"The Special Counsel's investigation did not find that the Trump campaign or anyone associated with it conspired or coordinated with Russia in its efforts to influence the 2016 U.S. presidential election. As the report states: '[T]he investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.'"Mueller made clear that he not only considered conspiracy charges in connection with the election but also looked into whether there was some sort of coordination between Trump and the Russians, which Mueller defined as an "agreement -- tacit or express -- between the Trump Campaign and the Russian government on election interference." Mueller did not find any such agreement. "The evidence does not establish that the President was involved in an underlying crime related to Russian election interference," Mueller wrote, according to Barr.
© Reuters/Kyle GrillotThe AP subtly arranged its headline for maximum effect, while the BBC had passed on to the "acceptance" stage of grieving.
Most pundits clung to the gray area implied by "evidence not sufficient.
The Young Turks' Cenk Uygur lamented that Mueller had focused on the wrong things the whole time - it wasn't about the election, dummies, it was about before and after the election!
A dour-looking Rep. Maxine Waters suggested that Trump had actually hypnotized his "sycophants" by repeating the "no collusion" line. "This is not the end of anything!" the congresswoman defiantly told Joy Reid. "There's so much that needs to be - you know - taken a look at this point."
Rep. Adam Schiff, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, wouldn't let go of his impeachment dreams, demanding the release of all the evidence Mueller collected. "We know that the special counsel was not permitted to indict a sitting president, and we ought to see what evidence he produced," he told ABC's George Stephanopoulos, threatening to sue the Justice Department if it didn't cough up the goods.
House Judicial Committee chair Jerry Nadler thought that was a great idea, announcing his committee would haul Barr in to testify to exactly what he meant with that "does not exonerate" line the media chose to latch onto.
Sen. Ron Wyden blamed Barr for letting Trump get away, suggesting Mueller had dropped the ball by not indicting the president for obstruction himself - evidence be damned.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer also released a statement demanding the release of the full report along with "underlying documentation." After a 19-month investigation, there was surely a needle in this haystack, and the American people deserved to have a look.
Perhaps the best response came from former FBI director James Comey, whose firing triggered the appointment of Mueller as special counsel in the first place. What did it all mean? Why are we here? When a manufactured conspiracy falls in the forest, does it make a sound?
The Palestinian resistance movement Hamas has rejected Israel's claim that it launched a rocket which hit a house north of Tel Aviv and wounded seven settlers.See also: Israel launches another round of airstrikes against Gaza, in response to one rocket strike (which Hamas denies firing)
"No one from the resistance movements, including Hamas, has an interest in firing rockets from the Gaza Strip towards the enemy," a Hamas official, who asked not to be named, told AFP on Monday.
He added that the same message had been conveyed to Egypt, which intervened to broker a ceasefire and prevent Israel from launching another war on Gaza after tensions escalated last year.
His remarks evoked the possibility that the rocket strike may have been caused by "bad weather."
Earlier on Monday, Israeli authorities said a long-range rocket launched from the Gaza Strip had struck Mishmeret, a settlement north of Tel Aviv, wounding seven settlers.
Israel's military said the rocket was fired by Hamas from the Rafah area in the south of Gaza.
The incident had forced Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to cut short his trip to Washington as he pledged to "respond with force" to the rocket attack.
The attack came a day after Israeli warplanes bombed the besieged enclave ahead of the anniversary of Gaza fence protests at the weekend.
Writing in The Telegraph, Sammy Wilson, the DUP's Brexit spokesperson insisted that his party would not let "the PM or the Remainer horde in Parliament to bully us into backing a toxic Brexit deal."
Wilson argues that May's withdrawal agreement as it stands means "no Brexit" for the UK and is not averse to a long extension to article 50 of up to a year.
Comment: In addition to the possibility of the S-300 deployment, Moscow has confirmed that Russian military planes have landed in Venezuela: At some point, perhaps the citizens of the West will recognize that Russia has been acting as a stabilizing force around the world. This is precisely why the country has been targeted by the Empire of Chaos.