Who is FBI Director James Comey kidding when he agonizes over what he wrought after sending to congressional leaders an almost unprecedented letter in our nation’s history, 11 days before a heated presidential election?
Yesterday in testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee he admitted it was “a hard choice” and that the idea of impacting the election made him “mildly nauseous.”
Mildly nauseous? What a fortified stomach lining he must have, contrasting his concerns about doing so with remaining silent as he testified, “Concealment, in my view, would have been catastrophic.” Really?
It was FBI policy not to discuss an investigation so close to a major election. Plus, the scrutiny about her email servers had already been reported publicly and dismissed with his having stated Hillary Clinton wasn’t legally culpable, albeit with Comey’s thoughts she’d behaved recklessly. Indeed, this “news” in his letter to congress of a reopened investigation wasn’t based upon additional information, but simply concerned emails discovered on former Congressman Anthony Weiner’s laptop, which had been forwarded by his then-wife, Clinton aide Huma Abedin, as a convenience so that she might more easily print them. The Abedin emails on the laptop were found only due to a totally unrelated inquiry regarding Weiner’s sexual behavior on the Internet.
Also, there was an admission by Comey in his October 28 letter that there might well be nothing new, ending with “Although the FBI cannot yet assess whether or not this material may be significant....” It was nonetheless explosive, even though the FBI didn’t want to leave the wrong impression anything unsavory might be discovered, all of which was confirmed November 6, two days before the election, in which Comey wrote “Based upon our review, we have not changed our conclusion that we expressed in July.....” However, significant damage was done to Clinton’s campaign. Many states were voting over the previous days and surely some votes had shifted during that time frame.
So, let’s briefly examine which was worse, Comey’s being “mildly nauseous” in revealing an investigation that had no smoking guns vs. the “catastrophe” if he’d done nothing.
Let’s be frank. His letter, along with Russian intrusion in Hillary’s campaign, possibly in league with Trump confederates, which has since been acknowledged as being under investigation, without question caused a shift in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin vote totals moving their electors to Trump’s column. Don’t forget these three states gave Trump a less than one percent victory, in Michigan’s case .2%, and while it’s more likely Trump’s plurality came about because some Hillary voters, shocked by Comey’s letter, decided not to vote as opposed to actually voting for Trump, the result is clear.
Donald Trump is president and Hillary is not.
Now, let’s compare it to the “catastrophe” that would have resulted if Comey hadn’t revealed an investigation that only a week later proved to be groundless, with no new or incriminating evidence against Hillary.
Somehow in Comey’s view that would’ve been more “catastrophic” than Hillary’s loss, which is laughable in light of what America and the world have witnessed with the new administration. Not to mention that, even with Comey’s rash move and with the Russian/Wikileak involvement, Hillary still managed to lure three million more voters to her side than her opponent. Yet, because of an archaic system, Trump is president and pursuing and enacting policies so many more Americans didn’t want. I’ve certainly discussed this many times and will do so again.
But this piece is to condemn Comey, because even if somehow the unlikely scenario took place that the FBI Director hadn’t revealed this specious investigation and it HAD ultimately revealed Hillary to be culpable after she was elected president, she would’ve been subject to impeachment, a horrendous process, but to many a lot less horrendous than the situation three million more Americans now find themselves in.
Had Hillary been impeached and convicted under the improbable scenario that she was guilty of something (God I sound like Rachel Maddow, repeating myself so that all will understand), even though no evidence had ever been shown that anything was hacked from her computers or servers, no information that damaged our security was ever demonstrated to be true, if she were removed from office then Tim Kaine would have become president, presumably following most of the policies he and she espoused according to the Democratic platform.
Thus, the three million more Americans would have seen those policies protected as they’d indeed voted in support of them, as opposed to their being ignored through the result of Comey’s less-”catastrophic” activity which resulted in Trump’s election, bringing forth a rightward shift to the Supreme Court and many cabinet officers working to undermine Obamacare, immigration reform and a host of other progressive undertakings.
Shame on James Comey for attempting to deflect from his nefarious and frankly unprofessional deed, in which he paints himself as some sort of moralist confronted with two difficult Solomon-like decisions, the worst of which he’d avoided.
No, James Comey, your almost unprecedented and egotistical behavior was designed, in my opinion, simply to save your ass. It’s possible you might well have believed Hillary was so far ahead, whatever you were doing wouldn’t affect the outcome. That she did win greater support of the American people shows such a thought process might have been credible. However, it was still irresponsible, selfish and the sort of thing that should make you go down in history as a bit of an idiot.
Just my opinion. And another reason why we must change our presidential election system to popular vote. Support the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact!
Michael Russnow’s website is www.ramproductionsinternational.com
Check out Russnow’s novel, Hollywood on the Danube on all Amazon sites and Kindle
Follow Michael Russnow on Twitter: www.twitter.com/kerrloy