that has a strongly pretextural feel to it.an't imagine that's one reason why the president believes mueller couldn't be trusted. it doesn't color the president in a favorable light which means maybe on the more central evidence that the special counsel may be considering obstruction, i think the president is considering himself to do no favor and losing the benefit of the doubt in the course of the investigative inquiry. that's one way this could play you ever favorably for the president and introduces awkwardness between the president and mr. mueller over the terms of a purported interview. >> what you just said about the thinness of allegations that were apparently going to be used to justify the firing of mr. mueller, it's the second time tonight we've heard a distinguished legal mind describe that has having a pretextural feel. what's wrong with opening up a plainly thin, transparent, untrue justification for doing something. if the president has it within his power to fire anybody he wants to, why does it matter if he wou

mueller, it's the second time we heard tonight that having been described as having a pretextural feelwhat's wrong with offering up a plainly stupid or thin transparent or obviously untrue justification for doing something? if the president has it in his power to fire anyone he wants to, why does it matter he would offer a plainly false reason for doing so? >> one is intent. that's one element of an obstruction case. and if it's pretextual, it focuses more on what his intent might have been. it reminds me of the firing of jim comey, which was that the president was disturbed by the way he treated hillary clinton. then it turned out that wasn't the reason at all. i don't think that, again, did much for his communicating successfully that he had any sort of, you know, genuinely law enforcement centered intent as opposed to a self-protective intent. >> and a self-protective intent, of course, is a big part of understanding what obstruction is versus lawful action. bob bauer, former white house council to president obama, thank you for joining us on short notice. >> a pleasure, thank you.

all of these reasons given could be pretextural reasons for why he wanted to do it. it's like throwing spaghetti on the wall here. if you can look at the person and figure out what your true intent was, all this does add up to that. you can build a case on the contextual clues. you need not have the actual statement that says i intended to do this in a nefarious way. that is not the only way to be success in an obstruction of justice case. it helpful. it's probably why there's a negotiation with his attorneys about what he's going to say and not going to say but it does not fully immunize him if he doesn't make that embasxplicit statemen. >> he does have the fire to fire the special counsel. he can tell the person in charge at the justice department. why would this be obstruction of justice if he has that power? >> if you look at what's happening so far, if you look at his power to fire the special counsel, i don't think it's just about obstruction of justice. i mean, if you look at the pattern of activity, that's one issue you got to focus on. if i'm his lawyers and