the district level it is !!!!

[Drunken Irishman]

3. And, more importantly, in the court of public opinion...

This is a grand slam home run for Trump.

[maryellen99]

6. Trump is going to be re-elected in a 40+ state landslide nt

[Drunken Irishman]

8. No. But the Democrats hitched their wagon to this investigation...

And it blew up in their faces. Trump will still remain unpopular but the Democrats will take a hit, too.

[TwilightZone]

10. Well, no.

Trump is unlikely to win any states he didn't win in 2016, in any event, and he's solidly underwater in a few that he won. This isn't going to drastically change anything.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

15. I'll make it easy. Hillary won twenty states. What states do we lose that she won in 2016?

[DemocratSinceBirth]

13. I'll make it easy. Hillary won twenty states. What states do we lose that she won in 2016?

[maryellen99]

16. I don't know Maybe Nevada,Virginia due to the abortion outage from the right nt

[DemocratSinceBirth]

19. That's two

And Nevada just elected a Democratic senator, a Democratic governor, and I believe a Democratic state house.

As for Virginia Tim Kaine won his 2018 senate race by sixteen points.

[Windy City Charlie]

7. All of the Republicans

are suddenly going to say Mueller ran a perfect investigation, even though they spent the last 2 years trying to discredit it.

[LincolnRossiter]

9. If Barr's letter actually accurately convey's Mueller's conclusions, this was a homerun for Trump.

I can imagine ways in which it could be worse, but none that are realistic. Either we misread Mueller and his team or DoJ's standards for what constitutes criminal activity and even impropriety are all kinds of f*cked up.

[mucifer]

11. So it's kinda like what Comey did to Hillary. Exonerated, but implying there may be more sorta.

It's almost like they had to keep it equal with a kind of "both sides do it" conclusion.

This really sucks!!!

[mvd]

12. I'm disappointed because after all this time it basically says nothing

At least from what is out. Have to wait for the full report.

[mucifer]

14. You know there is no taking back this "conclusion" that treason is ok

[mvd]

17. Some things just seem so obvious

The report unexpectedly seemed afraid to go too high. I mean how can Trump be surrounded by all these crooks and not be one? Trump IS a crook.

[mucifer]

18. We know that. Apparently Mueller isn't the patriot we thought he was.

[Awsi Dooger]

20. This was always the most likely outcome

Trump is a life long liar and cheat but given 50+ years high level practice he knows how to conceal just enough, and who to surround himself with to make sure nobody squeals, at least not the ones who could destroy him.

Minus a damning video/audio there simply wasn't going to be enough for Mueller to find. Decades from now we'll know many more devastating details but in recent years anyone hitching hopes to Rachel Maddow and her nightly investigations was receiving an absurdly inflated view of Trump's vulnerability. I realize I wasn't popular for emphasizing that repeatedly but I trust my big picture handicapping instincts above day-to-day obsession, which is the worst possible approach toward clarity.

Trump is going to scream vindication and witch hunt. His approval rating will slowly climb. That is another prediction I made for 2+ years. We just have to hope he continues to implode when needed, so that approval doesn't go above 43 or worst case 44% on 538. I think Trump wins at 44% or above.

My frustration is that we did not take full advantage when his approval was in that 35-38% range late in 2017. Voter registration drives should have been the priority every minute of every day. Tom Steyer should have devoted $100 million to registration instead of the moronic impeachment commercials. At bottom for an opposing president you can lock in voters who will think blue for life. It reminds me of when I bet sports for a living in Las Vegas and there was a period of chaos for a specific athlete or team. You had to ignore what everything else was screaming about. That is too obvious and is already being gobbled up. But there were always sidelight opportunities that weren't the most obvious, like season win totals or future odds on a rival team, something impacted by the chaos. Within a couple of days people would be bemoaning that they didn't think of that. I would smile. I did. I had those tickets.

Now we have to do it the hard way...ousting a presidential incumbent whose party has been in power only one term. Yikes. That was always normalcy once 2016 was lost.